No More Radiation!

Can I get a Woot! Woot! Yesterday was the last day of of radiation! I am done! Fini!

Well, sort of.

Now comes maintenance, or rather watchfulness.

The area around my knee is red, something between a 2nd and 3rd degree burn. I say that because some of the skin has peeled off. Underneath is some not so pretty stuff - pus, ooze; you know. Yucky stuff. Since it has been exposed to radiation day after day, there's been no chance for it to heal. The surgery scar is pretty much the same. It's dry, scaly, red, swollen, etc. And for some reason, probably related to the bone being irradiated, the kneecap is very tender. But now that I'm done, gotta give all this time to heal. Dr. Danny provided a burn cream called Silvadene that I can use. But nooo bandaids! The sticky stuff will only cause further damage to the skin. So, I gotta cover it with gauze, and I have a 'burn sleeve' to hold the gauze in place. And then I can wrap my leg, loosely, with an ace bandage. But all along, gotta flex, flex, flex that leg.

You can feel and hear that scar tissue popping every time I bend my knee. Dr. Danny explained that the scar tissue will continue to develop over the next few months and that it is imperative the the knee be exercised so the scar tissue won't have opportunity to develop. So I walk, allbeit slowly. And I keep my leg bent when I recline or sit. Stand up, stretch, flex, do it all again. And I sleep. Sleep, sleep, sleep. 12-14 hours a day. And apparently, that's not unusual. It's one of the quiet side effect.

In the meantime, I will be seeing Dr.Berrey next Thursday. On Dr. Danny's recommendation, it will probably be 6 to 8 weeks before I can start the quarterly MRI's, CT scans, X-rays, bloodwork, etc. that are necessary in the first few years to be sure the cancer doesn't reappear, metastsize, relocate, etc. Dr. Danny said it would take that long for the damage of the radiation to heal - swelling and other stuff that can mask any relevant test results. My appointment with Dr. Berrey will be to check the knee, and determine when I can return back to work full-time. I will be glad to get back to working full-time as long as I can drive. I can't handle that right now though, but I've got a week for the knee to heal. So, we'll see.

As treatment comes to an end and maintenance begins, the focus of this blog will likely change. My close encounter with cancer has reminded me, rather forcefully, of the things I enjoy and the things I want to experience. I've viewed other blogs, and several are centered around a specific topic - as has mine, up to this point. While I know I will continue to write about my experiences with cancer, and (knock on wood) the non-recurrence of cancer, I will also address other topics. I am not yet sure what those topics will be, but I know there are some I want to explore; character exploration, current events, daily life, events, and more.

For a while though, the primary focus of this blog will continue to be my experiences with cancer. So, stay tuned! More to come in my interesting life!