I am in the middle of getting 10 radiation treatments for the evil lumpy on my chest. I get 4 days of electron therapy and then 1 day of photon therapy which goes deeper into the tumor, for total coverage. I'm not supposed to have any side effects, other than burned skin, like a really bad sunburn. I've only had 2 treatments and I can definitely feel the heat on my skin. I'm trying to put aloe on it and hope the burns won't be that bad. Dr. Ramakrishna is in charge of setting up my treatment plan and blasting this thing. Within the walls of the office, Dr. Ramakrishna is all business and doesn't have the warm and fuzziest bedside manor. That is fine, though, because he is the best and as long as he helps save my life, we are all good. Well, this last doctor's appointment, there was a bit of a shift.
At some of my hospital visits, there is a form that I have to fill out over and over again. It's the form with the outline of a body on it where you are supposed to circle the part of your body that hurts. Well, I usually take those forms as an opportunity to show that I am a real person and not just a number, so I draw ridiculous faces on the heads and add flowers or balloons or whatnot.
For Dr. Ramakrishna's appointment, I drew a hideous lump coming out of my chest and a happy face on the head. I added a talk box saying that I was in pain and needed his help. Then I added flowers in the hands of my person. Nobody took the form during our visit, but apparently the doctor saw it later.
When I showed up last Monday for the scan/simulation of the tumor, the doctor came running over to me all smiley. He said he was sorry he didn't take my form at the time but he really appreciated my picture and thought it was "communicative." Heh heh. I'll say. He kept going on about how creative I was and was so friendly and laughing. I had never seen this doctor act like that before.
But here he was, totally friendly and charismatic. I guess art, no matter how much it looks like a three year old drew it, brings people together. I am so surprised and glad to be able to have gotten his attention like that. It's fun to see him let his hair down and laugh a bit.
Eight more radiation treatments to go. Die lumpy die!!!
Hey Laura. I've been out of town a lot this summer and must admit I haven't logged onto your Cancercopia website in quite awhile but I'm happy to see that overall things are looking good with your scans/tests. Having to go thru radiation for this lump by your sternum sucks but is nothing compared to what you've gone through...I hope to see you sometime this month with all the BC awareness stuff going on. I'll be walking in both Komen (team Fight Like A Girl) and ACS (team Ellen's Angels) plus will be at various functions so hopefully radiation won't fatique you too much and you'll be able to be there too. Pink Hugs, Darla
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