Today is my first radiotherapy meeting – it is just a prep talk with Dr. Ricke at the radiation center! I have to bring all my paperwork, but forget the referral …. yep, I still sport my chemo brain 😉.
Dr. Ricke – on the contrary – is very efficient and talks me through the possible side effects, which can apparently still appear months after radiation. The radio beams will enter my breast from the side, which means that my rips, heart and lungs will only be minimally touched. I am lucky that only the breast needs radiation, which keeps the potential burns to one area, but they can only start when the breast has healed (I still had bloodstains in my bed this morning 🙄, but the swelling is going down every day). She is positive though that April 19 is still realistic. We are talking 28 sessions – five days a week, sometimes six, which could potentially take me to May 29….. and I would just miss the QM2 mini cruise I wanted to book….. hmmmmm….but I will check next week, if it will definitely be that long first and I can go to Berlin with Maja in June! Yipehhh! Dr. Ricke recommends the afternoon for radiation, as the mornings are quite busy, but I want to do it when the kids are in Kindergarten and won’t spoil the rest of my day, if I do it first thing in the morning 😉. If necessary, I can still get taxi transfers, which makes is very easy!
Next week, they will draw all different lines and crosses on my torso to make sure the rays will enter in the same angle every time…. I have seen pictures and I will look a bit like a human sewing pattern, which has to stay on my body for the entire six weeks (I am still allowed to shower though 😉).
Birthday breakfast with Simone, a shopping scroll and physio fill my day before I am picking up Leo now! The financial impact of being sick is not funny, as I only get 60% of my salary, but hey, I get 60% more than a lot of other cancer patients in other countries and I do appreciate every penny! My savings are less and less, but I don’t really care, still go shopping and have endless coffees while enjoying life!
Kick Cancer Chick 