Quick Update
Quick update - Which usually means I'm about to type 6 paragraphs. I feel fine. Still.
3/5 radiation treatments are done. It's an interesting process - I go down to the Duke Cancer Center basement and check in.
Note: If someone you know wants to be a radiologist, make sure they enjoy 1) basements, and 2) cashing checks.
One of the radiation techs, who are usually a team of 2 to 4 women, leads you to a dressing room to undress and put the gown on open to the front (against all previous medical gown experience). Keep the shirt on, but pants and underwear are gone. Walk down the hall like that, clutching the robe closed while carrying whatever you brought. They check my name and birthdate. I check to make sure there's a picture of me on their computer - I don't want someone else's radiation. Then go into a room where they are so nice about trying to offer some privacy before lying down bottomless on the table. Told them several times, this gown is for y'all, not me. These circumstances don't require (or allow for) modesty.
Once on the table, they align my body with green lasers that come from the walls. In the initial session, they drew on my body to align where the lasers hit. In each subsequent session, that same alignment should be replicated. Where they drew on my me is covered with a sticker to keep the mark from wearing away. Currently my back looks a bit like a 3rd grade treasure map.
The techs tug on the sheets to move me and align the lasers to the marks. Once that's good, the leave the room and run the machine. My understanding is that the first few cycles take x-rays to make sure that my body is lined up as expected. They also check the size of my bladder - If the bladder isn't full enough, the machine will send radiation where you don't want it. The first session, one of the techs said my bladder was huge. Didn't want to ruin her day, but I had to tell her I was happily married. Today was the first time my bladder wasn't full enough, so they had to pull me off the machine and drink some water while they took the next patient.
Last, they run the machine while I try to breath belly-down on a table while also staying absolutely still because there are copious levels of radiation beaming into my body. This thought invariably causes me to breath faster, and it all cycles back on itself into several anxious moments until the treatment is finished. Usually a total of less than 15 minutes.
I haven't had any side effects that I can discern yet. I'm not sure when those will come into play. There's a lot of energy hitting my colon/rectum, so that tissue can't be happy. So far, it has been completely painless (That, friends, IS foreshadowing).
For the engineers in the back:
The machine looks about like this: https://rad-onc.arizona.edu/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/treatment_option_image.jpg?itok=RKY4lGNI
And the science behind the therapy I'm getting is: https://www.fairview.org/Patient-Education/Articles/English/i/n/t/e/n/IntensityModulated_Radiation_Therapy_IMRT_for_Cancer_41365
~Ed