A dark, cozy room. Soft light emanating from the corners. You gaze into liquid brown eyes and gently curling auburn locks. Quiet music can be heard in the background if you can spare the attention. No words are exchanged. You unbutton your gown and lay down quietly on the bed, one arm raised. As you turn your head slightly there is another set of eyes, sparkling blue in the dimness. You close your eyes and sigh with contentment.
"Okay", says brown eyes, totally ruining the mood. "How are the markings today? Do we need to re-do any of the tape? We're going to do another set of x-rays tomorrw to make sure we're still lined up."
Both sets of eyes approach. Whey were there no male nurses on the chemo ward where one could stay fully clothed and yet the radiation techs are at least 50% male. Is it because they get to play with large machines all day in radiation?
Brown eyes and blue eyes, who have names that I can never remember, start undoing tape and drawing on me with Sharpies. I sigh again, not with contentment but with endurance. The drawing on me by two young men is not even the worst thing - although it has ruined me for body art adventures in the future (say with chocolate??!!). The worst thing about radiation I have discovered is that it's too short to actually fall asleep, but just long enough that I am on the cusp of dozing off when it's all over. Worst timing possible. Man, am I tired! Only when I was extremely burnt out from work did I ever before feel like this. It's a fatigue that has settled deep within my bones and even when I'm sleeping I dream about sleeping. The scary thing is that I've only just begun the radiation and my yard is a huge mud pile as I try to re-grade and re-seed it. I realize now that I should have started the back yard project at least a week earlier. I'm worried that I won't make it and I'll have another summer living in mud. It seems my days are filled with nothing but dirt and young men who draw on me but are as interested in me as they are in dirt. How did my life get so dull?
Radiation began for me on Wednesday, May 9. Barring any delays, my last session will be Tuesday, June 5 and already I cannot wait. You may be able to tell from the ever decreasing pace of the posts and other updates to the blog that I'm quickly getting bored with the whole cancer thing.
I'm finding the whole radiation process rather odd. I'm in the same room every session - room 6 and there are a couple of teams that rotate through that room but the people treating me are two or three from the same group of about 10 techs every time - dependiing who'se on shift. Sadly, I'm not there long enough to get to know them so the names are difficult for me to learn - but at least I recognize them all:)
With being in the same room with the same team, one might think that I would be scheduled at the same time every day. Alas, this logic has not yet penetrated to the hospital administration. I'm not even close to the same time on a regular basis, say, late morning or late afternoon. Hell, I'm not even always in the morning - late or early. The appointments are all over the map from 07:30 to 17:45 - and could be even later! Schedules are given to each patient on Thursday for the following week - but here's where it gets even better. They change the schedule - whenever they want!! At the end of each radiation session you have to check with the techs to see what time you're to come in the following day. It isn't always anywhere near the original time you've been given. It makes planning very difficult.
On Tuesdays I'm supposed to meet with Dr Genest, my radiation doc. He does have a set schedule - from 09:30 to 11:30 Tuesday morning. You don't get an appointment with him. Each patient - on becoming a radiation inmate - is given a cardboard card with the "tentative schedule" written inside and a computerized bar code on the front cover. You bring your jailhouse card with you to each visit and scan it into a computer terminal that tells the techs that you're there and ready to go. If you don't scan or if the scan doesn't work, you presumably can sit there forever, forgotten. When your doc is in, you are supposed to take the jailhouse card and leave it in a little slot with your hospital card and sit in a different waiting room until the doc's assistant calls you in. However, your radiation session on the day your doc is working the lab isn't even coordinated to the doc's hours. The result? Doc works from 09:30 to 11:30 and your radiation appt could be 13:30, 07:00, really anytime. This is what happened to me last Tuesday. While I originally had a rad appointment at 10:30, it was changed to mid-afternoon. No way was I going to sit there for hours nor make two trips to the hospital. I have too much to get finished before I get sick! I was only a week into the radiation by that point. Other than fatigue that was expected, I had no symptoms on Tuesday (I am just starting to feel the burn and my scar is rather bothered by treatment and my skin is taking on an odd texture - but still nothing major (knock on wood)). In the end I opted to forego seeing the doc and only went in for the radiation.
Now, I totally get that sometimes appointments have to change and things come up - but seriously? This scheduling is reedonkulous! And who needs emergency radiation? I suppose it could happen: you doctors out there can tell me who suddenly shows up who needs life saving radiation so badly that they can't wait until say 10:00 when there is a scheduled spot for emergency patients. There are about 8 or 9 radiation rooms. If they all had a 15 minute slot scheduled in on a rotating basis, could that not handle the "emergency" cases? If patients had the same time slot every day - could they not schedule around it or, heaven forbid, change places with another patient for one day? It's not even that the times are all different - it's that they change all the time! If major airlines can schedule aircraft all over the world (yes, I know airlines bugger up but if you consider the number of planes and connections they juggle....) surely some computer program can do a better job for the Ottawa Hospital. It can only be this disorganized intentionally........
When I was re-mareked on Wednesday before my first treatment, I couldn't believe what they did. First off, there are alot more marks than there were previously - and they're all in different places! There's now even one in my armpit. Joy. I have 7 green thingies on my covered in tape. These ones aren'et just crosses like the last ones either. I have what looks like a little target drawn on my chest, just right of centre, parallel to my armpit. The location means that it's almost always visible - unless I were to wear a turtleneck. Perhaps it's their way of punishing me for refusing the tatoos???
I finally got a reasonable answer to why they are so incredibly anal about the positioning of the radiation. I asked brown eyes about it and he said that a few milimeters wouldn't matter, but the more accurate they can be the better. The doctor has determined the area that actually needs to be radiated and they have enlarged that somewhat to take into account breathing during treatment (thanks for that) and any slight movements that may occur. However, they want to ensure they don't cause more harm than they fix. For example, they are radiating my neck and they would apparently like to stay away from my spine (thank you for that too) so they are very careful to ensure that they get what they want but not too much else. Makes sense - but still doesn't explain the need for tattoos.
So far, out of 6 treatments I've walked twice, ridden my bike once and driven 3 times. Not great given my goal of walking every day, but in my defence one car ride was b/c I was out biking until right before the appointment and another was caused by working hauling dirt until right before my appointment. So, I am still getting lots of good physical exercise in my days and that was the true goal. I do however enjoy the walks. I'm learning to love the slower pace and what I actually notice. I've seen a ton of butterflies. I don't know whether that's good news for the butterfly population or that I'm just going slowly enough to notice for the first time, but either way it lightens my heart every time one flutters by.
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