Highlights and Lowlights

The highlight of last week had to have been seeing the band play! Great entertainment.

The low light... (not sure if that is the right term but you get the idea)
It's a bit complicated, but medically I am right on track. I went to the radiologist to have my Simulation (set up) appointment for radiation. The technicians made a mold out of what you might picture a very small bean bag chair for my arm. The bean bag hardens after holding your arm in an awkward and uncomfortable position for about twenty minutes. Then they did a CAT scan of my upper body, I think to see where all my vital organs, etc are. At which point the doctor decided that my expanders were going to get in the way of my radiation treatment. We had to stop the set up process right then. On Friday afternoon I went back to my plastic surgeon. In one twenty minute session she took out half the saline (from each breast) which had been injected over the past few months. I now have saggy, lumpy not perky expanders. Looks kind-of like a half deflated balloon - no not quite that bad. And in clothes it's fine. Since the skin has already been stretched, hopefully things will all work out in the end when the silicone implants are installed. I was actually in a state of shock and didn't ask too many questions. The most important thing is for the radiation to get done correctly, the rest will be what it is and and we will figure it out when we get there. Mentally it was a very hard day.

I went back to finish up with the radiologist on Tuesday. Turns out that the deflation of my expanders shifted things around and I have less arm mobility than I had before. Go figure. Putting my arm back in the mold was not fun. Leaving it there for 25 minutes was even less fun. Got three tiny tatoos. Just little dots, not anything fancy. And that didn't really hurt. I am now working on getting some more mobility back in my upper body. The hope is that once my body adjusts to the new position of the expanders I might feel better. So far, not so much. Radiation starts on Jun 30 at 10:40am every weekday for 6 weeks. The actual appointment is about 1/2 hour max. Side effects are fatigue and a really, really bad sun burn. The goal is to fry your skin so the cancer won't come back there. Nice!