Radiation

Yesterday I had my first radiation treatment. It went well. My appointment was for 1:45 p.m. My friend Marilyn went with me. Her husband worked there for 7 years until he was hired by Huntsman Cancer Institute. When we got there they took me right back to the treatment room. I laid down on a thin metal table and had to put my hands above my head like I did with the CT scan. This wasn't very comfortable partly because I am 5' 10" tall so my arms are longer than most women. I was supposed to hold onto two bars above my head but because of my long arms I had to bend my wrists down to hold onto them. This put pressure on the inside of my wrists and made my arms go numb. I had to stay like that for approximately 35 minutes while trying not to move.

After I laid down the technicians adjusted my body so that the dots that they drew on me last week were lined up with the machine then they took an x-ray of me. After showing the x-ray to the doctor they adjusted my body a little then took another x-ray. This one seemed to be right so they did my first dose of radiation on the area around my collar bone. This is to get any cancer cells that may have migrated from the lymph nodes that they removed to the lymph nodes by the collar bone. Next they moved the machine to another area, more to the side, and took another x-ray. That one we got right the first time so they gave me a dose of radiation on that area. Finally they moved to another angle and took a final x-ray and then dose of radiation. After the actual radiation treatment was complete it was time to get my permanent markers. The technician gave me 7 pin prick size tattoos. This was the most painful part of the visit. It was like getting 7 shots that are still a little sore today. They look like someone took a fine tip permanent marker and drew 7 fine black dots on me. To someone who doesn't know differently they probably look like a black freckle or tiny mole. Only one can be seen if I have on a t-shirt with a scooped neckline. I don't know why anyone would want to sit through that over and over again to get an actual tattoo that looks like something. I am too much of a wimp to go through that kind of pain if I don't absolutely have to. The whole radiation process took 45 minutes from when we arrived to when we left.

When I asked the technician how radiation works she basically said that the radiation damages ALL the cells in the area that it hits. Normal cells when hit with a small amount of radiation are able to repair themselves. Cancer cells are a mutant or abnormal mutation of the original cell. They can't repair themselves very well so the radiation ends up destroying them or at least that is the hope.

When I went for my radiation today I was in and out in 15 minutes. It took me longer to get parked and walk inside than it took for the actual treatment. The radiation to the three different sites took approximately 5 minutes. That included the technician putting this warm rubber mat on top of me to fool the machine into thinking that my skin was closer to it than it actually was so that the radiation can treat the top layers of skin as well as the tissue below. The radiation room was much warmer today which was nice also.