Boobs successfully squished!

See this?



This is a cream-filled coffee choux bun and is my reward for undergoing my first ever mammogram.

I was a little horrified a few weeks ago when I got the letter in the post 'inviting' me to come along for one.  It just underlines that I'm not getting any younger.  Weirdly, my mother had asked me only a month or so before if I'd had a letter yet but I scoffed at her.  'I'm only 48', I said, 'they only ask you once you hit 50, and I'm not 50 for AGES yet....'.  Then the letter arrived.  I'm so old.

I know what's involved, they stick your bosoms into a machine and squish them flat, but I had no real idea as to what it was actually like to have this done.  So I asked around.  My sister-in-law said it was excruciatingly painful.  This was not good.  I began to have The Fear.

I asked the women in my favourite message board on Ravelry and the general consensus was that while it can be painful for some people, for the majority it's more uncomfortable.  The discomfort also seems to be connected to where in your cycle you are, and the size of your boobs in general.   Smaller boobs = more pain.  This was more heartening since my matronly boob shelf is cumbersome and about as far from perky as you can imagine.  It has never done me any good and gets in the way.  Clothes don't fit me properly because I'm top-heavy.  I have to wear the most industrial sports bra on the planet in order to reduce the likelihood of giving myself black eyes when I go running. Of the blokes I've dated over the years, absolutely none of them have been boob-oriented, and, of course, I can't have kids so, all in all, they've been a bit of a waste on me.

I decided not to worry too much about it but take some painkillers an hour or so before 'just in case'.  The Ravelry gals also suggested that I should treat myself to something afterwards.  It being a fibre-related messageboard, a trip to the nearest wool shop was the top choice.  But I pointed out that my nearest wool shop was 15 mins drive away, but delicious, delicious cream cakes would be in walking distance.

My appointment was for 2pm this afternoon in a mobile unit, parked in the car park of my nearest Sainsburys.  A very fancy mobile unit, it turns out.  All wood panelling, carpet, piped music and friendly staff.  What happens next is that you go into the little room with the machine and stand there topless. A kindly lady with (hopefully) warm hands flops each of your boobs, one at a time, onto a 'plate' (for want of a better word) and then she lowers a clear plastic panel onto it, flattening it as much as is just about comfortable for a few seconds while she takes an x-ray.

 Each boob gets squished horizontally and then vertically, a total of 4 x-rays being taken.  The vertical one was a bit more uncomfortable than the horizontal one but, as the nurse said, less painful than end-stage breast cancer, so it's a small price to pay really.  All finished and done in 10 mins.  I get the results in 2 weeks - I'm hopeful that they'll be fine as, for all my whinging about The Girls, they've never given me any medical problems at all.

And with that, I trotted across the carpark to Sainsburys and headed straight to the cake department and brought home that bun at the top of the page which I've just forced into my gaping maw.

Cake - mmmmmmmmmmmm.....