Attitudes. I haz dem.

Hey gang!  I'm back!  Ya miss me?

oh that's not fair.  I haven't gone anyplace and the transparent grasp for attention is just really too much even for me.  I have, however, become a particularly fudgy and ill-advised version of myself, so I'll just take a moment here to kindof try to make myself accountable and crawl out of the ol' pit (OF DESPAIR!!!) yet again.

For the hozillionth-eth time.

The good news is, kids, that I had a kickass April.  No seriously.

And now I'm spent and my brain is rather like how the water is when you ask it to get back into the balloon. First day back at work in a month was awesome.  Whole place went to beans while I was gone and gosh darnit if that doesn't stoke a fire under the ol' ego then nothing will.  Turns out, I really am part of the solution.

At home I'm all precipitate.  But at work, I am totally solution.

Another thing I've kvetched about in here is a certain health situation that many if not most of us ladies have to wrestle with and the results on that bad boy came back as pretty much good news.  Now I'm the sort of kicked-puppy who knows better than to just take good news at face value.  You see, I've been burned before by those big disney eyes that good news uses to beguile me into relaxing.  But I've also been in this rodeo for a long time.  And I know many more women who have been in the game for far, far longer.

A quick catchup bordering on too much information:

I get lots of ASCUS results.  It's kindof a career for me.  All you menfolk out there can go and look this up but the squeemish had best look away and maybe check in next week or something.

Ever since I started going for my annual "grownup" exams...  it's pretty much always included a professional on the other end with pursed lips, a tilted head, and the ACSUS explanation pouring forth from her perfectly well educated heart.  "don't worry" they say.  "it's fine" they say.

And they're right.  It's fine.

Until it's not.  And then one year it wasn't.  And I bought a ticket for the colposcopy train.  And then everything was 'grossly normal' (egad I hate that beshitted diagnosis) for a good while and then all of the sudden I was back to ASCUS.

Well if that isn't the shit in your oatmeal, I'll tell you what is.  I have always, always only ever tested negative for the HPV.  If they can test for it, they tested for it...  every variation known to science.  And I'm as bereft of the stuff as I am of tentacles, stingers and ex-ray vision.  So they're like "don't worry".  And they're like "it's fine".  And I'm like, "get the goddam ice-cream scoop already and just take everything out, I don't need it!"

And then, last year, they found some high-grade nastiness and we decided to save my life with a LEEP.

The aforementioned ice-cream scoop was employed but except for ice cream it was my insides and instead of a scoop it was a burning hot laser knife.  9999 times out of a thousand, it goes really well and nobody feels a thing.  I was the 'one' and felt everything.  However, as I told myself, if this is the (allbeit barbaric) medicine that keeps me in this plain of mortal existence for another little spell, then let's just ride it out.

Also, I told myself, I was noble as hell for taking one for the team of the thousand of other women who'd now get through the process utterly unperturbed and probably drinking tea and watching gray anatomy throughout the whole thing.  You're welcome.

So now, as you are well aware, we are at the season of the SECOND FOLLOWUP.  1st one was groovy. "all is well" they said.  "looks good" they said.  "Come back in six months after the scar tissue starts to receed".   And I'm like "GAH!" but also "a'aight".

And so now my test results come back and I'm back on that beshitted ASCUS boat again.  Short of a hysterectomy, they pretty much scooped out as much as is scoopable...  so there's not much tissue to sample.  But what they sampled is still being atypical with a dash of squaumous and I'll be damned if I hear another "don't worry" speech, another "it's fine" lecture without slapping someone.

If I didn't want to worry, I wouldn't go get checkups.  Preventive care only works if it's preventive.  So, as far as I can see, it's time for this shit to start preventing something or I'm going to have to go back to the little dudes with the loincloths and start getting my shaman-medicine on because this whole ankles-to-jeezus thing just really isn't doing it for me.

The short version:  I'm fine.  Don't worry.  The good news is, that everything in the test appears to be grossly normal.  Perfectly par for the course, you see.  So I'll take another ticket for the checkup train next year and we'll play the game again.

And if I EVER hear about any of you skipping your annual exams...  I will come over there and give you the scowling of a lifetime.  In the short time that you all have known me, I feel comfortable in asking you to do one thing for me:  Get Your Annual Exam.  Not for you, not for your family, for me.

Preventive care, after all, only works if it's preventive.


And finally, the short short SHORT version?  My medical history is summed up nicely in the included video below.

P.S.  I wonder what they'd get if they tested for lignin-based activity?  best not ask...