Suspicion

Finally I went to the GP. Not as soon as I was back in the UK, as you might imagine. It took me awhile. Was I in denial? I couldn’t tell you. From my perspective I just didn’t think about it. Of course it occurred to me whenever I reached down absent-mindedly, but I was easily distracted from thoughts about it. Other things were more important: getting work, reconnecting with my friends and family, some of whom I’d not seen for the three years I was elsewhere, finding somewhere to live.

But it wasn’t going away. By the time I made the doctor’s appointment it seemed to be slightly bigger than my other testicle. The bouts of grumpiness were still very occasional – it was only a handful of times I complained to Mark about it aching a bit. But it was hard. I couldn’t get away from the fact it was now almost entirely hard and lacked the spongy feeling of the other one.

Yet still I didn’t entertain (or didn’t allow myself to entertain) thoughts of cancer. I was reasonably sure it would turn out to be something else. At one point I did say to myself, well what if it’s cancer? But I didn’t know where to go with that thought. What do you do with it? It was best just to wait and find out.

The GP confirmed my way of thinking. He’s a batty old man, scatty as. One of those, “Now, where’s my glasses?” Around your neck. “Oh, yes, jolly good. Now, where’s my pen?” He had a look at me and decided it was probably scar tissue developing because I’d knocked it, maybe doing kickboxing. A recent development from the old operations I’d had. With hindsight, it doesn’t sound very plausible; I had those operations some 20 years ago. Why would nothing have occurred from them until now?

He started filling out a form for me to take to St Thomas’s Hospital and make an appointment for an ultrasound scan. Then he said something that shook me. “I’m going to put suspicion of cancer,” he said, and paused. A really long pause. Far too long. “But I don’t think that’s the case. I’m just putting that to get it hurried along a bit. If I leave that out they might not look at it for awhile.” I nodded. I was still hearing the words ‘suspicion of cancer’.

He jolted me out of my thoughts by slamming his pen down. “I can’t do this,” he said. “They’ll think I’m inept if I say that and it’s obviously not cancer. Sorry.” I shrugged, not really sure what was going on. He went off to get another form.

Speaking to Mark later we wondered if he’d been caught being inept before and was a bit paranoid about it. Either way he needn’t have worried. They looked at me pretty quick on seeing what the problem was.

After work I went to St Thomas’s to book the appointment. I got to the Ultrasound Department late and it had just shut. For the first time I felt the urgency of getting this sorted. It was Friday and they weren’t open at the weekend. I could see the receptionist but couldn’t get his attention. I stood there like a lemon, wondering what on earth to do. Then luck struck. A nurse left the clinic and I was able to sneak in. The receptionist looked at me with some annoyance but I immediately launched in with the apologies and didn’t let him get a word in before I handed him the doctor’s note. He immediately softened upon reading it and set about arranging an appointment.

But there was a problem. The earliest appointment was Monday, the next one after that was a week after. The problem with Monday was, my boss was on holiday and my colleague was on a lieu day. I was going to be holding the fort on my own with an inexperienced freelancer my only help.

I decided to risk it. I could just pop out for a couple hours and be back to work the rest of the day. Better that than wait a week for this to get looked at. The appointment was booked. I went home feeling a little better.