The Daily Grind

Radiation continues. I've done 7 of my 33 treatments and it continues to be way better than chemo. That is not to say it is without side effects but at least I still feel like a human being while doing this. Well, so far. What I dislike most is that I have to go the hospital every day to spend about 90 seconds in this machine. It just feels like such a drag to haul my ass all the way there and all the way home for 90 seconds no matter how many times I remind myself that it is an important 90 seconds.

On the upside, I've gotten very good at laying perfectly still. I feel like this is some sort of accomplishment when really it is the epitome of lazy. I think it is because the techs always congratulate me at the end. Who knows, maybe I'm less fidgety than your average patient. All I know is that radiation machine scares me stiff - literally!

I also had to get another tattoo. They tried to bring back the no showering rule and I hit the roof. Well, as much as a polite Canadian like myself can "hit the roof". Turns out, my radio-tech was under the impression that foreigners would prefer to not have tattoos and instead spend 6 weeks not showering. While that may be true for the other ladies she has dealt with, it is not true in my case. So, I have another tattoo bringing my total to 5 (4 are cancer related). This one is the most likely to be visible but only when I'm wearing clothing that displays an amount of cleavage bordering on inappropriate. Since this isn't really my MO it will likely not see too much of the light of day. I'll keep you posted if I suddenly decide that my girls need to get more air.

The other major downside of radiation is that I feel sick pretty much all the time, but it is a mild amount of nausea. My stomach is always slightly upset but so far it hasn't ranged outside of slight to moderate so I consider it very manageable. If it gets worse they can give me some of the drugs they gave me for chemo and I know those work pretty well. For now, it's my back-up plan. I prefer to take as few drugs as possible and since I'm coping right now I'm going to opt not to take the dugs.

The only amusing story I have from this week happened on Monday. One of my techs speaks quite good English. I have a variety of other techs who rotate in and some speak better English than others. One in particular seems to think that shouting at me will help me understand. Initially I thought he was always mad at me but I've since realized he's nervous. Anyway, on Monday he shouted "Did you have (inaudible word) yesterday?" at me. I started freaking out, thinking I was supposed to do something to prep for these treatments on the weekend. I had to ask him about 4 times before I figured out he was asking me if I had a nice weekend by saying "Did you have joy yesterday?" I'm sure he couldn't figure out why I was looking so worried when all he asked was if I had a nice weekend. Luckily in the end we figured it out. He had a nice weekend too, in case you're wondering.