My Cancer Journey

I received radiation treatments Monday through Friday for four weeks. The first one was on Wednesday, March 20. After the second treatment on Thursday, my skin felt like I had a bad sunburn. It happened faster than I had thought it would, and I was concerned.    My skin had gotten drier with age, and even more so because of the chemotherapy. The days before radiation I had been rushed and not put lotion on. I asked the radiation oncologist if that could be the reason for my skin to burn so quickly, and he said that was very likely. So, if you need radiation, make sure your skin is not too dry, but do not have lotion on the affected area when going in for treatment.   After applying lotion on the area, it felt better. I got into a routine -  When I got up in the morning, I slathered lotion on the area that would be treated. Before leaving for the hospital, I showered to make sure all the lotion was gone from my breast and armpit. When I got to the hospital at 1:15pm, ...

On Thursday, February 22, I had a consultation with the radiation oncologist to discuss what to expect for the radiation treatments. Then Thursday, March 7, I went for radiation set-up. This was done in a different room from where the actual radiation is done. There they made sure I was positioned correctly on the couch (the hard table you lie on during the treatments) so that the treatments would work on the correct area each time. The technicians do this by creating a personal “pillow” for you to keep you from moving your upper body during the treatments. During this appointment they created a mold for this headrest.   They were able to make it a little elevated, and I was also allowed to keep my head sideways, so my vertigo would not get triggered. It helped, and I did not have any vertigo attacks during any of the treatments.   One technician tattooed three small dots on my midsection - one on my left side, one on the right, and one halfway between the two. They were posit...