Almost Home

I am now exactly 90% done with my radiation treatments. The proverbial finish line is in sight. As far as I know everything has gone smoothly. My doctor (the radiation oncologist) tells me they'd probably eliminated 99.9% of the tumor in the first three weeks and that the final few weeks of treatment exist to kill the surrounding area as to prevent the tumor from returning. As those of you who are connected with me on Facebook have already seen he has provided me with the below letter authorizing my return to work in a few weeks. I do not mind the treatments themselves and Durham has been pretty great but more than ever I am very tired and eager to be done with this entire experience.

As I noted in a previous post I do not generally feel the radiation itself. My treatments consist of a daily visit to the Duke Cancer Center where they escort me back to a machine called a linear accelerator (check it out below). I lay down on a bed and they affix my custom mask as to keep my head from moving, effectively bolting me in to the bed. The radiation therapist who administers the treatment then leaves the room and I sit there for around 10 minutes while the machine beeps and buzzes. The radiation therapist then returns, removes my mask and I'm on my way. I've now had two separate hellacious three-hour MRIs since this process began so the 10-minute treatments feel like a breeze.

Despite the relative painlessness of the treatments there are a few side effects I've experienced. I've been feeling the fatigue my doctor warned me about. It's hard to complain though, as I get the sense from talking to other patients that my fatigue is less severe than the fatigue most of them endure. The scar on the back of my head which had felt painless for several weeks has become sensitive to the touch and is sometimes sore and/or itchy.

The nausea I mentioned in a previous post is occasionally present though they've prescribed me a steroid which has helped a lot except that it makes me want to eat more and all I want to do is lose some of the weight I've tacked on since this started (mainly recovering from the surgeries). The fatigue is the worst of the symptoms - it's strange to want to sleep nearly all the time and to go so long without energy or motivation to do many things. This is probably also why it has been awhile since I last posted to this blog. I'm also inclined to blame any and all unusual pains and sensations on the radiation however unrelated or coincidental they are.

Besides sleeping I have kept busy in Durham. Devin has been here most of the time and I am happy to report we have not yet murdered one another. I'll save the details of what I've done in Durham for another post as it might quadruple the size of this one, but for a quick summary: attended a Carolina Hurricanes hockey game, attended a Durham Bulls baseball game, wrote extensively in my vinyl record notebook, read(ing) a few books, walked/exercised daily, had a visit from my brother & his wife, had a visit from my parents, had a visit from 1-2 friends, inexplicably eclipsed 5,000 followers on my Instagram account, checked out a few local record stores and checked out a few local restaurants. For the past 3+ weeks we've been staying at a place which exists exclusively for cancer patients called The Caring House. It has been pretty great - the support community in the Durham area for people like myself is all around impressive.

Devin, meanwhile, has begun a really cool project hand making bracelets and similar beaded items with metal stamping in support of me/us through my health craziness. She set up an Etsy page to sell them which can be found by clicking here. As I mentioned on Facebook awhile back this is a great opportunity to receive something nice in return for your financial support. She has some new designs up on the Etsy page since we first announced it including some which could be good for Mother's Day, children, couples and grandparents so check that out. She can make personalized charms with dates, names or whatever you want and she doesn't charge much relative to the amount of effort it takes to make them. I like the ones which say #fubkp but there are several other options (and I'm biased). If you're not interested in jewelry and keychains and the like but want to help we still have the YouCaring page which can be found by clicking here.

As usual I am exhausted and fighting to keep the negativity which accompanies this feeling out of this post so I think I'll stop here for now. I finish the radiation treatment on Friday (!!!) and will post again after that, hopefully discussing my next steps before we can officially call this over. Thanks, as always, for reading.