A Lighter View
Mammogram: A smashing time
By K.E.H. Stagg

Feburary 25, 2016

Any female can - and often will - testify to the depths of pain experienced in childbirth.  Slightly less well known, however, is the painful annual exam we all undergo to detect hidden breast cancer.

I was thrilled by the medical advances heralding digital imaging, envisioning something more like an x-ray and less like a steamroller backing over my chest. However, the 3-D imaging feels every bit as painful as the old fashioned 2-D, from where I'm standing.

It all starts with the back-up beeper from an 18-wheeler, which the technician signals to get as close as possible to my lungs without actually piercing one. Then she stands behind a piece of plexiglass where she's hunkered down in front of a missile-launching device. I'm stationed in front of a piece of machinery that's a cross between the Middle Ages "iron maiden" torture device and a concrete pillar.  I'm draped in a position so awkward, it can only have been devised by a Y-chromosome carrier.

The technician spots a shadow, which she thinks is my chin. The only solution is to make me throw my head back so far, it's practically attached to my back. She staples it in place, just to make sure it stays there. Then she tells me to relax the arm that's NOT wound around the machinery, as if it's possible to relax anything, given the position I'm in and what's about to happen.

The cheery observation that she's only using 15,000 pounds of pressure per square inch does nothing to relieve the stabbing pains shooting from my waist to the top of my head. She says, "I'm filming now; hold your breath." Since I stopped breathing the minute the tractor-trailer backed into the cubicle, that's the only instruction thus far that's been easy to comply with.
As she's waving flares for the driver to maneuver the semi into a better position, I think I'm going to pass out.  From a great distance, I hear her dreaded observation:  "Oops! Looks like two of the wheels didn't make contact with your chest wall. We'll have to re-do that side."

Maybe the Amazon women warriors were onto something!