My radiotherapy treatment ended on Wednesday with my 30thsession and I can tell you that it feels really good not to have to travel the 40 odd miles for my daily zap. The people there tell me that the side-effects will continue for the next couple of weeks and then should slowly subside. Some of them may linger for a month or two but most should disappear completely in time. My next appointment is in two weeks and I'm hoping that I am speaking again by then. Then they will probably decide whether or not to remove any more lymph glands.
I'm still unable to swallow but I've got used to my feeding tube and things are well under control in this respect. The pain is well under control thanks to the morphine.
The fatigue and lethargy is incredible. My normal sleep pattern is around 5 or 6 hours per night at most. At the moment I'm sleeping for around 10 hours each night and I also go to sleep for around 4-6 hours each afternoon. Does anybody remember the robot in Lost In Space kids TV series (might be before your time)? Well at 1pm each day I'm like the robot when they used to pull its power pack out – I go into standby mode and can do nothing about it. I have even fallen asleep standing up in the kitchen. At least I'm getting plenty of rest.
The inability to talk is not too much of a problem but it's the little things that crop up that I find tricky. For instance, I now use the self-service checkout in Waitrose and Tesco because it feels really odd not saying 'thank you' when I'm handed my change.
I look a bit odd at the moment (well, odder than normal anyway) because my neck is very sore and the skin is red and burnt whereas my face is still pale, and so I look like I've fallen asleep in the sun with a newspaper over my head.
In a nutshell, I am where I expected to be at this stage and things are still moving in a positive direction.
Lynne is still coping really well although it has been tough for her –she has been absolutely brilliant and I would be in a worse place were it not for her.
