148. MRI

I assumed that as I’d just had 2 scans that I wouldn’t need the breast MRI before my op.  I knew I’d have one before THE big op but not this time.  Then the letter came.  Day prior to op.   Someone, somewhere must have requested it. 

I don’t sweat it.  Why bother.  I’ve heard it’s not nice but what I don’t know won’t worry me.

The morning of the MRI, we’re up at the crack of dawn.  Since R’s ‘rethinking’ of his role, I’m more upfront about what I want.  I don’t want to go for the MRI on my own.   

Most unusually, we arrive at the doors to X –ray, which are locked, only to have someone run up to unlock them and usher us in.  In the waiting area, someone comes STRAIGHT over and takes me off to get changed.   

I’m taken into a little room to have a canula put in.  WHAT?  Why?  To put the dye drip in.  Fuck.  As if it’s not bad enough being totally enclosed in the scanner, now I’ve got to have a drip?   The girl looks dubious when I explain about my veins.  She goes off to get a more experienced bloke.  Who then insists on using my burned chemo vein.  He gets the needle in and flushes it through.  It hurts a fair bit.  What an arse.   

In the scanning room I’m made to lie on a bed with my boobs hanging through 2 holes.  Very attractive.  The radiographer (or whoever she is) gets my arms in position to put me into the tube.  At some point, she puts headphones on me because the machine’s going to be loud.  And I’m winched in.  To be honest, I’m most worried about the dye going through my vein.  It hurts and I’ll probably flinch.  And it’s going in mid scan.   

I feel various things during the scans.  I’m actually inside the scanner for 20 mins.  It’s loud, uncomfortable, scary.  My arms shake involuntarily with the stress of being in such an awkward position for so long.  A couple of times I feel fairly hysterical.  She scans me twice and then warns me that the next scan will be 6 minutes long.  The dye will inject half way through.  By this point, I’m getting a little immune to it.   

Nora Jones is playing in the background.  This is somewhat ironic.  R and I watched a Nora Jones concert on TV on our first weekend together, which was very passionate, and I’ve had a soft spot for her music ever since.  Not any more, probably.   

Sooner than I think, it’s all over.  Unfortunately, the drip has made me feel very sick.  Totally psychosomatic.  All the associations with chemo.  But still, the nausea is very real.  In the changing room, I almost barf but manage not to.   

And out and home and in the car and off to work.   

The nausea talks a couple of hours to wear off.  Course, now I’m worrying about where they’ll put the line in tomorrow and the post op nausea.  Better than worrying about having my tit chopped off I suppose.