28. Taking a Rad Trip - Part 2
Monday 30th July
It was a nice idea, having a weekend to sleep in and no trips to the hospital…so my husband has a disc extrusion in his back at the moment and wakes very early. Saturday morning 2.30AM!!!!! I was asleep on and off, 4pm, 5pm…Sunday we were both awake at 6am..sigh. We had a lovely 34th wedding anniversary though. Went out for lunch – Vietnamese. Nice.
Last night I slept in the spare bed. Great sleep. Poor guy, he was very lonely sleeping by himself.
Back to the hospital today for a ‘late’ 9.30am appointment. All straight forward. Tomorrow hubby is coming to see what happens and meet the staff.
I came home and sliced off the biggest piece of aloe vera and took the spikes off, then sliced off the skin and rubbed it all over my breast, very soothing. And messy! (Yes, I washed the leaf thoroughly first!) I’ve also found a deodorant I can use as most deodorant is on the banned list.*
This morning I bought some Free Runs as I don’t want to wear my tacky old sneakers and my new runners are for, well, running! Lying on the table made me realize how battered the old ones were and needed replacing. These look awesome, pink and grey and are very comfortable for all the walking, too.
I had to have a nap this afternoon and trying to drag myself out of sleep later was like trying to wake up after surgery. Then I went to the gym and did 35 mins on the bike and burnt 235 cals and also did some floor exercises and core stuff.
This evening I’ve been doing some work on setting up my blog – buying a domain name and trying to choose a theme from WordPress. I may as well put all my stories from this road trip into a blog as I’ll never get a book to publish out of it I think.
Gotta go to bed, out the door at 8.40am in the morning and will encounter some school traffic.
note to self: put hospital number in mobile in case I get stuck in traffic.
*(a number of products are banned when having radiotherapy, as they can react with the treatment. Deodorant is a no no as most contain aluminum. Shaving is out as it’s possible to cut the skin and for infection to get in. I can’t let shampoo get on the area and I’m not to use soap, but a soap free body wash is acceptable)
Thursday 2nd August
It was nice to mark the ‘one week down’ point, only 5 weeks to go! It’s a good routine now, knowing where to park on what days and when I get there, grab a cup of water, go to the loo after I get changed, try to remember the girls’ names – seems to be a few different ones every couple of days. It’s easy to remember the guy’s name – only come across one of them so far and he’s lovely.
It was great to have my husband come and see what the whole procedure is about. The staff were great and took plenty of time to explain things to him. When he asked about the machinery, they asked if he was an engineer! Can’t hide an enquiring mind! They let him take some photos of the machine too.
The last couple of days have been frantic and not how I intended to approach all this at all, but it’s been stuff out of my control.
When I got to work on Tuesday (at noon) my job share girl looked at me and suggested I don’t come in till 3pm on Tuesdays from now on. It will be so much better to just work 5 hours and I can have a nap before work. I was so grateful. Getting home at 8.30pm is tiring as it is. Doesn’t look like I can get an earlier time slot on Fridays for treatment as they have a team meeting from 8.45-9.30am, but that’s ok.
Yesterday the wheels fell off when my driver’s side car window wouldn’t go up (at 5pm) I AM grateful it wasn’t raining, but it was cold. We managed to get it booked in today for a service (don’t get it back till tomorrow night) but I could have cried, it just tipped me into despair. We got my parents car last night, hubby shouldn’t really be driving, but as it’s only 4km he could manage the automatic. Wore hats, gloves, coats and had the heater on with cold air pouring in the window!
Today I dropped hubby for a meeting at Centerlink at 8.30am (about my crisis/trauma insurance payout) then got to the hospital for my 9am treatment, but they were running late. Then it was up to see the doctor as it was Thursday. My oncologist is away so I saw a radiology oncologist. Nothing much to say, see or do. One encouragement was he said ‘they got it nice and early’ so that made me feel better. Hubby walked to the hospital and met me just after that, then we went for a coffee. Came home and got our car to the service place, about 6kms away and he managed the drive ok.
It’s been nice to have a little break (read: do housework) before I drop him back for another interview about his injury and ability to find work and then I’m into Fitzroy for Chinese Medicine Treatment. That will be nice, to sleep and come out feeling more balanced, hopefully my pulses will be down and BP stabilized. Then it’s taking hubby to his Dr at 4.40pm for more steroids. I’m not sure whose state of health this blog is about!
My breast wasn’t as sore or tender most of yesterday but today it’s getting sore again. The oncologist didn’t seem to think that was a big deal and normal. Hasn’t been normal for the last 2 months since surgery, but I’ll get more feedback next week when my oncologist is back. Time to go make up our son’s bed – he’s back from Greece late Saturday night, hopefully not too late!!