Negative

I need to go bed, but soon. And yet, I just had to write something out in all capital letters: I DON'T HAVE THE MUTANT CANCER GENE! YOU HEAR ME, WORLD?!? NOT HERE. NOT IN MY DNA, THANK YOU. GOOD NIGHT. I got the call yesterday from my doctor, who left a message on the machine that I feel compelled to keep for the rest of my life. I had gotten the bloodwork done Feb. 7, but it took this long to process because ... yeah, you don't even need a drumroll; it was the insurance paperwork that needed to clear through before they'd perform the test. Hearing Dr. Bruce's voice say: "It says here 'No mutation detected'" just got my shoulders to drop about a foot. I hadn't realized just how long I was carrying this little medicine ball of anxiety around with me, until I heard my primary care physician speak. And yet, at the same time, I felt a twinge of guilt, that the BRAC-2 mutant strain - which, if it had been detected in my person, would have meant I would have a hereditary predisposition to both breast and uterine cancers - was not there. That meant my mother didn't pass it on to me. But it also means that my mother suffers alone, and for that, I felt a twinge of guilt. And I know if she reads this, she will have to fight an urge to call me and say "Don't be silly." And it is silly, because, believe me, I didn't want her to pass it on to me. But still, a (small) part of me felt bad that I got away clean while she suffers. And then, after I felt all that (in the nanosecond after I heard the message), I enjoyed a solid night of relief, knowing that my daughter wouldn't get this gene mutation, either. Carly, we dodged a bullet. Sleep tight.