Musician with AN, contemplating Radiation/Radiosurgery

[Jim Scott]

Phanta ~

Congratulations!  I'm pleased to learn that your financial obstacles are being dealt with and your treatment can proceed.

My experience as an FSR patient was that the sessions were relatively short and totally uneventful with no real side-effects.  Best of all, they were successful!  I trust that you'll have a similar experience. 

Please try to keep us updated.  Thanks.

Jim

[Tumbleweed]

Good luck with your treatments, Phanta!

Best wishes,
TW

[phantagrae]

Thanks, guys!

I go tomorrow morning (the 10th) to have my mask made for the treatments, and then at noon I'll have a fresh MRI done for the radiation plotting.
My treatments then begin on the 22nd.

My parents are coming out for the first week of my treatments, just to kind of make sure everything goes well and to be supportive, so I'll probably take a day or two off from work to hang out with them.  It will be nice having them out here--but it means I have to clean my apartment!!

One thing I'm wondering about is the idea of possible fatigue.  I have a mild chronic anemia and I haven't been to my hematologist for a check-up in a little over 2 years due to my insurance issues.  I have had to have an Iron IV every 2 or 3 years and the last one I had was in March of 2011.  I suspect that my ferritin levels may have dropped low enough to warrant another IV (I can usually tell by my energy level and my intolerance of cold), but, of course, I'd need to see the hematologist.

I might talk to the doctor or nurses tomorrow to ask their opinion.  I figure that if I need an IV that will certainly help with my energy levels going into the treatments...

[Tumbleweed]

I concur that talking with your doctors about your anemia history is important.

You might not suffer any significant fatigue, though, considering how fractionated (divided into many small doses) your treatment plan calls for.

Again, good luck. You're on your way to better health.

Best wishes,
TW

[phantagrae]

So, I had the mask made on the 10 and it was a little more stressful than I had hoped, but thankfully that was the worst of it--and it wasn't really that bad.
I've never really been claustrophobic, but the mask, though not at all painful, was so close on my face that I got a little antsy.

I did see my hematologist on Monday, and my numbers weren't all that bad--I'm usually just right under the bottom end of "normal", but this time I was right at the bottom end of the normal range.  I won't hear about my hematocrit levels until the end of the week, to see if I might need an iron IV, but if my numbers weren't too bad, I might be okay for a while longer.

And now I've started my treatments--I started on the 22nd--and I will go each week day through the end of August.  The treatments themselves are very easy.
I lie down on the table and get positioned, they do an x-ray or two to make sure I'm properly aligned and then it starts.  It takes almost exactly 30 minutes from the time I walk into the clinic to the time I walk out, so my time in treatment is very short.
For me the hardest part is lying on my back.  My lower back doesn't like that!

The only incident I had was on Monday when they were snapping the mask into place.  The technician accidentally caught my skin on the front of my shoulder, so now I have a little "love bite" from the mask...

At any rate, things are going well so far, though it's only been 3 days.
I'm looking forward to the day when it's all done.  Since I get to keep my mask, I think it's going to go up on the wall...