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9/2/2006

RADIATION UPDATE
Today’s update tracks time with a different approach. Instead of counting how many treatments of radiation I have received, I’m beginning to track how many are left to go.

Someone asked me that question today. “How many treatments do you have left?” I answered, “Ten.” My husband quickly corrected me. “Nine!” Well, they all blur together after a while. But Guy’s right. I only have 9 treatments left.

The cancer center will be closed Monday for Labor Day, so my next treatment will be on Tuesday. It will be the 25th and final treatment of whole breast irradiation. The last 8 treatments will be what they call “the boost.” That means the radiation treatment will be changed so that only the site of the lumpectomy will be irradiated. The direction of the radiation will be different as well. Instead of a strong beam that’s designed to hit my body at an angle to pass entirely through the breast tissue (and presumably out into the room), the boost will come straight at me but won’t go deeper than the breast tissue. The beam gets changed so that it doesn’t hit the bones or organs behind my breast. Oh, and the dosage of radiation will be increased from 180 rads to 200 rads. Looks like I’ll top out at over 6000 rads of accumulated radiation treatment. Lucky me.

All I can say is, “This had better work.” I SO don’t want to do this again.

I was given a new mark on my body to care for. It’s a dot in the middle of the lumpectomy scar. The dot is covered by a special tape like my “plus sign” marks are and I got it Thursday morning. I also got another round in the CT scan machine so that my radiation oncologist can prepare the machine details of the boost. I was recently corrected by someone that the doctor I had been referring to as my “radiologist” is actually my “radiation oncologist,” so I apologize for the earlier misnomer and vow to say it right from now on.

STATE OF MIND
I’m in about the same frame of mind as the last entry, I think. I’m happy to have normal amounts of energy. I’m stressed about money and resigned to my treatment regime. I’m optimistic again about my long term survival and I’m thrilled to be Kelric’s mom. Some days I’m extremely tired and that makes me more prone to feeling depressed. I have gotten a decent amount of rest the last three days so depression has faded away lately.

Sometimes my skin and/or my lumpectomy site hurt. Sometimes they don’t. I grumble a little when my lumpectomy site hurts because it reminds me of the early days of diagnosis when I was healing from the lumpectomy incision. My greatest desire often is to get the laundry caught up. That desire has yet to be fulfilled. I appreciate even more when people baby sit Kelric for us as that gives me time to focus on running errands or getting stuff done around the house. I’m getting tired of the piles of papers in the “office” part of the music room so I’ve started the attempt to organize and file the piles. I’ve made a dent but I’m far from finished.

BLOG
I’ve decided to succumb to peer pressure and start a blog. For those of you who may be wondering what a blog is, it is a journal of someone’s thoughts posted to the web in reverse chronological order (with the most recent entries showing up first). “Blog” is short for “web log.” I have been more or less creating a blog when I send out e-mail messages to you all, but it’s been private. A blog will be public in the sense that it’s on the world wide web and anyone can stumble upon it. I’m a little nervous about this, but it will make it much easier for new people to find and read all of the messages to date. I can even post pictures.

It’s going to take me a while yet to finish the preparations, but essentially I’m going to go through all of the updates I’ve sent out since diagnosis and post them to the blog (with spelling errors corrected). The first entry of the blog fills in the blanks a little and talks about how I came to get the surgery that became my lumpectomy and diagnosis and how I was given the news that I had breast cancer.

I’ll let you know when it’s ready.

PARTY
Guy, Kelric and I attended a party tonight. We got to visit with a number of people we hadn’t seen in ages. It was wonderful to see these people and reconnect with them.

I’m looking forward to our Life is Beautiful party October 15.

MAGAZINE INTERVIEW LAST WEEK
On Thursday (two days ago) I joined the three founders of the Pink Ribbon Cowgirls in giving an interview to a local magazine called ParentWise. I believe the article is about young mothers with cancer. This was my first magazine interview and I was excited to be included. The article will appear in the November 2006 edition.

That’s it for today, folks. A bit dry and matter of fact this time, but at least I’m feeling upbeat again.

Angela

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