Mammogram, anyone?

Picture taken from http://www.endalldisease.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/mammogram-720.jpg

Now I know what a panino feels like.

Last week, as I was busy typing away on my laptop, hoping what I was writing actually made sense, I received a text message from my brother's girlfriend, asking if I wanted a free mammogram. The hospital where she works had just bought a new machine, and they were willing to use it to screen women from forty and above for free.

Like any red-blooded Filipino I jumped at the mere mention of the word "libre" - or free (or gratis for our Spanish-speaking readers). My insurance does cover it, but the thought of getting it for nothing, thrilled me.

So early Monday morning, I found myself in the car with my brother and my husband, on our way to Pampanga. Perhaps the idea of mammogram + road trip seemed more appealing to me than just mammogram alone. We were pulling up at the hospital parking at exactly nine o'clock. I wasn't nervous or anything, but it was to be my first mammogram. I didn't know what to expect.

But I remained surprisingly calm, more anxious of what the results might say, than of the actual procedure. I had heard of mammogram horror stories but I thought to myself that it just had to be done. According to the Philippine Society of Medical Oncology "The country has the highest incidence of breast cancer in the continent and an estimated 3 out of 100 Filipino women will contract the disease before age 75; 1 out of 100 will die before age 75." (Source: http://www.gmanetwork.com/news/story/329126/cbb/phl-has-highest-breast-cancer-rate-in-asia ) It is a scary statistic, and I can only imagine what women with breast cancer are going through.

No one wants to hear bad news, especially not news which tells us we have cancer. But like what my friend Emilie keeps telling me, early detection is better than a late one. She was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2010. On her birthday. How cruel could fate be? But where is she now? What is she doing during holidays? Where is she on weekends? She's living life to the fullest! She travels, she paints, she watches how-to "makeup" videos on YouTube. She has plans for her future, and all this is possible because of early detection.

So even if having a mammogram feels like being a human panino, it is well worth it. The small sacrifice we have to make now, could mean a longer life ahead of us.

P.S. I felt no pain during the mammogram, only very light pressure. :-)

Rude Awakening

Whenever someone points out our flaws or inadequacies, we take offense, for though we believe ourselves imperfect, we don't want anyone rubbing it in. Just tonight, my best friend mentioned in a private message sent through Facebook, that she's turning forty very soon. And even though I'd always known that our days as thirty-something were numbered, the reminder still came as a mild surprise. 

I'm not saying being old is a flaw. Nor am I saying that being forty is old. I guess the point of this rant, is that the truth, no matter how benign or amoral, hurts at times. Like when an innocent child makes a guileless remark about someone's weight (my nephew, in our recent trip to Guam, asked my dad "Lolo, how many pounds are you?" - a big improvement from "Lolo, are you pregnant?")

I still have a couple of months as a thirty-eight-year-old, and I will definitely imbibe my thirty-eight-year-oldness for as long as I can.  Next year, though, I will turn forty. It is inevitable. But it doesn't scare me one bit. Yeah, the joints become a bit rusty with each passing year, and I store fat as if my body were anticipating a famine, but my face remains crease-free even without the help of age-defying creams. 

I am still at that age where plastic surgery is not an option. And looking at my youthful mother, I don't think it ever will be one.  Having a much younger husband doesn't hurt either. ;)

Diet, Diet

Photo taken from www.burgerbusiness.com

So after a week of listing down everything I ate (no restrictions yet), I met with the nutritionist. She said my average caloric intake was about 1,100 per day, which was not bad. The problem was that there were days when my intake was less than that. Our goal now is for me to have an average intake of 1,100 a day, but that I would need to eat at least five times a day: something that I still have to get used to.

Yesterday, I bought a small weighing scale just to make sure I'm not cheating myself. I found out that 35 grams of anything is tiny to say the least! That's all I'm allowed to eat, 35 grams of fish, 35 grams of beef, 35 grams of chicken, and lots and lots of veggies. No condiments, which is hard, since we Filipinos love our sawsawan (sauce). No fries, pizza, burgers. Ayayay! Oh well, that's life. With half a cup of rice, fruit and water it's more than enough to fill me up.