Hi, Tracy,
Yesterday's experience brought back a memory of a term I learned 20-30 years ago from Jack Gordon, the executive director of the state's restaurant association. He was referring to motels that rented out rooms for four hours at a time. They were "hot sheet" motels, I believe he said. The name implied the reason for the short rental periods.
I had that experience when I went in for radiation today. When I went into the dressing booth prior to my second treatment (The first was Thursday, Feb. 2.), I put on the pajama bottoms and then had to wait because someone else was ahead of me. When I walked in and saw the platform I would lay on, it struck me that these enormous machines are pretty expensive and take up a lot of room, so that don't have a whole bank of them. There's just one platform, and I was about to climb onto the surface that someone else had just used a few minutes earlier.
My colon
As I will for all the treatments, I had walked to Group Health after waking early, eating an apple, and then a smoothie. I don't have those famous five-minute Gravensteins we grew in Pacific -- the ones that, for some pavlovian reason caused me to do my business quickly every morning that I ate one. But the Costco Pink Ladies were pretty good at that. It didn't happen this day, however, because I've started my weight-loss diet, the one that took off 35 pounds about 12 years ago. I have regained 25 pounds, and I want to descend back to 185 pounds, so I ate light yesterday. The only thing the doctor saw in my lower bowel today, when he scanned my body prior to the radiation treatment, was gas. That's good. You want an empty colon.
My bladder
But you want a full bladder. The fuller the better, so it's a bit of a juggling match to figure out how to fill it just full enough that it enhances the radiation treatment without requiring a potty call before it's over. Yesterday my bladder wasn't full enough, so today I pre-loaded it with a banana-OJ smoothie and then headed out to radiology, where I drank more than a pint of water prior to the procedure. We went through with it, but the doctor would have liked a fuller bladder. Next time, walk to the hospital with your "Platypus," the technician suggested. That's a type of water bladder that backpackers carry. They can walk and drink at the same time, with their hands free.
My "private parts"
I smiled to myself one time when your mother was having her stem cell transplant and the assistant was bathing her. She asked whether your mom wanted to bathe her "private parts" herself. Yeah. Like there's anything private in a hospital. I crawled up on the platform, lay back, and one of the three female technicians present started pulling my pj's and undershorts down. They do that every time. Maybe they think they're the president -- you know how people just let celebrities do that. In this case, however, there was no grabbing. She claimed they were looking for my tattoos (the ones they use to target the machines). OK, whatever. They're celebrity technicians. Who am I to resist?
The machines
It's hard to describe them, particularly because I'm laying on my back, very still, holding a rubber donut on my chest to keep my arms immobile. I only get to stare at the floral design on the ceiling, while the metal monstrosities -- which remind me in an abstract way of praying mantises -- roll around above and beside me as they scan or radiate. I didn't feel a thing, although I had a hot-flash lying there. I don't think it was all those excited prostate protons, just the bicalutimide--the hormone suppressant. One of the attendants noted I looked warm as she helped me rise up following the procedure.
It started at 8:45 a.m. or thereabouts. I was back on the street at 9:17. I still can't believe it was that fast.
The treatments resume next week.
Love,
Dad
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