Hello again,
I was to have 5 weeks of radiotherapy in the pelvic area with a grand finale of 2 sessions of something called brachytherapy. I had to be at the appointment 1 hour before to ensure I had drunk the right amount of water so they could get a good look at what they needed to zap.
It was during the summer so could sit and wait in the grounds which were lovely or catch up on podcasts in the car. During the radiotherapy treatment I felt nothing and it only took a few minutes. Luckily I never had any skin irritation which can be common. What it did do was mess with my bowls something rotten. To put no fine a point on it I was caught short a couple of times which meant I did not want to be far from a toilet for long! That made me feel like I did not want to go out any where so a nuisance in that respect. Because the chemo had bunged me up a bit, it became a fine balance of Imodium & Movicol.
The first couple of weeks were fine but the last 2-3 weeks I found tiring and fortunately my husband could drive me on those occasions. I also had a couple of extra sessions of chemo which added to it I guess.
Now the brachytherapy. I had an appointment with the nurses who were lovely and did all they could to make the internal examination as comfortable as they could. I won't sugar coat it, I found it horrible. The examination was to see what they were dealing with and I thought it was to see if brachytherapy was required or not, as it turns out it's done as "belt & braces" to maximise the chances of them getting everything.
There were only 2 sessions of this and I was dreading them, kept telling myself nothing is as bad as you think it is going to be. The first session came along and it was made 10x easier by the nurses but still the least pleasant thing I had to do. I had also spoken to a doctor about the absolute necessity of it (along with the after care involving dilators) He was very reassuring so that had been a conversation worth having.
For some reason I though the 2nd session was the day after the first (I guess because the radiotherapy had been daily) but I was mistaken it was a week later so just prolonged it. I did not have any after effects just relief to get them over with. It was recommended I did not start the dilation until about 4 weeks later so could put that off for the time being.
So there ended the treatment, my next milestone was to be in about 6 weeks and my consultation with my Doctor.
Much love
