Radiation whammies putting hurt on hammies but cancer treatments moving nicely outside of that

 

Is it normal to want to chew your own hamstrings off after radiation sessions to blast away a tumour on your L-1 vertebrae? Asking for a friend, mind you.

I kid. Largely. We're four sessions into our set of 10 designed do away with the cancer that's taken refuge in my back. The first three days featured about a two-hour stretch afterwards where it did feel like hamstrings were seizing up. I took some Advil before today's treatment and we're doing better with that.

I decline comment on the number of Advil I took. Yes, even to you mother. 

I spoke with a radiation techie who felt that the pain was tied to swelling in my lower back from the radiation. He said to monitor it, and report it of course if it began to get worse. It seem to set off any major alarm bells for him. 

Other than that, we're muddling along nicely. Sessions take about eight minutes from start to finish. It's about the same as when we had by the end of our 20-session turn for the original tumour in the T-2 in  2010.

The top photo is the current master blaster. The second photo is the version that dealt with the tumour 13 years ago. 

You get a on table and this new machine circles around you. Does the full lap.  I'm not sure if it takes a break on my lap for lunch. Stop that. That's mean.

The first machine brought you up on a table and just blasted away from one position, if I remember correctly.

I worked the first three days of this little episode but my plan is to take a few days off and rest up.We'll see what happens next. The newspaper has been understanding, as always. 

I felt well enough today to have lunch with Vancouver Canucks ratio play-by-play broadcaster Brendan Batchelor. (This shameless name drop brought to you by me being friends with Bif Naked.)

We get the weekend off from treatment and Monday, too, since B.C. Cancer counts that as its holiday for staff. I see a radiologist next week as well as getting blasted, so we'll have some more info then.

We do have a PET scan booked for January already. The hope has been that the 10-radiation sessions will be done with this bout with cancer. It took us six months in hospital and eight operations to get through Round 1 in 2010-11, and a stem cell transplant to get through Round 2 in 2017, so two-plus weeks seems mighty simple, if that's what it winds up being.

I'll check in again here next week.