Feb 20, 2011

With three more radiation treatments to go my skin is feeling the heat. It blistered up this weekend and is moderately painful, like a really bad sunburn. Of course I would have had to be at a topless beach for this one. Huh! Don't think so. Energy level has been pretty good the last couple of weeks, but today has been spent in rest mode. Some days the tiredness just hits me hard. I often think this is what an 80 year old must feel like. When I bend down it takes some effort to get back up. Most times when this happens, I just laugh at myself cause I just think it's funny, crickity, crackity old body.

Everything else is great. The radiation treatments have gone by so quickly I can't believe it. I usually run into these two older guys at radiation who talk up a storm. It's comical how when you are in these places with other cancer patients all privacy gets thrown out the window. They talk freely with me about their prostate cancer, treatments, and such. I'm usually the only woman in there and these guys just give me such a kick. I have found this to be true though in a few different places that I have been. People want to talk and they want to talk with other people who have some idea of what they are going through. It's therapy, just a different kind, and I enjoy listening.

Feb 3, 2011

Over half-way done with radiation and so far so good. Relatively speaking radiation doesn't even hold a candle to chemo. I have been fatigued, mostly in the evening and more so towards the end of the week, like today. My skin is holding up pretty well with some mild burning, but nothing that is really bothering me. My joints are telling me that I'm like 80 when I'm only 42. Feeling good in all ways otherwise. Oh, yeah, hot flashes. Got em now. Chemo put me into a possibly temporary menopause. Saw my oncologist today for a check up and she said this happens about 50% of the time in pre-menopausal woman. Hormone therapy is next. I will start that a week or two after radiation is complete, and that will go for five years. Feels like the end and in a way it is, in three weeks I will be done with radiation and move to just taking a couple of pills every day and checking up with the doctor every four months. My hair is slowly beginning to cover my head, it's a little fuzzy currently, and in a few months I will have to start styling it again. One kinda nice thing through all of this is that I have saved a ton of time washing, drying, and styling my hair. I can go from my bed to showered and out the door in like fifteen minutes. How many other women can say that?