The Miracle on (30th) Street

This seems to be the Christmas of counting my blessings. Today I got an early Christmas present. It didn't come in a box but it warms me more than a cashmere coat. It wasn't wrapped but it sparkles more than a diamond. It didn't come with a bow but it has more value than the new cars advertised on TV at this time of year.Last week, I went for my first mammogram. I turned forty and it was time turn to get smooshed and smashed in the name of women's health. It was routine but uncomfortable as my tiny (barely-A after two children) breasts were stretched and scooped to get a proper picture. I went home feeling a little sore but completely confident that I would hear nothing more than the requisite postcard.What is that saying about "best laid plans"?Yesterday, I got a call. Or should I say "the" call. The call that says there is a density. They need to take another look. Can I come in tomorrow?If you guessed that I slept little last night. You guessed right. Just as my mind thought through the facts and statistics which told me that everything would be okay, my imagination ran through the images of surgery, my hair falling out and explaining to my children why Mommy was sick. In other words, I did the nightmare scenario.I woke up this morning pretending that I wasn't nervous. But I was. I bathed and dressed (without deodorant, just to make things a little better). My husband, who was dear enough to take the day off to hold my hand (which may or may not have been shaking), drove me to the breast center on 30th street. We went through the financials. I undressed from the waist up and put on a robe and waited.And waited...I watched President Clinton on the View. I watched a grown woman have a fit because they wanted her to fill out a paper. Finally, they called my name.I was taken back and my breast was pancaked four different ways. Then the nurse took me to a different waiting room. One that was away from the general mammogram population. The lights were lower and the TV softer.And I waited...There was a selection of really out of date magazines. I decided on an October 2010 Vanity Fair with Lindsay Lohan on the cover. Talk about deja vu.  She's made bad mistakes but she's not that person any longer. She's changed. Yada yada yada.. I was two pages in when the nurse returned. They need a couple more views.So I head back, still in my robe. This time they need my breast twisted each way before the squashing. Yes, you read that right. They literally twisted my breast to the right and then lowered the pads. Then they repeated it to the left. Fun stuff... really.I was then ushered back to the second waiting room where I (all together now...) waited. Picked up the year old Vanity Fair and continued on with the saga of LL. And then came the really nice nurse that I was beginning to hate. They want to do an ultrasound. AARGH!!!So I held it together with the first mammogram. And I still did okay with the second but now the nightmare scenario of the imagination really suckered punch the statistical, analytic argument and sent it reeling. I snuck out to the main lobby and touched base with my waiting husband. I must say that  his face reflected what I felt... fear.In what seemed like hours, but surely was a matter of minutes, the radiologist took me back for the third procedure. She was kind and funny but I didn't care. I tried to read her face but I got... nothing. So she drizzled the solution (thankfully warm) and rubbed and moved and clicked and moved and so on and so forth.And, God help me, I had to wait again. Finally, yet another nurse came in. She entered with her blue scrubs and a clipboard. She asked my full name and my birth date to confirm my identity. Then she closed the door. I felt like Samantha when she got asked back to the private office for her AIDS test results. I mean, they only close the door when it's bad news right?!?!Wrong. I am so blessed to say that, as soon as the door clicked, she sat down and said, "Everything is fine". The best three words I have heard since "I love you". "Everything is fine" might as well have been the hallelujah chorus because that is how I felt.It seems, she told me, that I have very dense breasts. To which I responded, "Not to be dense, but what does that mean?" (I was near delirium in my relief). She laughed and explained that density reflected that my breasts were "young" and that I may have this issue for a while until my breast tissue breaks down with age. I replied that they didn't look all that young to me but okay...I know there are many women who walk out of that building without such words. I don't know why I'm not among them. I do know that I am immensely thankful that I am able to share my second Christmas miracle with you.I might not be Natalie Wood but I believe in my Miracle on 34th 30th Street.Do you believe in miracles?