Tattoo You

September 21, 2008 at 8:16 am | In breast cancer | Leave a Comment

Yes, that is a reference to the Rolling Stones’ 1981 album. This was released when I was a kid–and yes, the Stones were “old” by the time I was hitting my teens, but they were still great. I’m probably around the age now that they were when they released Tattoo You, but to me they were old. Positively ancient. But the cool kids loved them.

Last week I got prepped for radiation treatment, which starts Monday. In preparation, I had to have two appointments for taking measurements and in the process, I got five pinhead-sized tattoos on my skin, which will presumably help guide the radiation therapists to make for the most accurate treatment possible. Having chickened out of getting a tattoo in the 90s, I’m thrilled to now be one of the cool kids with not one but five tattoos.

The fact that I have to have radiation has proved to be more psychologically challenging than I had expected. I described the feeling to one person as being knocked flat, then learning to walk again, only to be knocked down again. I have been working so hard to recover, only to learn from my new oncologist that more treatment is needed. Though I don’t expect this to be as physically challenging as chemotherapy, the 6 weeks of 5 days/week radiation is probably going to cause fatigue and skin irritation so I am told. Given my history, that probably means going to bed at 5pm and having a lot of pain.

The entire process has been surreal. The high-tech nature of radiation is both highly personalized and dehumanizing at the same time. They spend a lot of time taking preliminary x-rays and measurements–I have spent a good hour lying on a white table with an x-ray machine rotating around me and computers whirring and making determinations about where and how to radiate me. The treatment is tailored specifically to my body. But lying there, I feel less like a human than a science experiment. I hardly recognize myself anymore, with all the scars, the tattoos, the crazy-short (gray) hair. I keep wondering when I’ll look in the mirror and see myself again. Or maybe I’ll just get used to the new me. We shall see.

“Life is a series of experiences, each of which makes us bigger, even though it is hard to realize this. For the world was built to develop character, and we must learn that the setbacks and grieves which we endure help us in our marching onward.” (Henry Ford)

September 4, 2008 at 8:04 pm | In breast cancer, cancer, health | Leave a Comment

Setbacks.  Ah, joys. I have experienced several recently.  First, the LTR (laryngotracheal reflux) I have been suffering from since last fall has recurred and stayed with me since chemo (it had disappeared after my initial surgery) and my new insurance refuses to cover the one and only med that actually works.  So lately I’ve been in agonizing pain all day, every day.  Trying to be semi-normal toward and amongst others has been tough going at times.

Second, I met with my new oncologist here in NC and she has prescribed a bunch of tests (bone density, ultrasound, blood work, and more) to check various states of my being, and she also believes I ought to have radiation, given the amount of tumor I had and the “impressively high” odds I have of recurrence.  This was not what I wanted to hear.  What I wanted to hear was that she had a cure for my chemo brain, which doesn’t seem to be improving.  But she just said that will take patience.  Sometimes it takes years.

While I feel very well taken care of, and was overall impressed with the facility, which seems to offer one-stop shopping for the cancer patient (they even drew my blood right then and there–about 103 tubes of it), the last thing I wanted to hear was that 1) even though I’m on hormone blockers I might still be producing estrogen, which is what feeds my type of cancer, 2) that I might have to endure more treatment via radiation, 3) that the hormone blockers might be causing osteoporosis.  I appreciate her thoroughness, but would have been happier had she just said I am a-ok and ready to move on with my life.

No such luck.

I did get a referral to a plastic surgeon to consult about what I hope to be the final phase of my reconstruction.  I need to find another word for it, though; I can’t ever hear that word without thinking of it with a capital R, and no self-respecting southerner could hear that word without conjuring up images of carpetbaggers and the general misery that followed the Late Unpleasantness (you may know it as the Civil War or, as my Virginia relatives used to say, “the Wawah of Nawthun AggRESHun”).

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