Michelle parked her car to the right of the navy blue door leading into the women’s clinic. She silently sat inside after turning off the ignition, twisting and twining her fingers together, her knees practically bouncing underneath her. She wondered if her period had started yet or if the twisting feeling deep in her belly was just more anxious nerves for her appointment.

When she’d visited the clinic a couple of weeks ago, they “strongly recommended” she return once she had started her period. Promised her it would be an easier insertion process. Ugh. She wished they could have just done it at the first appointment. To make her return a couple of weeks later and go through the humiliating rigamarole of stripping naked from the waist down, being propped open wide in the stirrups for yet another gynecological procedure. The indignity!!

She thought she’d calculated the dates accurately. She was usually so regular. But trying to narrow it down to the exact day that she would begin bleeding was easier said than done some months. Before going to the bathroom prior to driving over to the clinic, she wasn’t hopeful. God, she hoped they wouldn’t send her home again. She didn’t want to wait yet another month to get the damn thing put in. It was a Friday, by Monday it could be too late - assuming she’d even be able to get an appointment within a business day’s notice in the first place.

She took a deep, steadying breath. She could do this. She could, she could! It wouldn’t be as bad as she’d read about. People were so hyperbolic online. She could do this! Not like she had a whole lot of other options available to her.

She pushed open the blue door and walked into the waiting room of the clinic. There was a pregnant woman sitting in a corner, but otherwise the space was completely empty, save for the receptionist sitting behind a plexiglass window.

“Name and date of birth?” The receptionist asked without enthusiasm. Michelle gave her the bare necessities of the details of her appointment.

“Have a seat, the nurse will be out shortly,” the receptionist nodded towards the waiting room and Michelle sat opposite end of the room from the other waiting woman.

Michelle stared vacantly at a floral painting on a wall of the waiting area. The minutes felt endless as her anxiety only grew and grew. Finally, she heard the latch of a door open and jumped. Her name was called by a deep, masculine voice that startled her. She’d never seen a male nurse at this clinic before.

“Michelle?” His voice was kind as she approached and he held the door open for her as she walked through to the back, “I’m Daniel. I’ll be attending alongside Dr. Jacobs this afternoon for your procedure. We apologize that there’s a bit of a flu bug going around the office this week and most of our female practictioners have called out sick today.”

Michelle swallowed the lump in her throat.

“Come on, step over here and we’ll grab your weight and vitals quick,” he directed her to a scale, then directed her to sit down in the chair next to it as he took a quick reading of her blood pressure and heart rate.

He smiled at her as he pulled the heart rate monitor from her finger and placed it back on the cart next to the chair, “Nervous?”

“Extremely,” she squeaked.

“You’ll do great,” she swore he winked at her as he directed her to stand and follow her down the hall to the exam room.

He opened the door to room 5, flagged the room as occupied and followed her inside. Michelle’s heart immediately plummeted to her feet as she stepped inside to see the exam table already dressed and ready for a gynecological examination. She felt like usually the stirrups were usually folded into the table at least… No secret what she was here to undergo today.

“You can have a seat in the chair there,” Daniel nodded to a plastic chair next to a shiny silver tray already decked out with papers and instruments Michelle had never seen before. A tiny little IUD was right there on top, sterile and sealed in its plastic packaging.

“You’re here for an IUD insertion today, correct?” Michelle nodded. “Are you on your period?”

“Um… no, it hasn’t started yet,” she said quietly, looking down at her lap, “I really thought it would have started by now.”

Daniel frowned, “We’ll need to do a pregnancy test then, just to be sure you’re not currently pregnant. When was the last time you had sex?”

“Last week?” Michelle guessed.

“Yes, then we’ll go have you provide a urine sample before we have you get undressed,” Daniel said, typing something into the computer in front of him, “Any other health or pelvic concerns? Any questions before the doctor comes in?”

Michelle took an anxious breath, “Will it hurt?”

Daniel shrugged, “Most patients tolerate the insertion process just fine. Depending on what the doctor sees once he’s in there, it’s possible that he could administer a local anesthetic. If he can’t get past the cervix, we might need to provide you with a prescription to soften the cervix and have you come back another time.”

Her heart skipped a beat. Ugh, she did not want to come back to do this AGAIN. If she had to, she might just forget the whole thing all together.

“Think you can provide a urine sample right now?” Daniel asked kindly. Michelle nodded and followed him back out the room to the bathroom across from the hall.

“Specimen cups and a marker are on the counter. Write your name on the cup, provide the sample, and you can put it in the cupboard once you’re done. After that, go ahead and return to the exam room and you can undress from the waist down and wait for Dr. Jacobs. Might be a couple more minutes to get the results from the urine sample, ok?” Michelle nodded and was left alone in the restroom to do what she needed to do.