End of week 6...miserable

Swim can you sign a first name at the end it would be more personal and for us to call you something besides swim. Your choice.

Mr. Swim if you have a recliner it may be more productive to live in it and sleep there for a while. As the healing takes effect after rads your saliva gets very thick and laying down seems to gather near your throat I know I woke up several times with my air cut off and it was quite a gagging feat to get cleared out and breathing again. It's going to be a very tough time for a while as you well know by now, but many of us have gone through it. You can and will too. As I said before slow process so it's gonna be a bit till you start feeling better. But it is said that when rads are done you are still cookin so to speak. To me, that means rads are accumulative, sort of building up and following behind so when they stop the treatment it is still building and working a bit. The estimate for this is up to 2 weeks but I say once they stop the intensity of the effect starts dropping off. Sorry for your situation but strengthen yourself and just sleep as much as possible and get enough food and hydration in. Get it in your mind and prepare to get through anything you encounter even if you have to concentrate to get through the next hour or the next 15 minutes or the next minute just get to the next one you are getting closer to recovery. Pain, stay ahead of it if you have constant pain then for now take a regularly scheduled pain medicine. Every 4 hours or whatever it takes but be on a schedule. Rinse as you have been doing as much as it takes as often as it takes. Forget about what's going on out in the world right now and concentrate on your situation and getting through this. All the politics and everything else has been corrupt since they were invented that won't change just concentrate on your life and family and friends. Besides that, I don't care who is president or who is in Washington because I know who's on the throne in heaven and that's all that counts. if you can talk pick up a phone and call a relative or a friend. They would probably be glad to hear from you that you are alright and hangin in there. And many times people are afraid to call the cancer patient because they don't know what to say or are afraid they will say the wrong thing id you call first you may put them at ease.

Pray a lot, read the Bible and take comfort in the words.

Here are a couple of links to Bible verses for cancer situations--

Hope--

Healing--

Peace--

Wishing You The Best

Take Care-God Bless-Russ

Veery good Graham, I certainly hope they are a blessing and a help to you. I also wanted to mention when I said about sleeping in a recliner or for that matter whatever you can do to find comfort and rest you may experience spotty sleep, disrupted sleep, and you may sleep for longer periods as you heal so rest when you can. Also besides sleep, This brutal treatment I think has to have quite an effect on much of our body so anything that is out of whack for now just bear with it and as you heal things will get back in order again.

Take care-God Bless-Russ

Hello Swim,

I am a bit late to the conversation as my treatment ended 17 years ago. Many good points have been suggested to you. As mentioned by others, your recovery time will vary depending on what you went thru, age and health at the start of all this. Measure recovery in weeks, not days. Set in your mind that you went thru nearly 7 weeks of Radiation, that it may take that long to recover. It may happen sooner and hopefully it does. Stay positive, you have just been through a battle and got banged up.

Mouth sores- I was told to use the Baking Soda and Salt Solution. I mixed up a quart of it daily and had it at room temperature. I carried a water bottle with the BS & S in it as well as water bottle. I used the solution as often as every 20-30 minutes to take the edge off of my discomfort. My Oncologist was surprised that I hadn't started taking any pain med's at the 5th week mark and I had quarter sized ulcers in my mouth and throat. He suggested I start and I am glad I did get ahead of the discomfort.

Mucus- as mentioned, and you appear to be on top of this already. Sleeping in an inclined position helps with it, but it also helps with the possibility of Lymphedema, swelling of the neck and face. We have gravity on our side so when we walk around, the buildup of fluids slowly drain down to the reservoir located near our waist line.

My Best to You and Everyone Here