NOTE: Attention Men - if you are not capable of hearing about, living through or reading about the trials and tribulation of the joy that is womanhood, now is where you quietly exit this particular blog and scroll to my previous blog on my position on U.S. border patrol. This is not for the weak in spirit. Consider yourself appropriately warned.


M & M's - Plain or Peanuts?

As many of you know, I recently turned the milestone marker of age 40 on my last birthday. In previous blogs I have lamented over how this has been a shock to my system and that I've even had a few bad days over having to check the 40-45 box on surveys. Will the horror never cease??

I ended a very stressful week with a trip to my OB/GYN for my yearly exam. As if my week hadn't been bad enough already I had to live through another humilating exam where you hear those three tiny words all women cringe when they hear, "scoot down more". Trust me, it's not so WE can get a better view...........

Not only did I live through that bliss of womanhood, I was told that since I was now FORTY that I may start menopause early due to my cancer history and oh yeah, I needed a mammogram. Oh joy for joy! Just what I needed. My boobs smashed in between two steel plates to the thickness of an Aunt Jemima pancake. I was happily informed by the nurse, who was frankly way too perky for 8:30 in the morning, that the Imaging Center could do it at 5:40 on Monday afternoon. Perfect. End the week on a low note; start the week on an even lower note.....well sort of.

I arrive at the Imaging Center around 5:15 thinking I'd be in and out. WRONG! Clearly the minute I stepped foot into the place, there are brats running everywhere. It had to be summer sports exam or something. Scattered throughout the slighty overdone waiting area were Spring Hill and Cool Spring Mom's with their lovely little offspring. I quickly noticed that most had not one, but THREE children in tow. One even had the audacity to get hubby to run by to sit with them when he got off work.

This insued into a huge conversation about some woman named Becky who had done some evil to the wife. Loud enough for the whole waiting area to hear, she went into grand details of the wrong and what she said and what she was going to do and what she was not going to do the next time she crossed Becky's path. What made it even worse was that the kids were running wild and the Dad seemed to be as wrapped up in the Becky story as the wife. I suspect that was a tactic to avoid having to deal with the fact his kids were brats.

I tried to focus on my game of Frogger on my cell but everytime I'd get ready to jump a log one of the brats screamed. Finally about the time I started to speak up and tell them I didn't give a rat's ass about Becky but would they please shut the f??k up.....they called my name. I breathed a sigh of relief!

I was escorted back to a dressing room, given a dressing gown and told to keep it open in the front. I was also asked if I was wearing deordant??? What the ???? I was like, "uh yeah..." I was promptly told to use a "wipe" and make sure it was all gone. OKAY. This really was no beauty contest and even your pits needed to be naked.

Next I was escorted into the X-ray room with a machine that could easily have been something from Deep Space Nine. I was explained in full detail exactly what was going to happen to my boobs and why.

All my female friends were right....it was cold steel and uncomfortable but not unbearable. It was a bit interesting to see my boobs flattened like that....but before you could ponder or gawk too much, she was telling you to step back and wait to make sure the film took. On a scale of 1 to 10 on the pain meter, it was probably a 2....I've hurt myself plucking my own eyebrows more than this hurt. I was also relieved to see the "girls" sprang back to their normal buxom shape.

As I was dressing, I thought about my experiences over the past few days. So far, you can sum up being a woman as having to endure strange and humilating events. I won't expound further, but I'm sure you can get the general idea. It either means having your legs up over your head, naked, or your boobs flattened, naked, or giving birth, with all of the above and yes, naked. At least we don't have to bend over and cough too, although I'm sure there is some medical quack somewhere in a lab at John Hopkin's inventing some test for a woman that would require this - just to make the humilation factor complete.

When I was a kid, and in fact, to this day, my favorite candy has always been M & M's. I'm usually a plain girl....but sometimes you just want the peanuts. That's when it hit me....M & M's no longer represent my beloved treat....but instead menopause and mammograms.

They no longer melt in your mouth but it IS just plain nuts!