So radiotherapy finished up at the end of last week but I’ve been to fatigued mentally and physically to do much this week. It’s only the last few days that I’ve not need in bed all day. Now the radiotherapy has stopped, I can feel the slow recovery process showing signs of physical progress. The cognitive and mental recovery may take much longer but I’ve been told not to push myself… dammit! But its probably the best excuse to slow down for a bit! The next few months may be just as important, if not more important to my recovery process than the past few months. Click ‘Continue Reading’ below…

The 6.5 weeks of radiotherapy really takes it out of you. If I need further treatment, I can’t have radiotherapy again as they attack you so hard the first time, the human body can’t take another bout of treatment. Although I knew the short term effects of radiotherapy were cumulative and I would get worse over the treatment period, I thought from the first few weeks I had gotten away with the side effects. How wrong I was!

Weeks 1 – 2: I felt slightly fatigued but generally not too bad considering my situation.

Weeks 3 – 4: My hair started to fall out (on the left side only). I started to feel nauseous and fatigued. The effects were starting to kick in.

Weeks 5 – 6.5: The full effects were kicking in. I was sleeping all day, I felt sick when I ate, I lost my appetite, I only got out of bed to go to the hospital for treatment and a lot more hair fell out.

Weeks 6.5 – 8 (and ongoing for the next few weeks): post-treatment, it gets worse before it gets better. I know I feel like I’m on the road to recovery, a long and very, very slow road to recovery!

The next steps now are to recover at to have MRI scans at the on of July. These scans will be the baseline for future scans. So unless there is something significantly wrong with this scan, the doctors will not know how effective the treatment has been, and how the tumour has been effected, until later this year when I have follow-up scans.

Thanks again to everyone for their support. Especially to Lily for her ongoing support and Lukey for packing up his life in Brisbane and moving over to Manchester in mid-August to live with me!! And I can’t leave out the staff at Christie Hospital for how nice they have been through the treatment.