I’m sixty-five today and I have only two treatments to go.
The day started badly as I had the runs and had to resort to a couple of Imodiums to settle things down before I went out. From such a start things can only improve.
It’s been a day to make me realise how damned lucky I have been. When I was waiting for my treatment I was listening to a conversation between two women waiting for their husbands to come out from radiotherapy. Both men had had cancer in their throats or mouths and both had had to have part of their tongue removed. The surgeons had reconstructed their tongues using muscle from their arms and legs. I think that’s pretty amazing.
Mind you, the husbands were both having dreadful pains in their mouths and were experiencing great difficulty eating. Indeed one had not eaten for over a week and was being fed through a tube.
Later, after I had returned home a friend arrived to wish me happy birthday. She was telling us about the father of a mutual acquaintance who was dying of cancer. His had started in his bladder, too, but he hadn’t done anything until he had a big lump on his stomach. I just can’t imagine how he could have ignored it that long if his symptoms were anything like mine. Maybe his was far less painful but far more aggressive than mine and he hadn’t really worried about it until it was too far advanced.
Sometimes I wonder why I complain about feeling tired and having the minor inconvenience of the runs.
Thursday, 29 October 2009
Monday, 26 October 2009
Fifteen Down
Fifteen down and that means only five more to go. Four more treatments this week and then the last one next Monday and it won’t be a day too soon as the tiredness is really building up now.
Mostly I’m fine in the morning and can get a few things done but then I’m ready for a rest in the early afternoon but, of course, that’s just the time I have to rush round to go to the Christie for treatment and by the time I get back the opportunity has passed. Losing a couple of hours every weekday afternoon is a real bind.
I worked quite hard on Saturday morning and then I felt utterly shattered by lunch time. All the family turned up just after two and the girls were delighted to see their uncle for the first time in many months. The happy sound of little girls’ giggling and shrieking with excitement really got to me which was sad.
Sunday was much easier because I got most of the preparation of the evening meal done during the morning, had a sleep in the early afternoon and then I was OK until about seven o’clock before I started to droop again.
Today, being Monday, I had my weekly session with Dr. W. I mentioned to him a concern I had about a bruised feeling just where my left thigh becomes my left buttock. It’s a pain I had when almost all of me below the waist ached or hurt to some extent and it has returned on and off this last ten days or so. He says it is likely to be some soft tissue being affected and irritated by the radiation but if it is still troubling me in a few weeks he’ll have a closer look at it. His explaination makes sense and I feel reassured.
Mostly I’m fine in the morning and can get a few things done but then I’m ready for a rest in the early afternoon but, of course, that’s just the time I have to rush round to go to the Christie for treatment and by the time I get back the opportunity has passed. Losing a couple of hours every weekday afternoon is a real bind.
I worked quite hard on Saturday morning and then I felt utterly shattered by lunch time. All the family turned up just after two and the girls were delighted to see their uncle for the first time in many months. The happy sound of little girls’ giggling and shrieking with excitement really got to me which was sad.
Sunday was much easier because I got most of the preparation of the evening meal done during the morning, had a sleep in the early afternoon and then I was OK until about seven o’clock before I started to droop again.
Today, being Monday, I had my weekly session with Dr. W. I mentioned to him a concern I had about a bruised feeling just where my left thigh becomes my left buttock. It’s a pain I had when almost all of me below the waist ached or hurt to some extent and it has returned on and off this last ten days or so. He says it is likely to be some soft tissue being affected and irritated by the radiation but if it is still troubling me in a few weeks he’ll have a closer look at it. His explaination makes sense and I feel reassured.
Wednesday, 21 October 2009
Twelve Down
Twelve down and eight to go!
So far the side-effects are quite manageable though the fatigue is starting to get a hold now. It wouldn’t be so bad if I could have a sleep during the afternoon but of course I have to go for my treatment and, depending on how late they are running and how quickly my taxi home takes to get to me, it can be three or three thirty before I’m back and then I have other things to do. So I have about an hour’s sleep in the early evening and I’m OK. And of course I’m drinking more to keep fluid moving through my bladder so I’m up several times during the night.
Apart from that I’ve slipped into the routine quite easily but it is a bit of a drag having to go every day.
I heard from Stephen over the weekend and I am worried about him. I mentioned that his MRI scan had shown that he had not responded too well to the chemotherapy and that the team were thinking how to proceed. He has still not heard anything which I find worrying.
