Monthly Archives: May 2011

A week left

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As expected, the biggest side-effect to radiation has been the sore throat and sore esophagus. How does one know if their esophagus is sore, trust me, you know. Swallowing is difficult and painful, but it could be worse. From what I understand it can become so painful for some people that they aren’t able to swallow at all, at that point some people (in particular the elderly) have to be hospitalized as they quickly become dehydrated and have to be fed through a tube. It’s not going to come to that for me though. However I can definitely see how trying this could become if I was due for a longer course of treatment.

The pain and swelling is essentially due to a “sunburn” on my upper esophagus. It gets irritated from being irradiated (see what I did there =) and swells so that the opening is less than half of what it would normally be. The subsequent pain and smaller hole makes eating difficult, and I have had to adjust my diet. NO sharp pointy foods. Only soft foods and the colder the better. Ice cream is pretty much the perfect food in this case, it’s the only thing I’ve found that doesn’t cause any pain at all. It’s a combination of being soft, cold, and a thick consistency that keeps the throat from having to constrict too much. Even water hurts so it’s become a chore to keep up on it so I don’t get dehydrated, but ice cream goes down smooth! Smooth and delicious.

I’m “sun burned” on the outside too. My chest is a little red, but my neck is very red. I’m supposed to use aloe to sooth it, but it hasn’t hurt at all, so I haven’t been keeping up on it. In fact, I’ve used it once so far, and that was in the doctor’s office when the nurse showed me that I should be using it. Apparently after 7 months I’ve stopped doing EVERYTHING that doctor’s and nurses have told me to do. It’s my own little rebellion I guess. But seriously if it started to hurt, I would probably remember to use the aloe more often than the NEVER that I’m using it now.

Apparently there should also be some fatigue associated with these treatments, but like I’ve said before, after chemo the word “fatigue” develops a whole new meaning and understanding, so if there is any fatigue happening with radiation I haven’t really noticed it.

5 more treatments left. Then I should be officially done with cancer treatment… hopefully forever.

Today and Tomorrow

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Today:

Today is a good day.
Today is the last day of my cancer treatment.
A journey which started back with my diagnosis on September 13th, 2010 (a date which will live in infamy) will end today after over 6 months of chemotherapy and 3 weeks of radiation.

There will be follow-up appointments over the next few months of course, and my first quarterly CT Scan is scheduled for the beginning of July. I’ll have a CT Scan every 3 months for a year. Then every 4 months for year. Then every 6 months for a year. And if I make it that far without signs that it’s come back, it will be pretty safe to say at that point that I am cured.

It all starts with Today!
Today is a good day.

Tomorrow:

Tomorrow will be a rough day.
Tomorrow is the first day of Pepper’s cancer treatment.

It’s possible I’m being a bit over dramatic and speculative as we don’t for sure yet that it’s full on cancer, but we do know that she most likely has a tumor. Technically at this point they can only say that it’s “a mass” but I’m just trying to prepare myself for the worst.

She is scheduled for surgery in the morning and the mass will be removed. It will then be shipped out to somewhere where they will take a closer look and determine what it is/was and those results will dictate what our next steps are.

For now though, we have to get her through the surgery. We just wish we could explain to her what is about to happen and why its happening. But try as we might, we can’t get her understand English, and she just looks at me like I’m crazy when I try to bark.

It all starts tomorrow.
Tomorrow will be a rough day.

Still plugging along

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1 week down, 2 to go.

I haven’t really experienced any side effects, and it’s possible that I won’t as I’m getting a fairly small dose compared to some forms of cancer.

One side effect that I’ve been told to possibly expect is difficult or painful swallowing. Radiation damages internal organs in the same way that a sunburn damages your skin. So you can think of it as a sunburn on your internal organs =) In my case the organ most likely to be effected is my esophagus.

It supposedly starts with a feeling like something is stuck, like you have a piece of food, or peanut butter, or an ice cube stuck in you esophagus but you can’t get it to swallow down and clear all the way. I actually started feeling that way after my first treatment, but it had to have been psychosomatic since there is no way it would happen that fast. It went away after a day or so.

But now (just this evening) I think it might be happening for real… I don’t know, it’s hard to tell. Maybe I’m just tired after a long day.

I’ve been working on another high school play lately, and they open on Thursday, so there have been some long evenings at rehearsal this week and last. I love it though! It’s like I told Christine 2 weekends ago when I was inside a dark theater for 8 hours on what was the nicest day of the year: there is no place I would rather be!