The penny drops

Thursday 14th January, following weeks of uncertainty, aches and pains, I was finally getting the ultrasound done. Ellen dropped me off and away I went. First I overstepped my mark with the receptionist by introducing myself, she grunts and points to the sign next to her head, as if using words are now mute. It read something like ‘wait your Turn at the yellow line’ I looked down and a flashback to my cricket days at school, my back foot had landed past the line ‘no ball’. I apologised and stood and waited in an empty room for the lady to call me 5 seconds later, ‘oh hello what’s your name’. She told me where to sit and then the nerves kicked in, not of the ultrasound but the ‘oh crap what are they going to find’ or the main constant going round my mind ‘it’s a tumour, it’s a tumour, it’s a tumour‘. I suppose I’d already accepted something was wrong and I just needed that clarity to be able to move on and get myself sorted. After an agonising 15 minute wait where people came after and left before me, just set in my head that the omens were against me. Finally I got called in. ‘Lay down, pull your Pants down, pull your penis up and we will cover you’ okay spot on, I’m literal, I like instructions especially when they are easy to follow. So there I am, laying, pulling my penis up, trying to relax and thinking like Balotelli ‘why always me’. I have a trainee and a senior doing the ultrasound and you know its going well when the trainee leans over and says ‘don’t worry we are just changing driver..’ in steps what can only be described as miss trunchbull vigorously pushing the machine over my troublesome testicle. It was uncomfortable and she did her best I am sure, to inflict some pain! They were very vague and didn't say anything to me, just the standard ‘You’ll hear from your doctor if there is anything wrong’ well..within two hours I had a call from the doctor I had previously been checked by, and you just get that gut feeling it’s serious, purely based on the turnaround. Yet he was still adamant that when he first checked me it didn’t feel like there was a lump and he’s referring me to a specialist ‘just to be safe’ within this conversation he did mention the cancer pathway, which was the first time other than in my head it had been mentioned, and this is when the penny dropped for me, but I was just relieved something was being done!

Fast forward to Monday 18th January and I received a letter confirming I had a specialist appointment with the urologist but it wasn’t until 28th January, a long two weeks to be inside my head...