Tonight Scott was playing with Sadie, lifting her up into the air with his hands under her armpits while yelling "WOOOO!" A minute later, he said, "Hey, did you notice that she has a lump in her chest?"
Um...is there something he could have said that would make me panic more? Maybe, "Look, Pepper's burying Sadie out the backyard." Perhaps, "Aw, how cute, Sadie found my beard trimmer." No, I think Baby Boob Lump pretty much tops the charts.
He took off her onesie and put a thumb on her right...well, I guess you'd call it a breast. It's really just skin with a little tiny pink nipple on it. (Sorry, honey, that you'll be reading this one day.) "Feel here," he instructed. I put my finger where his finger was and felt the small lump there, mushy and small like a raisin.
"It doesn't seem to bother her," I said, and my voice was calm but inside my chest my heart started beating fast. I made Scott Google "baby breast lump." I remembered the way I felt when I was fourteen, lying in bed one night, and found a lump in my own breast, tiny and painless but undeniably there. I remembered how dry my mouth got, how I spent the rest of the night sleepless, certain that my fate was to die of breast cancer before I'd even had a chance to lose my virginity. My mother rang up the doctor, who reassured me that cysts are normal and go away on their own, and I remember the relief I felt, even as I had a hard time believing that something that felt so alien and strange under my own skin could be harmless.
"They say it's normal," Scott said. I demanded he read me what the internet said (because that, of course, is where you should get all your facts from.) Luckily, the internet seems to have reached a consensus on baby boob lumps: they are quite normal, they come and go, and unless it becomes inflamed or swollen or hot, it's nothing to worry about.
It's odd to have this feeling now of loving something so hard that the least hint of something wrong leaves you nearly frantic with worry. How could we ever deal with it if something happened to her, if she was hurt or got really sick? Our friends' baby just spent a week in the hospital with RSV, a disease I'd never even heard of until a few months ago but which is apparently common, manifesting itself as a mild cold or flu in adults but very serious in babies. What would we do if Sadie got that sick? Yet I know all we can do is allow her to live in the world and try to keep her surroundings fairly clean, cross our fingers and hope for the best.
Being a parent is a game in so many ways ... you delude yourself every day that nothing can or will go wrong. You almost have to shut out the bad news about other babies and their misfortunes because, honestly, you'd go insane if you didn't.
ReplyDeleteOnce your baby is walking, talking etc. the good news is that you get so busy focusing on the here and now, there's less time to spend worrying about it all!
Another upside: worry arises from caring. Not all parents are capable of it, or able to deal with it. You and Scott are doing A+ in my book.
Now I bet you appreciate your parents even more. I know I do. I hadn't heard about RSV until Em got it. and I felt like such an ass....and now I wash my hands and panic every time either child has a fever!
ReplyDeleteJust imagine...not to be a doomsdayer (sayer?) but we get to worry about these little bundles of joy for the rest of our life. And yes...I still check to see if Samantha is breathing if she sleeps in and if I get to sleep through the night I panic at about five a.m. thinking I have neglected one or the other child!
Glad to know that Sadie is okay though. I saw the title of this blog and panicked myself! I actually had the thought. "breast cancer in a baby? or is is Manda?"
Don't scare my like that! Love ya babe!