Radiation: Spooky, Not Scary
I should probably wait until I have had a few more sessions before I report, but I kind of don't believe it is going to get worse. Maybe it will be tiring but I don't even see why that would be true. The bottom line: they are so ready for it to be uncomfortable that they make sure to keep the patient so comfortable that nothing seems very bad. It was totally fine. But I will still tell the story because most people don't know what happens down in the basement at the Radiation Oncology department of the hospital. I have one tiny view to share.
The first question was, "what size underwear do you wear?" Then the tech went to rummage around in the closet or something. She arrived with a lovely giant pair of underwear that I did not examine fully but it had a strap that wrapped from the back around underneath and up the front, attaching at the belly. This strap was to stabilize the cylinder that was going to be inserted. So we are standing there, about three of us, in this big room with a CT machine in the middle. The ladies tell me to put on the underwear. Right here? Right now? Okay, so I took off my pants and put on the underwear and then got onto the mattress that slides into the scanner. Then a bunch more people came in the room, the ladies flipped the blanket up and said, "oops, you put the underwear on backwards." Drat. So there was an undignified flurry of activity while we turned the underwear around, with a roomful of people, and then the doctor (the only man in the room, as it happened) put the cylinder in while about four women stood at my head and gave me instructions about breathing in and out and staying relaxed. It was a non-issue. The cylinder went in and we were ready for the CT scan.
They had to do a scan to see how everything fits together inside of me. That took some time, then there was a wait of about half an hour while the Physics Team did the work of making the customized treatment plan. The Physics Team was programming something to make sure the gamma rays aimed exactly right at the place that the doctor wanted to zap.
Then two smallish techs (women) said they were going to move me onto another gurney. Really? With this cylinder still in place? Yep. You are going to lift me? Well, of course they had a system that was incredibly smooth -- they just slid me off the narrow bed and onto one that rolled, without missing a beat. They rolled me down the hallway and into a small room that had a High Dose Rate machine in it. The machine is called an "afterloader." They attach a small tube to the cylinder, connecting it to the afterloader -- this allows the radioactive material to travel into me.
The room is like a closet, but it has this big machine in it and two cameras on the wall and some kind of an intercom so I can say STOP I don't want to do this any more. They all leave the room and the giant spooky vault door closes very slowly. The machine starts to make noise, then everything stops all of a sudden. The vault door opens very slowly and a tech comes back in to make an adjustment. She leaves again and then there is five minutes of humming, clicking, buzzing. Then we are done. The Physics guy came in with a Geiger counter to make sure that the radioactivity was in the right place, and not beyond a certain point in me (or something). Everything seemed good.
All along they kept asking me if I had any questions. So I asked one of the techs how she got into this line of work. She said she decided she wanted to do something where she saw the same patient over and over, not just once. But that didn't really answer the question of why she would choose to be in the basement with radiation equipment. She was nice and friendly and very capable, but what a strange job. Then I asked the Physics guy (a small earnest Chinese man) what it meant to make a plan. He tried to figure out how to answer that, but he mostly just said they try to do exactly what the doctor wants, within a millimeter. They had stopped the machine before because it was a half millimeter off. The other techs said the Physics guys are super nerds and they are lucky to have them.
At no point did anything hurt me. It was all very strange and high tech and I kept thinking, "who THINKS of this stuff?" Who figures out that it makes sense to make a pair of underwear with a hole in the bottom and a strap? Who figured out how to deliver this radioactive material so precisely right into the middle of a person?
I am lucky to be allowed to have access to all this fancy technology. I am lucky to have medical professionals who care a lot about not scaring me or not hurting me. I may have side effects eventually but right now I feel totally normal. There are four more sessions of this weirdness. And then I will be all done.
I came home and hoed some parsnips, just for good measure. Then I had a teleconference meeting for an hour, then Carrie and I bagged some greens while her girls waited around for us to finish. Their season has only just begun. They will find themselves down at the stand in the evening more than they even know. Eventually the baby will get up on her feet but for now she is just scraping up dirt from the floor, all over her front. Life is very good.
