Medicine, markets, menopause, migraines

I was online to do market research about a medical company, and the website happened to feature a story about facelifts. So I followed the links and wound up with several graphic descriptions of actual cosmetic surgery procedures. As I now have my appointment in Marseille scheduled, I began to read them with interest. And suddenly I felt light-headed, dizzy, almost nauseous. Uh-oh, I thought. If I can’t even get through READING about this stuff, maybe it’s not my destiny to go under the knife.

But then again, maybe it’s menopause. I have hot flash attacks frequently, several times a day at least, and I have headaches too, sometimes starting when I wake up in the morning. A few weeks ago I woke up in the middle of the night (maybe 3 am?) and said, "This is bad. I am about to have a migraine attack." Bizarre -- WAKING UP from sleep to experience a migraine. And it was a bad one too. Not the worst, but a Force 7.

Doctor, no!

Dr. Lorenzo had been on my mind for two reasons. First, I hadn't yet summoned the courage to call Dr. Delos. And second, last week I had finally motivated myself to go and see her to get my appointments nailed down for a mammography and pap test. As in Treviso (the Italian town in Veneto where I lived before Busto) -- and unlike the South of France, where I had lived before Treviso -- she can’t do a pap test in her office. That required one appointment, the mammo another, and she suggested a full-gamut blood test to establish a benchmark for me at this point. My last blood test had been in France, seven or eight years ago, and I don't remember the exact results. Besides, now I am in the throes of menopause, hot flashes that are downright intrusive and all the more wearing because of the heat wave this month.