The Dr. leaves me with the understanding that the lump I discovered less than a week ago is cancerous.

He didn’t use those very words, but he also didn’t say it wasn’t… Unbelievable!
For the two days leading up to that fateful Wednesday I was constantly on the verge of tears, every conversation with every girlfriend, every pitying look I got from anyone, a touch on the shoulder, my sons smile, a hug from my beloved man – it didn’t take much to get me sobbing.

It’s exhausting. I didn’t sleep the whole night and the next day went to my family Dr. to ask if he could give me something that would let me sleep (“Can’t you give me something that will wake me from this nightmare?” I asked him… No he can’t. “But…” he said, “It’s too early to mourn… all the options are still open”… and I imagine my heart open and him ripping it out with his bare hands… – who are you kidding??)

My family is with me throughout, they don’t leave me alone for a minute… which helps, but it’s also suffocating. I do a countdown to Wednesday and don’t book anything past the fateful hour.
Everything stops.

On Tuesday night I take a pill, lie down on the couch and watch a silly TV show – not a smart choice considering one of the characters plays a woman with huge tits who is attempting to make a man look her in the eyes while she speaks… And that was right after the part where a man walks into a lingerie shop to buy his wife a bra and feels up the shop keeper… again I start crying… finally I start to dose off… my eyes get heavy… and I’m… asleep.

The next morning I go in to work just to pass the time until 11am…. My boss speaks to me but I respond to a different question…. I’m there but I’m not… I feel a screen has gone up between me and the world. I drive to the hospital and all I see on the way are women and their bouncy breasts… happy and carefree.
I walk on my black cloud towards the unit, take a number, 153, but walk in immediately. I am lead into a large room sectioned off by a curtain – each section has an examination table and chair – My Dr. (the one who was the first to ‘feel me up’) and a nurse walk in. I have arrived with full cavalry, my man, my sister and my parents are with me (my mother too has come equipped; she has sandwiches, fruit, snacks, cut up vegetables and drinks).

Once we managed to locate chairs for everyone the Doctor sat down looked at me and said:
“I am sorry, but the lump we found is malignant and your glands have also been affected. At the moment it looks like the best course of action will be a full attack – that means a vasectomy and all the treatments that go with it, chemotherapy and radiation. I’m afraid we need full force…”
Breathe, breathe… I hear my brain ordering my lungs to function… breath, breath!
The Doctor keeps talking, trying to calm me down.

But I am having another conversation, I’m talking to the guy upstairs – “I fucking have Cancer!!! Are you kidding? Having a laugh at my expense? What have I don’t that’s so bad? Why would you do this to me?

Why?

Why???