On this momentous occasion of subjecting you all to the 100th entry on my blog, I can tell you all about my new tattoos. Yup. You read it right I have been tattooed. They are used to align the radiation treatments. There are lasers on either side of the room that aim at me in the middle on the machine where I will get zapped. (We're going to refer to it as zapped. It sounds like more fun.) Anyway, I knew that they were going to mark me somehow but it hadn't sunk in that it was a permanent tattoo. I have prided myself in having made it through my 20s without any ink. So much for making it through another decade. Oh well. They are itty-bitty.
The best part is when I asked the nurse "Are they real tattoos?", her answer was "Yeah. Just like the tattoos you get in prison." Do I look like I am intimately familiar with the prison system? Do many of her patients make that connection? 'Oh yeah, when I was in prison that time and they tattooed me...'
During the appointment I was written on by the doctor and lined up in the Zapper, then sent to CT scan to see where my heart is so they don't zap it. It was a little longer appointment than usual and I left with my schedule for treatment. I'll begin on Thursday, October 11th at 8:30 am and then every day, 5 days a week, at 8:45 going forward for 30 treatments. I should be done on the Wednesday before Turkey-day. Providing that the machine is up and running each day and I can keep to the schedule. I expect that my Thanksgiving will be low-key physically but provide an abundance of things on the list to be grateful for.
I told the doctor that she really needed to get on board with this whole 'I'm not getting cancer again' vibe and fast. She relented on the super-clavicular (on my collar bone) radiation when I told her I wanted to do what was necessary and not much more. I expressed my belief that radiation is basically the "icing on the cake" portion of my treatment. She was ok with it. Stuck in her 2¢ about those crazy clavicular lymph nodes going and getting cancer. It's not happening. That's that.
The best part is when I asked the nurse "Are they real tattoos?", her answer was "Yeah. Just like the tattoos you get in prison." Do I look like I am intimately familiar with the prison system? Do many of her patients make that connection? 'Oh yeah, when I was in prison that time and they tattooed me...'
During the appointment I was written on by the doctor and lined up in the Zapper, then sent to CT scan to see where my heart is so they don't zap it. It was a little longer appointment than usual and I left with my schedule for treatment. I'll begin on Thursday, October 11th at 8:30 am and then every day, 5 days a week, at 8:45 going forward for 30 treatments. I should be done on the Wednesday before Turkey-day. Providing that the machine is up and running each day and I can keep to the schedule. I expect that my Thanksgiving will be low-key physically but provide an abundance of things on the list to be grateful for.
I told the doctor that she really needed to get on board with this whole 'I'm not getting cancer again' vibe and fast. She relented on the super-clavicular (on my collar bone) radiation when I told her I wanted to do what was necessary and not much more. I expressed my belief that radiation is basically the "icing on the cake" portion of my treatment. She was ok with it. Stuck in her 2¢ about those crazy clavicular lymph nodes going and getting cancer. It's not happening. That's that.
5 comments:
LOVE YOU "TATTOOED LADY"-DAD
Hey...Are there a bunch of them?...Can we play connect the dots? :) Love you -MEO
There are 3 tattoos. It'd be relatively boring straight line of connect the dots except for anatomy. I think all my moles and freckles could make it more interesting though, something to consider. ; )
LTDHTT.
more later, ok?
love,
cherie
You can always turn three little dots into a "fabulous, cooler, designed by an Emmy award winning designer, didn't get them in prison, I BEAT Cancer," real tatoo. I've always been a fan of the lady bug...three TRIUMPHANT lady bugs, perhaps.
May that warrior we love and learned OH SO MUCH from surface this weekend, and kick some butt.
I love you. Laurie
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