Biopsy (The Bad Feeling and the Blessing)

Have you ever had something weighing on you? That strange energy running through your body—not the good kind, not excitement or anticipation—but more like uncertainty, panic, or fear? I’ve felt that feeling many times before. I call it “the bad feeling,” or “the dark cloud.” It hovers, it lurks, and it creeps into the corners of my peace.

This time, I knew exactly where it was coming from. I kept telling myself I was fine. I figured as long as I said it out loud, I was supposed to believe it, right?

It was a beautiful March day. I was out for a walk-and-talk, leash in one hand with my dog Kosmo beside me, and a nervous buzz of energy in my chest I just couldn’t shake. Not the good kind of buzz—the panicky, pulsing, can’t-sit-still kind that makes you bake 48 mini cupcakes just to burn it off. But I needed to do something with the energy because walking and talking? That’s how I process. It’s how I pray.

And I had something on my heart that needed praying over.

I was heading in for a breast biopsy. It all started when I scheduled my mammogram on time (go me!), and—at the last minute—decided to do a self-exam the night before. I felt… something. Not quite a lump, but definitely not nothing.

That one moment shifted everything.

When you show up to a mammogram and mention a specific concern, you no longer get a routine scan. I was quickly scheduled for an ultrasound—at the cancer center. 

I had driven by that building hundreds of times and never really looked at it. As if ignoring it might mean I’d never have to go in. But there I was.

When you put on the pink gown and sit in the waiting room, no-one meets eye to eye. Although connected at that moment, we all fear being on the wrong side of the results. Which one of us will it be? Praying it’s not me.

My ultrasound found a small mass and delivered a BI-RADS (Breast Imaging-Reporting and Data System) category 4 rating, indicating “a suspicious finding suggesting that there is an abnormality that may or may not be cancerous.” What this means: there’s a decent chance it could be nothing...or something.

So I waited for the biopsy.

If you’ve followed me for a while, you know I lost my daughter Caroline to neuroblastoma when she was almost eight. Pediatric cancer. That experience changed me forever. It’s why I speak. It’s why I share. But when you’ve gone through something that life-altering, a part of you feels like you’ve already had your “big thing.” That maybe you should be spared from more.

But life doesn’t work like that.

That day, I named the fear. I breathed it out and reminded myself of something I knew to be true: God had never taken me somewhere and left me there. He had always walked with and provided the strength I needed. He got me out of bed the day after Caroline died, and he has carried me through every day since. That was proof enough for me.

Still, the buzzing didn’t stop.

I wore a bracelet that read, “Don’t worry about anything; instead pray about everything.” (Philippians 4:6)

I looked at the tattoo on my wrist: “Faith shows us the reality of what we hope for; it is the evidence of things we cannot see.” (Hebrews 11:1)

I believed those words, but I was still afraid.

The Addendum: The Call Came

I had the biopsy. The results? Eventually, the call came.

Benign! It was a cyst, nothing atypical! Praise God!

I exhaled so deeply I felt it in my toes. That buzz inside finally quieted—not just from relief, but from awakening. Because sometimes, what shakes you up also wakes you up.

I had made a promise to myself—and to God—that if this was just a scare, I would stop living in fear. I would speak up louder, help more people use their voices, and make sure others knew they weren’t alone.

So, friend—if you’ve been putting off your mammogram, please go! Grab a girlfriend, make it a thing. My friends and I used to call it “Boobs and Beer.” Yep—we day drank after mammograms. It turned something unpleasant into a little tradition.

If you have breasts, check on them. And if you’ve got that bad feeling pulsing through you—for any reason—talk it out, walk it out, share it with someone. You don’t have to carry it alone.
 

We’re in this together. And together, we’ll keep moving in a bright direction.

Like this story? There’s more where that came from.
If this resonated with you, you’ll find even more stories, strategies, and real talk in my new book, 6 Steps in the Bright Direction: Your Roadmap to Resilience, Revenue, and Results.

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