Yesterday morning I got a lovely surprise. It’s been at least two years since I ceased being a viable breeding device or rather, stopped having periods. It’s called menopause and while certain aspects of it were a bit bothersome, on the whole I thought I’d gotten off fairly well. Until yesterday when I discovered that I was spotting. Very, very light spotting, but spotting nonetheless. Having recently read somewhere that any sort of bleeding after the complete cessation of periods was usually a sign that things are ‘not good,’ I decided, after an attempt at denial, to email my doctor this morning. His reply was basically, get thee to a gynecologist and get this checked out. So, I called the wonderful doctor who delivered the girls eons ago, confirmed that he is on my insurance plan and made an appointment for mid-October. Between now and then I will endeavor to refrain from searching medical websites for what this might mean as those types of searches usually just manage to increase my blood pressure and my panic level.
As there is a bit of a history of ovarian cancer (two cousins on my mother’s side), I am concerned. Especially since my very recent pap smear came back clear.
When I’m thinking positively, I allow myself to believe that this is just a hormonal reaction to my newly empty nest and my body is just trying to bring itself back up to reproductive speed. Not that I’ve ever heard of that happening to anyone. But there was the dream the first night Emily stayed in the dorm that I was pregnant again.
At any rate, I am taking action and not sticking my head in the sand, despite my fears of what might be causing this. A few weeks ago when I was in a major funk over the whole empty nest thing, I might have been tempted to leave this to fate, suicide by denial as it were. (I’ve always been good at procrastination, though this would be a rather extreme way to use it.) But I still have an extremely healthy fear of death (nothing like reading “Charlotte’s Web” when you are 7 years old after your father has dropped dead in front of you to keep you doing what it takes to keep living) and that fear keeps me going.
