It is the start of October Breast Cancer Awareness month. A month being pro-active and getting my mammogram and encouraging friends and family to do the same. Jeannette was misinformed by Kaiser Hospital doctors by telling her that she was too young for a mammogram when she arrived in the ER telling them she felt a lump in her breast. She was so sure something was terribly wrong but was reassured that it was just a pectoral muscle that was inflamed. She went home and was compliant taking the anti-inflammatory medication that the doctor had prescribed. It made her sleepy but that is all it did. The lump was still there above her right breast. Two months went by and then Mother's Day was just days away. She was determined to come to Fresno to her mama's house and so she did.
She arrived on a Saturday at around noon. I walked outside to greet her. She looked amazing and so damn beautiful. Her full thick hair was pulled back in a ponytail and her face had a touch of make-up. Of coarse that is all she needed since she was a natural beauty. She hugged me so tight as I gently kissed her cheek. We walked into my house hugging each other. When she sat down she let out a sigh of relief as though she had run a mile. I asked her if she was o.k. That is when she told me all about the lump. I asked her to let me check it. I did and I felt so damn scared. It was hard and didn't move around. It was there just sitting above her breast.
I believe that if the doctors had given her a mammogram months earlier that she would have had a better outcome. Maybe she would have lived longer.
It's not fair.
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