On that Tuesday they didn't like the way my colon rested in my abdomen, so we postponed the effort and tried again on Wednesday. Nothing had changed by Wednesday, so they put it off for a week and tried again the following Wednesday.
They made a mold of my lower half by having me rest on a beanbag cushion which was initially pliable. Once I was fully settled, they sucked the air out of the cushion and it became rigid. I'll rest my lower half on that for each treatment so that I'm always in the same position. The machine shines lasers at the patient, and they marked where the lasers hit by placing a small tattoo on each hip, plus one in the center of the targeting area. When I hop up on the table for treatment they'll scoot me around on the table until the lasers land on those tattoo dots.
I was told that it would take 2 weeks to make the plan. Today is Tuesday, and that would have the plan ready tomorrow. I was expecting a call this week to ask me to come in starting Monday for treatments. Instead, I got a call yesterday afternoon asking if I could come in this afternoon. I've been eager for this to get underway, so my first radiation treatment is scheduled for 3PM today, 113 days after surgery.
There will be 37 total treatments, 5 days per week for almost 8 weeks. The first 25 treatments will hit the prostate bed plus the pelvic lymph nodes. The final 12 will hit just the prostate bed.
A complication in all of this is that in June I'm scheduled to go on a school tour to Europe that has been two years in the planning. The trip leaves on June 9. With 37 treatments starting today, and a holiday for Memorial Day at the end of May, my current schedule has me receiving my last treatment at 9AM on the day that we leave for Europe.
At one point it looked like I might have a full week of treatments remaining after our return from Europe, and the radiation oncologist was OK with me having a 12-day break before finishing. Now that there's just 1 treatment of overlap, I'll have to see how he wants to deal with it.
I have a theory that a perfectly-timed spider bite during treatment could leave me with superpowers when I get up off the table. I'll post here if I can make that work.
