It is an ovarian cyst. A benign one.
It is not cancer. It never was cancer. The pathology after the operation confirmed every bit of that and Dr. Opoku made me say it back to her twice before she would leave the room.
I am putting that in the second paragraph on purpose, because I know four people who will not read past the first page and I would rather they had it.
What it is, is enormous.
On the CT it measured thirty-eight centimeters across.
When they took it out at the end of January it weighed twenty-one point four kilograms.
Forty-seven pounds. I have had to say that number to about eleven people and every single one of them has asked me to say it again.
The surgeon told me afterward, sitting on the end of that bed, that he has seen four of them in a twenty-two-year career.