And he didn’t sound so good. He said he had had a few rough days caused by painful constipation which he put down to the side-effects of the chemo but I am not so sure as most of my side-effects have gone now. I fear that things are not going to work out well for him.
So far the side-effects are quite manageable though the fatigue is starting to get a hold now. It wouldn’t be so bad if I could have a sleep during the afternoon but of course I have to go for my treatment and, depending on how late they are running and how quickly my taxi home takes to get to me, it can be three or three thirty before I’m back and then I have other things to do. So I have about an hour’s sleep in the early evening and I’m OK. And of course I’m drinking more to keep fluid moving through my bladder so I’m up several times during the night.
Apart from that I’ve slipped into the routine quite easily but it is a bit of a drag having to go every day.
I heard from Stephen over the weekend and I am worried about him. I mentioned that his MRI scan had shown that he had not responded too well to the chemotherapy and that the team were thinking how to proceed. He has still not heard anything which I find worrying.
And he didn’t sound so good. He said he had had a few rough days caused by painful constipation which he put down to the side-effects of the chemo but I am not so sure as most of my side-effects have gone now. I fear that things are not going to work out well for him.
Sunday, 11 October 2009
The First Weekend
It’s Sunday and so far I’ve had four treatments and now I have a weekend off. The NHS does not do weekends.
The treatments are simple enough and take only about ten minutes each day. You don’t even have to undress and wear one of those hideous hospital gowns but just bare the bit to be treated, in my case my pelvic area. It’s been several decades since young women were so keen to pull my trousers down.
It takes a little time to get you lined up correctly on the treatment table and the machine properly positioned above you. The machine emits three laser beams which have to be lined up exactly on the permanent marks on your body. Even then they take a couple of pictures before treating you just to make sure that the set up is exactly as it was on the day the CT scan was done and the markers put on your body. I have the most photographed pelvis since Elvis.
Once everything is right the staff withdraw and you get zapped from above, below and from each side with each zap lasting about ten seconds and then it’s all over for that day.
I have only one complaint and I’m aware how petty it may sound but on three of my four treatments I have been kept hanging around for half an hour beyond my appointment time. I’m an old-fashioned soul and to me an appointment is an appointment and it’s sloppy and lacking in respect when punctuality is treated with such a casual attitude.
So I’ve rushed my lunch to be there on time and then I’m sitting there suffering indigestion as a result. This is the only experience I have of the Christie that reminds me of what the NHS is like.
Now having got that off my chest I can say I am still feeling good. OK, I am going to the bathroom more often especially during the night but that is because I am drinking much more. And one good bit of news which came from a conversation with a readiographer is that tea, coffee and alcohol are perfectly all right as long as I ensure I drink plenty of water as well. That bit of news cheered me up no end as a month or six weeks with water as my main drink would have been a real trial. So every time I pass a tap I drink a couple of glasses of water and when I return to my bed from the toilet during the night I take a good swig of bottled water as I have learned that it’s best to keep my system moving and not to let my bladder run on empty.
I have heard nothing from Stephen and I am worried about him. I suppose I should ring him but I don’t want to push into his life at what must be a difficult time for him and Yvonne so I hope he’ll ring me when he has any news.
The treatments are simple enough and take only about ten minutes each day. You don’t even have to undress and wear one of those hideous hospital gowns but just bare the bit to be treated, in my case my pelvic area. It’s been several decades since young women were so keen to pull my trousers down.
It takes a little time to get you lined up correctly on the treatment table and the machine properly positioned above you. The machine emits three laser beams which have to be lined up exactly on the permanent marks on your body. Even then they take a couple of pictures before treating you just to make sure that the set up is exactly as it was on the day the CT scan was done and the markers put on your body. I have the most photographed pelvis since Elvis.
Once everything is right the staff withdraw and you get zapped from above, below and from each side with each zap lasting about ten seconds and then it’s all over for that day.
I have only one complaint and I’m aware how petty it may sound but on three of my four treatments I have been kept hanging around for half an hour beyond my appointment time. I’m an old-fashioned soul and to me an appointment is an appointment and it’s sloppy and lacking in respect when punctuality is treated with such a casual attitude.
So I’ve rushed my lunch to be there on time and then I’m sitting there suffering indigestion as a result. This is the only experience I have of the Christie that reminds me of what the NHS is like.
