Citrus-Scented Breasts

Good Morning -

Whew - I bet that caught your attention. I was going to try to find a way not to have "breasts" in the title but since what we're going to talk about today are breasts, it's hard to avoid.

As you can see, our Virgen is floating today over a collage of lemon branches and a halved image of a woman holding her breast - which is actually from a brochure for the MoMA in Chicago, but worked perfectly for last night's intention.

What's this? Have I gone and gotten a little abstract on you? Should you start to expect random symbolism and layered context? Not yet. All that random imagery actually comes together quite simply to demonstrate that yesterday I started my participation in a breast cancer prevention study.

I love doing these studies (remember the MRI?) - they're like live action science classrooms to me. I always learn something vastly fascinating and often get free medical screenings while I'm at it. In this case, I got a free blood work panel and a detailed explanation of what each number on the panel means. Apparently I'm quite healthy - even down to the size of my platelets - and I'm not pregnant (when the nurse told me that's why I had to pee in a cup, I promised her 10% of the National Inquirer royalties if it turned out I was pregnant - that and she could play a prominent role in the new religion we would start...:)).

In exchange for this information (and some sort of cash compensation, but I don't know how much - it's always the least of the motivators in these cases), I have agreed not to intake any citrus save for the orange oil blended with coconut oil that I am to rub on my breasts every day for four weeks (I even have to wear gloves (of which I was given a whole box) while applying the oil to make sure that the only way it's entering my body is through my breast tissue).

And how do they measure if the citrus has gotten into my breasts? Through a sample of the breast fluid, which they extract through a combination of massage and a strange little suction device placed on my nipple (It's like a big syringe with a suction cup on the end. The cup is placed around my nipple and the nurse compresses and releases the plunger on the syringe. Fascinating.). Part of the test to see if I could participate was whether or not they could retrieve this fluid and, amazingly, they could. These breasts have never fed another so I was blown over when she managed to get some.

And why citrus in the breasts? This part I'm not quite sure of, but it's either because it has demonstrated good cancer prevention benefits or because it's harmless but will be detectable in the fluids. I forget but maintain as fascinated. The whole big idea with this is two-fold - if most women are able to produce fluid in their breasts through a simple, non-invasive extraction procedure, then women could do the procedure at home, put the drop of fluid on a small square of lab paper and send it off to see if there are any pre-cancer conditions going on in their breasts. This would be great for women who don't have direct or regular access to medical interventions (I maintain that what we need is for everyone to have direct and regular access to medical interventions, but this does give women active participation in their health).

The other idea involves the citrus (limonene to be exact) and I think it's to see if application of it to the tissue is an effective way to get the benefits of the limonene or if it needs to be ingested or such. Probably the hardest part of this study has been avoiding the limonene (I've been off it for two weeks to make sure the sample of fluid they got yesterday was a good baseline). I love citrus and greatly miss its flavor in my water and most food dishes. More than that, though, is that I can't use any of my bath products - lotion, face lotion, or conditioner. It's amazing how many products that don't advertise a lemon-fresh scent have the limonene in it. I think for products that try to minimize the amount of created chemicals they use, the limonene acts as a good astringent.

All in all, it's quite fascinating. I love a good study - not only am I contributing to research that could benefit people, but I'm learning all kinds of amazing body/mind info. Excellent.