Today's zappy, with added infodump!

[annathepiper]

Today was the first day I took the bus from downtown to get to my radiation treatment. This necessitated my catching the 252 at Olive and Terry, and I think it was the 4:05 bus I caught--only it actually reached the bus stop around 4:15. Which doesn't surprise me, given downtown traffic. And as we got onto 520 and then 405, I was made thankful all over again that I no longer have to do the 520 commute. Because damn. I'd really rather forgotten the stop-and-goness that is 405 northbound during rush hour.

The good part of it was, though, that I got off the 252 very near the hospital, an easy short walk. In fact, I got there early enough that I had time beforehand to chat with Michelle, the radiation oncology nurse, who wanted to give me a general infodump about things like my prescribed radiation dosage, what side effects I can expect and when and what to do about them, and what they'll be looking for every week when they do a status check with me.

Overall I'm getting 6440 cGy of radiation. That's "centigray"--apparently the unit of measurement here is the Gray, measuring the dosage of absorbed radiation. For the first six weeks, I'm getting 180 cGy per visit from a photon x-ray beam, and they're doing the entire right breast. During the final and seventh week, they will be switching over to an electron x-ray beam, which will be specifically focused on the area where the surgery was done. At that point the beam will not actually penetrate completely through me, and it will also be a higher dosage per zap, 200 cGy.

Nurse Michelle says that if I have any fatigue issues I can probably expect those around the fourth week or so, though, like Dr. Taylor, she seems to think I'll probably be fine. From what she was saying, the tiredness I may experience sounds a lot like what happens if I'm out in the sun for several hours and get sun-sick--and since she said that the sunburn-like symptoms I may see on my skin will be similiar to what happens with UV sunlight, this makes sense. I told her that I haven't really seriously sunburned often, and that I tend towards mostly tan but kind of pink. We discussed several types of creams I might use for sunburn-like issues, and she approved of the aloe/vitamin E cream solarbird and I already use anyway. But she also gave me a few sample bottles of a cream I can try as well, that's more of a moisturizer thing.

Dr. Taylor will be doing an informal status check with me once a week, just to keep tabs on how I'm doing and to see if there are any issues with the overall state of the breast: is it too tender, how am I feeling in general, that kind of thing. They will also be checking my vitamin D levels. Michelle mentioned that in our region in general there's the interesting question of whether we get enough vitamin D in our diets, especially at this time of year. Since the area they're zapping kind of overlaps with my ribs a bit, they'll want to keep an eye on my bone marrow and stuff. So if my D levels dip a bit, they may want to put me on a D3 supplement.


Getting back was fairly quick and painless, too. Caught the 238 near the hospital, which dropped me off in downtown Bothell. From there I walked down to the bus stop I usually go to after chiro, and from there I was able to hop the 522 straight home. So yay, bus patterns for the next seven weeks all worked out and stuff.

Chris, one of the two radiation techs I'm working with, asked me if there was any possibility I can come in for a 3:40 zapping on Friday since apparently they're having tight staffing issues this week. I'll have to ask my boss about that tomorrow.

And, in honor of this being a medical-themed post, I now have an icon of Katara from Avatar: The Last Airbender healing her hands in the water. Icon by inking_ernie. It seems appropos for medical posts. ^_^

Comments

[angharads-house.livejournal.com]

Wow, thorough briefing you got there, and it looks as if they are giving you quite a bit higher total dose than I got, in terms of centigrays. X-ray beam, also not something we are using up here (we have "old-fashioned" isotopic gamma sources).

Good fortune to thee!

[tiggymalvern.livejournal.com]

Interesting. I thought they would have focussed right from the start, but it sounds like even after all the testing, they still want to cover their bases on missing any. Which I guess is sensible if the side-effects are minor and controlled.

[technoshaman.livejournal.com]

Interesting also the type of radiation for the first half....

Literally getting hit with a photon cannon! How many folks can say that?

[janne.livejournal.com]

Sounds less dramatic than I had envisioned, if bad sunburn symptoms are the worst sideeffects. Keeping fingers crossed that all goes as painlessly as possible.

[poodlgrl.livejournal.com]

Are you feeling tired at all?

[annathepiper]

Nothing yet that can't be explained by having to get up 45 minutes earlier, or by adjusting my thyroid meds! *^_^*

[annathepiper]

Yeah, all things considered I'm pretty sure this'll be a piece of cake. We'll see what happens around week four or so!

And by the way, I got a package from you today! Thank you so much, pleasant-smelling bath crystals FTW! ^_^

[annathepiper]

Hee, yeah! It's all x-rays, from what I understand, but the difference is in the type of beam or something like that? So it's six weeks of photon cannon and then a week of electron.

[annathepiper]

It may be a question of having spotted two potential problem areas in my breast rather than just one, which could suggest the need to zap the whole breast to take out any proto-cells that might be thinking about forming but just haven't yet. But this is just rampant speculation on my part!

And yeah, for the most part the side effects seem to be pretty minor, so yay!

[janne.livejournal.com]

You're welcome! (Site says they're Dead Sea bath salts, which are supposedly extra good for the skin. A little pampering never hurts :)

[annathepiper]

That sounds delightful, and they smell wonderful as well. I shall look forward to enjoying them! :)

[annathepiper]

Yeah, I was very pleased by the amount of data they gave me, and how well it fit in with stuff I was looking up myself. Thank you very much. :)

[ssha.livejournal.com]

I'm guessing they gave you Eucerin cream?

[annathepiper]

Yeah, something called Aquaphor, by Eucerin. Four little sample bottles.

[ssha.livejournal.com]

Yup, that's what they gave me. When you run out, you can go to any drugstore to replace it with a larger bottle, or the sample sizes they gave you. You can probably ask them for more. If I were still close, and knew where my tube of Eucerin went, I'd give it to you.

[annathepiper]

We'll see how it goes. So far I'm actually liking the aloe and vitamin E cream I already was using anyway better than this stuff, but we'll see what happens when I get a little farther along in the zapping. If I start showing signs of needing something heftier than the aloe cream, I'll give this stuff more of a shot. :)

[ssha.livejournal.com]

The vitamin E is the really important part, so you're probably good using what you're using. Also, I believe the Eucerin stuff contains mineral oil, which may or may not please you. YMMV and all that.

[annathepiper]

Checking back in on this, this week's check-in with the doctor and the nurse indicates that they approve of what I'm doing, so I'll keep up with the aloe cream. Though I note that I'm also using tiny amounts of the stuff they gave me. I think they've given me plenty to last me until the radiation treatment is done, though, so I don't think I'll have to buy anything. Yay. :)

[ssha.livejournal.com]

My experience was similar, yeah. You can always get another sample size if you run out, too, I'm sure.