The first question was, "what size underwear do you wear?" Then the tech went to rummage around in the closet or something. She arrived with a lovely giant pair of underwear that I did not examine fully but it had a strap that wrapped from the back around underneath and up the front, attaching at the belly. This strap was to stabilize the cylinder that was going to be inserted. So we are standing there, about three of us, in this big room with a CT machine in the middle. The ladies tell me to put on the underwear. Right here? Right now? Okay, so I took off my pants and put on the underwear and then got onto the mattress that slides into the scanner. Then a bunch more people came in the room, the ladies flipped the blanket up and said, "oops, you put the underwear on backwards." Drat. So there was an undignified flurry of activity while we turned the underwear around, with a roomful of people, and then the doctor (the only man in the room, as it happened) put the cylinder in while about four women stood at my head and gave me instructions about breathing in and out and staying relaxed. It was a non-issue. The cylinder went in and we were ready for the CT scan.
They had to do a scan to see how everything fits together inside of me. That took some time, then there was a wait of about half an hour while the Physics Team did the work of making the customized treatment plan. The Physics Team was programming something to make sure the gamma rays aimed exactly right at the place that the doctor wanted to zap.
Then two smallish techs (women) said they were going to move me onto another gurney. Really? With this cylinder still in place? Yep. You are going to lift me? Well, of course they had a system that was incredibly smooth -- they just slid me off the narrow bed and onto one that rolled, without missing a beat. They rolled me down the hallway and into a small room that had a High Dose Rate machine in it. The machine is called an "afterloader." They attach a small tube to the cylinder, connecting it to the afterloader -- this allows the radioactive material to travel into me.
The room is like a closet, but it has this big machine in it and two cameras on the wall and some kind of an intercom so I can say STOP I don't want to do this any more. They all leave the room and the giant spooky vault door closes very slowly. The machine starts to make noise, then everything stops all of a sudden. The vault door opens very slowly and a tech comes back in to make an adjustment. She leaves again and then there is five minutes of humming, clicking, buzzing. Then we are done. The Physics guy came in with a Geiger counter to make sure that the radioactivity was in the right place, and not beyond a certain point in me (or something). Everything seemed good.
All along they kept asking me if I had any questions. So I asked one of the techs how she got into this line of work. She said she decided she wanted to do something where she saw the same patient over and over, not just once. But that didn't really answer the question of why she would choose to be in the basement with radiation equipment. She was nice and friendly and very capable, but what a strange job. Then I asked the Physics guy (a small earnest Chinese man) what it meant to make a plan. He tried to figure out how to answer that, but he mostly just said they try to do exactly what the doctor wants, within a millimeter. They had stopped the machine before because it was a half millimeter off. The other techs said the Physics guys are super nerds and they are lucky to have them.
At no point did anything hurt me. It was all very strange and high tech and I kept thinking, "who THINKS of this stuff?" Who figures out that it makes sense to make a pair of underwear with a hole in the bottom and a strap? Who figured out how to deliver this radioactive material so precisely right into the middle of a person?
I am lucky to be allowed to have access to all this fancy technology. I am lucky to have medical professionals who care a lot about not scaring me or not hurting me. I may have side effects eventually but right now I feel totally normal. There are four more sessions of this weirdness. And then I will be all done.
I came home and hoed some parsnips, just for good measure. Then I had a teleconference meeting for an hour, then Carrie and I bagged some greens while her girls waited around for us to finish. Their season has only just begun. They will find themselves down at the stand in the evening more than they even know. Eventually the baby will get up on her feet but for now she is just scraping up dirt from the floor, all over her front. Life is very good.
I have been lax about checking here, but a Cleveland friend reminded me to come back. I still think there should be a way for me to get a notification, anyhow, visions of your special underpants are making me giggle.
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