Now having got that off my chest I can say I am still feeling good. OK, I am going to the bathroom more often especially during the night but that is because I am drinking much more. And one good bit of news which came from a conversation with a readiographer is that tea, coffee and alcohol are perfectly all right as long as I ensure I drink plenty of water as well. That bit of news cheered me up no end as a month or six weeks with water as my main drink would have been a real trial. So every time I pass a tap I drink a couple of glasses of water and when I return to my bed from the toilet during the night I take a good swig of bottled water as I have learned that it’s best to keep my system moving and not to let my bladder run on empty.
I have heard nothing from Stephen and I am worried about him. I suppose I should ring him but I don’t want to push into his life at what must be a difficult time for him and Yvonne so I hope he’ll ring me when he has any news.
Wednesday, 7 October 2009
Radiotherapy Begins
Yesterday I began my course of 20 radiotherapy sessions and it went very smoothly.
I arrived about five minutes before my appointment time, 12.45, and there was no hanging about at all. I was encouraged to empty my bladder and then I was on the treatment bed with my shirt pulled up and my trousers and pants pulled down to give the linacc unit a clear shot. It took more time actually to line everything up correctly using the marks they put on my skin last week than to do the treatment itself.
Oh, I had received some advice on possible side-effects and how to reduce them and it looks as if drinking tea, coffee and alcohol is out for a while. How can I survive?
I gather it will probably be a couple of weeks before I start to feel any side-effects kick in but then I can expect more frequent and uncomfortable urination and quite likely a rather loose bowel. Oh well, I reckon that, after what chemo did to me, I can handle that.
In the meantime normal life goes on. Last night we went out for a Thai meal to celebrate our wedding anniversary and I drank a pint of Thai beer which will be my last alcoholic drink until this is all over.
I arrived about five minutes before my appointment time, 12.45, and there was no hanging about at all. I was encouraged to empty my bladder and then I was on the treatment bed with my shirt pulled up and my trousers and pants pulled down to give the linacc unit a clear shot. It took more time actually to line everything up correctly using the marks they put on my skin last week than to do the treatment itself.
Oh, I had received some advice on possible side-effects and how to reduce them and it looks as if drinking tea, coffee and alcohol is out for a while. How can I survive?
I gather it will probably be a couple of weeks before I start to feel any side-effects kick in but then I can expect more frequent and uncomfortable urination and quite likely a rather loose bowel. Oh well, I reckon that, after what chemo did to me, I can handle that.
In the meantime normal life goes on. Last night we went out for a Thai meal to celebrate our wedding anniversary and I drank a pint of Thai beer which will be my last alcoholic drink until this is all over.
Sunday, 4 October 2009
Back In Court
I took another step towards normality on Friday by sitting in court for the first time since early July.
Ann didn’t say anything but I’m sure she thought it was a bit premature especially if it was a long day. In fact we did sit through until four o’clock which was quite long enough for me but I didn’t really start to tire until the bus home failed to turn up and I was stuck standing at the stop for half an hour.
I had gone fairly well prepared, however. I would normally have gone out at lunch time to buy a sandwich but instead took lunch with me so that I could, if necessary, find a quiet spot to have a short nap before the afternoon session. As things turned out that wasn’t necessary. I think I was a bit high on just being back that any risk of tiredness was kept at bay until I got home.
Oddly enough one of my two colleagues was also a cancer patient and was currently undergoing chemotherapy. He has been suffering from what began as cancer of the bowels some ten years ago but the disease has spread throughout his stomach and into his liver. Every now and again he undergoes several days of chemotherapy delivered through a tube into his chest from a tank worn on his belt.
I reckon he must be far tougher than me. When I heard about this and how he is carrying on with his life I felt a complete fraud having been as weak as I was during my treatment.
Ann didn’t say anything but I’m sure she thought it was a bit premature especially if it was a long day. In fact we did sit through until four o’clock which was quite long enough for me but I didn’t really start to tire until the bus home failed to turn up and I was stuck standing at the stop for half an hour.
I had gone fairly well prepared, however. I would normally have gone out at lunch time to buy a sandwich but instead took lunch with me so that I could, if necessary, find a quiet spot to have a short nap before the afternoon session. As things turned out that wasn’t necessary. I think I was a bit high on just being back that any risk of tiredness was kept at bay until I got home.
Oddly enough one of my two colleagues was also a cancer patient and was currently undergoing chemotherapy. He has been suffering from what began as cancer of the bowels some ten years ago but the disease has spread throughout his stomach and into his liver. Every now and again he undergoes several days of chemotherapy delivered through a tube into his chest from a tank worn on his belt.
I reckon he must be far tougher than me. When I heard about this and how he is carrying on with his life I felt a complete fraud having been as weak as I was during my treatment.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)