Leah Dennis Spears: Radiation and all that JAZZ!

Boy, time sure does fly when you are having fun... Duh, not really, it's just the meds. ;-)

My entire December 2012 was spent in Houston, in a cheap apartment, having radiation and discovering that the lymph removal had given me lymphadema (a condition that causes the fluid to build up in my left arm). The twice-a-day radiation treatments lasted only about 20 minutes or so and did not hurt. The position they put you, all twisted and with my arm over my head, hurt and made my arms and neck fall asleep, but no big deal. Each night the "red" starts to come on and by each Friday you think that you can't take the "sunburn" anymore. Then you have two days off for the weekend! Yippee, I called it the cooling off days! Then Monday rolls around and waa-laaaaa, it's time to do it all over again. Now the physical therapy is a totally different deal, Little Marigold was so quite and sweet and then she kept trying to break my arm off! At least I only had to see her twice a week. ;-)

I was so blessed with people that came to stay with me. Both friends and family volunteered to come and stay with me the five weeks I was in Houston. Not to mention all the Midland friends that helped with mail and checking on my house for me during one of the coldest December's we have had in years. Seriously, cancer has taught me a lot this last year. It's brought my family closer, my friends were always close but now we don't hold anything back, it's taught me to be grateful for every day. But, as my niece Heather said, "cancer, it's time for you to pack up and hit the trail...."

I gained 5 pounds in Houston during December. We took advantage of all my favorite places to eat and found 1 or 2 new spots. I am in a good fighting weight if we have to do any more chemo.

Kelsey, Andy and pretty baby Evie came down to be with me for Christmas. We had a wonderful dinner purchased at Whole Foods (yummy and just heat and eat!) and Evie turned into the poster baby for the radiation waiting room. "There's that BABY" was heard over and over again down the hall and in the waiting room. Evie was a hit with all the ladies and put smiles on our faces.

We didn't do anything too wild for New Years's, but by the look on Evie's face, we sure had fun! As you can imagine, and as I have said over and over again, Evie is my best medicine. Well, and Kelsey too, she is always my baby.

And meanwhile "back at the doggie ranch", Ruby was kicking back with my brother-n-law (Steve) and Chili. Pretty good life if you can get it. ;-)

The burn from the radiation took a month to get better. It was purple/red and really icky with the open sores that came up, but thank God no infection. I tell ya, I can wrap a good burn wound now so if anyone out there comes up with 2nd-3rd degree burns, I'm your nurse.

These are my boost plates. The radiation treatments have two stages, regular 20 min deal and then concentrated blasts that they call "boost". The boost is focused thru a lead plate that is designed for each patient by the rad/oncologist. My boost plates just happened to be my whole chest and side. I wanted to bring these things home, but alas, the darn things weigh about 40 lbs. each. (and the technician about had a rigor when I asked.)

While my niece Heather and my sis Nita were in town, we managed to run off down to Galveston one Sunday. Heather painted my toenails first and then we just took the rest of the day off from Cancer. Went on a ferry ride and got our toes into the sand on a beach. Nita, my mother hen, kept yelling at me to not cut my feet on anything (she worries about the infections). We couldn't pry her out of the car though. She is not into the sand thing! And we had a wonderful flounder dinner at Guido's in Galveston. It was great!

By the time I finished, I was really ready to leave Houston. So I was glad to ring the bell out of both Radiation and my physical therapy. My sister, Nita and the gals that "cooked" me where awesome and were glad to seem me finish.