My Uncomfortable Vaginal Health Scare
About 4 months ago I realised I was way overdue for a pap smear. Being a conscientious and responsible adult, I put it off for a few more weeks and then went to my medical center to spend an uncomfortable ten minutes getting my paps smeared while answering questions about my weekend plans.
I dropped the swabs off at the in house pathology lab and promptly forgot about it.
5 days later I get a text message from my medical center
“Your test results are in - please make an appointment. This is non urgent, but time sensitive”
I make an appointment for the following morning, thinking that it’s likely my doctor is about to go on holidays so needs to get me in and out as quickly as possible.
Sitting in the waiting room the following morning, my doctor is running late (not unusual) and i am sitting in the waiting room texting my friend
“Can’t be that time sensitive she’s running twenty minutes late haha *emoji* *emoji*”
We laugh and giggle, I am hilarious.
I am called into the doctor’s office.
“So you need to go for more tests”
I’m pretty sure she said more things after this, but I was too busy picturing a doctor removing my vagina, uterus, both legs and intestines.
I ask her to repeat this, twice more. She very kindly (and slowly) explains to me that my testing came back positive for a strain of HPV, as well as possible high grade intraepithelial lesions, and the best thing is to go for a colposcopy.
She gives me a piece of paper, and is very reassuring that this further testing is for safety and good measure.
I leave the doctors office and do what any self respecting adult would do. I call my mummy.
Mum reassures me as best she can - and I drive home and call the hospital, I get put through to the very scarily named “gynaecological oncologist” at my local public hospital, who explains they put you in a line based on severity of testing needed and they will give me a call with my appointment.
Two weeks are spent with anxious sludge in my stomach, desperately googling HSIL as much as I possibly can and getting absolutely no answers that satiate my thirst for knowledge.
“can you come in today at 10am?”
I show up - I go to the obstetrics ward, a very nice nurse directs me to sit and wait, because I am 20 minutes early for my appointment. I read all the pregnancy pamphlets that relate no way to my current situation and break some kind of record for leg jiggling.
I am called in. A very nice nurse asks me a lot of questions, and then I am led into a room and told to strip off from the waist down and hop on the bed. The fact that the nurse leaves the room seems like a really nice gesture. Then 4 people come into the room and focus intently on my vagina.
They swab me with something that smells like vinegar (my love of salt and vinegar chips is the first casualty of this experience) and take two biopsies. Not a lot of pain or discomfort, just nerves more than anything.
They explain that these swabs and biopsy will be sent for testing, give me a hospital issue pad and get me to make a follow up appointment in 4 weeks for my results.
I leave the hospital, pay SIX FUCKING DOLLARS for parking (second casualty of this experience is my patience for parking stations) and do whatever a self respecting adult will do. I call my mummy.
4 weeks passes, Mummy and me go to my follow up appointment. Mum brings some soothing pastille candies for me to suck on in the waiting room while I jiggle my leg like a maniac.
The doctor comes in and before her butt hits the chair she says
“SWEEEEEET, do you guys validate parking? I’ll see y'all on the flipside this has experience has suuuuucked.”
“But you do need to have surgery”
It is explained to me in the next 90 days I will have a Wire Loop Extraction Procedure (LLETZ) under general anaesthetic. It is explained to me (very well I might add, she was incredible) that this is a preventative surgery - these types of lesion need to GO and this is the best and safest thing to do for my future. Side effects are minimal - there is a small chance of issues if I choose to get pregnant, but I made the decision that it is safer to get rid of these now, rather than worry about a hypothetical pregnancy.
Mum and I leave the hospital after 45 minutes - the doctor has been very thorough, kind and reassuring, has answered every question I have, and has given me her number if i have any follow ups. WE PAY ANOTHER SIX DOLLARS FOR PARKING, and i get on with my life to wait for a letter for surgery.
I spent the morning of my surgery fasting, and having long conversations with my cat about being very very scared and nervous and scared. He meows sympathetically but doesn’t really get it.
Mummy picks me up and drives me to the hospital. She waits with me while I get changed into a gown - sits on the end of my hospital bed and distracts me with family gossip.
Then they come for me. A very nice wardsman tokyo drifts me into the anaesthetic ward where 8 different people ask me what I am allergic to. They attach three different hospital bracelets to me, and wheel me into the operating room.
There are ten people in there, and they descend on me like vultures to a carcass, blood pressure cuffs, oxygen masks, heart rate monitors, and a man standing next to me telling me my arm will feel cold.
Then I wake up in the recovery ward. I deliriously shout thank you to every person I see (I work in the service industry) I am tokyo drifted back up to the surgical ward and given the BEST cheese sandwich of my life. I get dressed, a nurse helps me put a pad on and go to the bathroom and then mummy comes to pick me up.
She drops me at home and me and my cat hang out sulking for 2 days. I go back to work.
We’re one month past the surgery now - I have had a normal menstrual period and my god i passed wound gel and so much disgusting gunk I was prepared to shove a pressure washer up there to get rid of it (resisted this temptation)
We’re not done yet - I have a follow up appointment at the end of this month. But the hard part is over.
Three takeaways from this story
2. I am so lucky to live in a country where this whole experience cost me TWELVE DOLLARS, and i’m still pissed it cost me that much
3. Pap smears are SO important. If I didn’t catch this now, I could have had cancer, I could have died, i could have i could have i could have, but I didn’t - because i got a pap smear.
TL;DR - got a pap smear, got a bad result, had surgery, am recovering well and glad it happened in a way - because pap smears are so important!
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