I tell folks that feeling fine (or feeling like shit) and what’s happening are two different things.
The first day of radiation and chemotherapy is done, and I feel fine. I feel normal. Inside the cancer, though, things have changed. As I climbed off the radiation table, I asked Makenzie, the Radiation Therapist, if she could also hear the cancer cells screaming like the Wicked Witch of the West: “I’m melting, I’m melting…”
Today’s radiation damaged the DNA of the cancer cells in the treatment field. Those cells will try to repair themselves. The ones with damage they can’t fix lose the ability to reproduce or die the next time they try to divide. The cisplatin adds another kind of DNA damage and interferes with the repair, which helps the radiation do its work.
This is not quick. The damage began today with my first session of radiation and my first session of chemo. Cell death and my body’s cleanup will unfold over days and weeks. My neck may look and feel the same tonight.
On the Iditarod Trail Invitational, a single speed makes for, well, one speed. Looking back, how I felt at any given moment told me nothing, really. Some miles were easy-peasy, and some circled Hell, and my mind kept moving between whether the work was getting done and a rapid-fire procession of fear and doubt. Either way, the distance was being added up. I might be 36 hours from a checkpoint, but I was also 10 hours closer. How you feel and how far you’ve come are two different measurements.
The difference is that on the trail I could count the miles. Here I can’t. But I’m further down the trail tonight than I was this morning, and that’s the measurement that matters.
Goal: show up tomorrow.
This is the MRI Linacs Radiation IMRT at UIHC melting cancer.