The trip went well...

I flew into Portland...
rented a really cute yellow PT Cruiser...
met many fabulous people...
went to the hospital...
had the Mammogram and Ultrasound...
got the results in the same day...
spoke at great length with the Radiologist...
visited with The Boyfriend's family...
and flew home in just a couple of days...

Oregon rocks!

The Mammogram (of course) showed nothing. My breast tissue is way too dense for even the new digital Mammogram machine that they put me on. (And the poor technician tried several times to get the shot to no avail.)

The Ultrasound showed a fibrous mass about 2cmx5cm... Not a cyst. (But we knew that already.) The Radiologist came in a spent a long time going over the images with me. He explained why he was very confident that I did NOT have breast cancer, that it was a fibrous mass.

The hospital staff was incredible! They called for several hours down to California to get my referrals faxed up. (Since after three straight days of calling and requesting them to be sent up for the appointment had yielded nothing. Par for the Californian course.) Finally after getting a barely readable fax, they whisked me right in to the tests. Then they processed the results and wrote up the reports so that I would not have to come back to speak with the Doctors. AND they are mailing a copy of everything, including a disk with all of the images to my home in California. No problem. And everyone was a sweet and kind and supportive as could be.

(And I am quite sure that the case manager that I had in Northern California was rather embarrassed by the whole thing. She actually called me to let me know that the hospital sent her the results and that she is sending them to a breast surgeon for review. I should be scheduled for a biopsy after the holidays, sometime in January. (Just to be on the safe side and definitively rule out the possibility of cancer.)

So the verdict for now:
No Breast Cancer.
Confidence is high that this will remain the same after the results of the biopsy.

And to top it all off...

The Boyfriend's Mother was wonderful. She was almost like having my own Mom there. She held my hand and walked me through the whole thing. And it was because of her that any of it was possible in the first place. (She was the one who got the cancellation and appointments for me. She took care of all of the paperwork and led my zombie body from one room to another until the whole thing was over. And then she cooked a fabulous home-made vegetable soup for dinner to make me feel better.)

Needless to say, the visit went so well, that I stayed chatting with her so long that I did not get a chance to drive around and see Portland like I had hoped to. But Portland will always be there, the chance to build a bridge or mend a fence is special indeed... (And I think she was rather intent on keeping me longer if she could. She even sent me to the airport with a package of ginger cookies... Yup... She is a sweet Mom...)