Surgery revisited

It's odd how one day you can feel so positive and then the next day a huge wave of sorrow comes crashing down upon you. Welcome to yesterday - a day of sadness, disappointment, and setbacks. A diversion from my great plan that was going so well after the infection had cleared up. I'd adopted a new perspective coming from the depths of bottoming out. For awhile I was on a pink cloud, floating and loving life and enjoying the little things.

The night before I had broken sleep, and I woke up every hour sweating and anxious. Then the morning came. I couldn't find anything. Everyone annoyed me. Perhaps it was some kind of psychic premonition tickling my senses. Something just wasn't right.

It took forever to get ready to take Talon to school. Then when I finally got into the car, I dropped my phone into a fresh vat of vegetable juice with beets. The bloody colored juice sprayed every where, and it appeared as if a gunshot had gone off, killing someone in its path. It stained the whitish grey clothes I wore, me hands, the car, and various other items in the mess called my car. I hope no one noticed that I looked like a violent murderer while I dropped my son off to his hippie school.

Afterwards I got gas, and I even made it to my appointment only 5 minutes late. Things were looking better. My phone even still worked.

The nurse got the saline injections ready to pump my fake breasts up another size. Then the Dr came in unfashionably late over an hour, examined the incision, and broke me the bad news. He mentioned that the expander was exposed and now "colonized" because it was in contact with the air. Well duh.... It was like that a month ago?! What had changed?? The nurses even brought it up to me then. He said, "Yeah but there was a stitch in it."

So.... It didn't count when it touched the air 4 weeks ago? Perhaps you were overbooked and too busy to remember that was a problem and preferred to make me wait 6 weeks to break my bad news and set me back further in my treatment. Perhaps you should spend more than one day in the office with patients so that you can give them the care and compassion they deserve? Or perhaps you're sick of your job and have to keep doing to pay for your extravagant lifestyle - the Prada shoes you wear at office visits gives that away. Why did he approve me two weeks ago to start chemo if the expander was showing all this time?

He said that we had to remove the tissue expander as I lay there on the examination table with my shirt off, my nippleless mounds exposed. I put my hands over my eyes and sobbed uncontrollably. He silently fumbled for a box of tissues and gave me a tissue. I didn't feel much compassion from him... as usual. But I will let him remove this implant. Then it's over.

Dear Dr, You're fired after your remove the damn thing tomorrow. It's not me, it's you. You've had more than enough chances. Good riddance.

Now I'll be flat on one side. As if I wasn/t already challenged with my new self identity with small, nippleless, scarred, wannabe breasts. Now I will become accustomed to one flat and one round bump on my chest. I won't be able to do chemo for some time again. I won't be able to work or hold my baby, drive, or tattoo.... again. I try to be strong like everyone suggests, but it's so hard when I keep getting slapped in the face.