Save the TaTas

Yep, it's that time again. Time for my boobs to be flattened like a pancake. Yikes! I will be forty, there I said it. I will be FORTY in just a few days. It is recommended that women get a yearly mammogram starting at age forty.

Here is what you can expect if you have never had one. After you get called back you will be asked to disrobe from the waist up. I recommend wearing some sweatpants. If you're like me, your jeans give you an unsightly muffin top. Honestly, nobody wants to see that. I wish I would have preplanned a little better and I would have had my sweats on. You are asked to remove any lotions, powder or deodorant on your underarms. They provide you with a half shirt style robe. It made me feel sort of nostalgic. Like it should have had Panama Jack on it or something. Don't act like you don't know what I'm talking about. Then the tech will take you to the room to do the mammogram. The machine looks like this:

She had me sit and answer a few questions, how many pregnancies and if I had ever breastfed. That sort of thing.

Then I just took one arm out of my mini robe and she perched my hooters, one at a time up on the black part and then she brought the top part down onto my breast and smushed it into a sad, flat breast.  The ladies of the old National Geographic had nothing on me. She took a couple of shots of each breast. It is uncomfortable but it really isn't all that bad.

The lady who did my mammogram was a cute little white-haired woman. I commented to her that I could never do her job. She replied that usually it's not that bad that most people clean up for their appointment. However, she said she could write a book about some of the things she had seen over the years.

She told me of a time she had gone to get an older lady to do her mammogram. The lady had tears in her eyes and that she seemed really nervous and uneasy. She asked her what was wrong and the older lady responded that when she was sent back to the waiting room they told her "Tex" would be right in to do her mammogram. She was so relieved to find out they said tech, not "Tex."

After the mammogram was finished I was able to get dressed and was on my way. They even provided a spray deodorant in the dressing room. I think I was in and out within an hour.

So for your own birthday I say give yourself the gift of a mammogram.