Today, Monday the 2nd of March 2015, is a milestone in my Radiation Therapy.
2/3 complete – session 22 of 33
Kind of comical, though – I’ll tell you all about it …
I went through my normal morning routine preparing for the radiation session – starting 3 hours before my appointment.
You know, W-K-V-S-E-G-H.
That stands for:
- Walk – 2 miles around the ring road to wake up
- Kegels – 70 (exercises to strengthen the pelvic floor muscles)
- Vacuum Therapy – an ED thing after surgery
- Shower – to wash off the road slush from OC Transpo and hospital commuters
- Eat – breakfast of hot oatmeal, granola, egg-on-a-bagel, yogurt – any of that at random
- Go – another 2 mile walk to my Radiation North therapy appointment
- Hydrate – rapidly drink 750 ml of H2O and wait for the ‘full bladder pain’ in about 30 minutes
Of course, that’s just a simplification of a bunch of other things that go on in one’s morning routine – it’s just a short form to remind me of the more important tasks at hand that I don’t want to forget.
This bit of structure usually makes for another successful day in killing off some more of the pesky cancer cells with a healthy round of photons from ‘Linac-8’ – my personal radiation canon, compliments of tOH – The Ottawa Hospital.
Throughout this sequence, of course, I drink 4 or 5 small glasses (about 200 ml each) of good old Rotel motel water to build up my body’s baseline hydration level for the day’s radiation session.
That’s it – forever hold your ‘pee’ce until the session is all over – if you can !!
And, this is where the day started to get a bit crazy.
It had been pretty cold the past few days (minus 20 deg. C or so), but today there was a reprieve – so I thought. I checked my computer for the local temperature and it was a ‘toasty’ minus 4.
A veritable Spring day. You think?
Stupid me didn’t check the wind speed – aka ‘wind chill’ factor. So, off I went with SPRING in mind (and apparently nothing else), and without hat or gloves and the inner sweater needed for those extra minus temperatures.
Boy – was the ‘Go‘ phase ever COLD !!!
Gulp, gulp, gulp, slurp … burp !!
300 ml down. – a few minutes go by …
Gulp, gulp, slop … wipe off the drips, sheepishly, as other gulpers look over the top of their own water mugs in agreement with the process.
Another 200 ml hit the stomach with a cold splash!
I look over beside me to see an elderly gentleman – like myself – feeling a bit uneasy, standing, fussing a little and with a concerned look on his face.
It was at this point that I noticed the ‘white board’ next to the sign-in robot (computer). There was note scribed beside ‘Unit 8′ that said ’25 minutes’ – that meant that there was a delay in the schedule for my unit – and, coincidentally the same unit as assigned to the new gentleman – sort of lightly ‘standing’ about.
Oh boy !!
A waiting hydrating patient’s worst nightmare – the bladder on course for ‘full’, ‘urgent’ status – the schedule stymied by complex circumstances surrounding multiple ‘Linacs’, myriads of high tech computers, hundreds of therapists and support staff and many hundreds of patients in all circumstances of compromised health requiring radiation treatment.
I got up immediately to confirm with the receptionist and admin assistant the veracity of the white board proclamation that ‘unit 8’ was in delay mode.
Yes – it was in fact about 25 minutes behind schedule !
My new gentleman acquaintance was unfamiliar with the whole process since it was his first day. He was pre-hydrated and almost at the ‘ready’ – bladder speaking – when he arrived. He had no experience with the signs of building up to a full bladder in a ‘controlled’ fashion and knowing how to avoid a ‘bladder exploding’ event in the middle of the radiation rotation.
This gentleman’s appointment was 2 ahead of mine and there was still another patient waiting before him.
So, he dosey doe’d around inconspicuously until he had to seek assistance on what to do – a real dilemma!
You could see other patients – unit 8’s, 9’s and 10’s – in the waiting area, some of whom were well into their hydration prep routines, looking more and more nervous as the schedule enigma pervaded the whole room – everyone literally silently dancing to the tune of the sometimes fickle system.
Well, my gentleman cohort in urgent bladder prep, thankfully found some able assistance and was talked through releasing the ‘valve’ and the certain over pressure on his bladder – he looked somewhat relieved as he began to re-hydrate from the drinking fountain for his now fast approaching delayed appointment.
Out of the blue comes Phil, a Radiation Therapist currently on today’s Linac-8 team.
“Would you be ready Mr. MacKenzie – fully expecting a ‘no’, since he had approached me in earlier sessions before the appointed time and understood how organized and focussed I was – or, at least, tried to be? He was offering me to jump ahead of my waiting room neighbour – call him ‘Pierre’, since we were not yet introduced – who was now re-entering the queue with water cup in hand and with great expectations of renewed success at his bladder control and his premier radiation session.
“Good try Phil, but no thanks – I’m not ready yet!”
Fortunately, it all worked out for ‘Pierre’ and I saw him returning from his session with Linac-8 – appearing so calm and all smiling – admitting that this was his first time and that he hoped it would go better on his next appointment.
Meanwhile, back in my camp, I was part way through my ‘Hydrate‘ sequence aimed at point ‘0’ and now in 35 minutes overtime myself – YIKES !!
What do I do? I was focussed, primed and ready for my scheduled time, and now I would be pumping ‘yellow-tinted’ H2O through the internal pipes (ureters in the medical vernacular) for another half hour or so – could I suppress the eager bladder spasms for the new target time?
Luckily by now, I had experienced what Jacques just went through – ‘Pierre’ became ‘Jacque’ after we met and introduced each other the next day – all smiles at definitely having lost his ‘newbie’ status on his ‘day 2’ at Radiation North.
So, I immediately cancelled imbibing the rest of my bottled Rotel H2O – about 250 ml.
Then the nervous wait continued for me …
Luckily, the building pressure wasn’t so bad and was tolerable – but I never really knew how safe I would be from the ‘big burst’ while under Linac-8’s determined focus and irrevocable rotations – about 5 minutes in all.
Whew!
But, this was just the calm before the storm on this sort of screwed up day …
To top it all off, didn’t a snow squall rip through the hospital campus!
I dawned my Spring gear – sans, hat, sans gloves, sans sweater …
A quick stop in the cafeteria for some lunch goodies – maybe a famous tOH-General giant cookie or 2 – and then I poked my nose outside the door …
… a snow squall to the left and another nasty squall to the right – go figure …
Which will it be?
Right it is – the shortest way back to my Winter spa pod at the Rotel motel – the wicked arctic wind and snow pellets pounding my face and gibing me like a sail along the inner campus pathways.
… another pace in my walk with Prostate Cancer – a really funny day.
