Week 3: Radiation, chemotherapy, and reactions

Week 3 of the Cycle 1: (7-11 October 2024)

The schedule of Monday to Friday daily radiation treatments continues. This week started with Public Holiday so treatments started Tuesday (8 Oct). It is amazing how much time can be devoured by attending a 20 minute treatment each day. I have no visible signs that I am having radiation treatments and I am amazed that my reaction to treatments varies so much from day to day. Some days nothing. Other days it knocks me out for a few hours when I get home. It could be that what makes me tired has more to do with reactions to the combined therapy regime than to the radiation itself. The interactive mysteries of combined chemoradiation therapy are as hard for the lay person to comprehend (what is causing that reaction – radiation or chemo?), as they are for the medical team to predict the type, number, severity, or timing of reactive side effects that an individual patient will experience. In my case, so far, I have only faced mild and manageable side effects. I have not lost my hair. Of course, the impacts of chemoradiation therapy are cumulative and what lies ahead after the second infusion (14 October) is unknown.

The members of my medical team are uniformly amazing practitioners and kind and generous human beings. They are all so YOUNG!!!!! I am at least 20 years older than the senior doctors and cancer nurse coordinators overseeing my treatments and looking after me, and I am 30-40+ years older than the medical registrars, radiographers, nurses, dietition, pharmacists, and students who are part of my treatment and support team. Eeeech.