The dates are set!

My mask from last year

So this week was fairly quiet on the cancer front, but not without some important happenings.  Jessica had one request of me last week and that was to not schedule any appointments on Wednesday as she had a hair appointment and would not be able to go with me.  Apparently I don't ask the right questions nor do I relay any information back to her in the rare instances that she is not with me.  That's probably a fair assessment.  Can you guess what day I scheduled every appointment this week?  Yep!  Wednesday.  4 appointments.  You're welcome, wifey!  It actually turned in to a huge debacle, but we all made it through relatively unscathed with Jessica's hair being the only casualty.  The big accomplishment is that I went through the radiation simulation and we are now officially on the books.  The simulation is a rather unpleasant process wherein I lay mostly unclothed on my back in a room on a machine that I am guessing is a CT scanner or something very similar.  A large gathering of people perform various operations throughout the process which basically is setting my position and target areas for the radiation.  All of them are people that I know from last summer and they all expressed their sympathy for my situation and their regrets that our reunion is due to my latest battle with recurrence.  They had to make me a new mask and this is the most unpleasant part of the simulation.  For those unfamiliar, the mask is used to hold me down to the table in the same position each time I receive the radiation treatment.  It is hard plastic and is molded around my head neck and shoulders and formed during my simulation.  It starts out as a flat sheet of perforated plastic that is heated in a water bath to make it soft and pliable.  The flat sheet is then placed over me and pressed down and locked into the table.  This time around, it was a bit more unpleasant because it seemed to have a lot more water on it than I remember and it holds me to the table very tightly.  Water was dripping down my nose and into my eyes and that, coupled with the fact that I can't move and have a mouthpiece in my mouth made me very uncomfortable.  Luckily, this time it did not last near as long as the last time.  I probably wouldn't have been able to hold out much longer, but I managed to remain calm the entire time.  I have yet to have an overwhelming claustrophobic moment, and hopefully that trend continues.  It is a very helpless feeling to have my arms restrained and my upper body immobilized in the manner in which it has to be for the treatments.  I left the simulation with my full schedule of treatments.  I start on the 10th of June and will finish on July 25th.  Radiation will be every weekday in that time frame sans July 4th.  Let's get this party started.
My official schedule for the day was bloodwork, followed by medical oncologist, followed by simulation, followed by meeting with surgeon.  I was told to see the surgeon prior to the simulation because they were to take my stitches out before I did the simulation.  I went there early in anticipation of some type of ordeal, and there definitely was one to be had.  I got my blood drawn and then went and waited to get in to see the stitch removers.  They weren't there yet, but they were kind enough to call and tell the ladies to NOT let me leave to go see the medical oncologist because I had to have my stitches removed and the simulation performed as there were no more time slot  available for me to get that in.  So I got to sit there and wait and play some Sudoku.  When my official stitch removal specialist arrived she brought with her the wonderful news that i would also be having a scope performed after the stitches came out.  Outstanding!  I do love a good scoping.  Again, for those unfamiliar, my scopings involve me, some lidocain and a long tubular shaped camera.  The lidocain is sprayed in each nostril while I breathe in deeply and helps to numb the pathways about to be probed.  The camera then gets to travel up my nose and head to it's final destination somewhere in my throat.  It's that magical place where I can do nothing but gag uncontrollably and tear up while the doctor calmly dictates commands for me to follow.  I have grown used to these and have worked up certain ways to try to control my reactions, but sometimes they sneak up on me.  Everything was in good working order and aside from some swelling all appeared normal.

The finish last summer

Once I was finished with the simulation and stitch removal, I ran upstairs to try to get in and see the medical oncologist for my last appointment.  I waited a bit, but he was able to see me late in the day and go over the plan.  They are giving me the same chemotherapy drug that I received last summer, Cisplatin.  This was a bit of a surprise as the last conversation with him, he told me that he would likely use a different cocktail.  The reasoning behind it sounds solid.  They talked it over and decided that what we did last summer worked.  I had active cancer cells in the left side of my neck and the combination of chemo and radiation took care of that.  This recurrence was outside of the main radiation field and received very little, if any radiation.  With my type of cancer, radiation is the primary fighting agent with the chemo used as a supplemental treatment that has been shown to intensify the effects of radiation.  We consider what happened last summer a successful treatment and therefore we will go ahead with the exact same course of action this time around, just in a different location.  I will receive the chemotherapy once a week, this time on Tuesdays.  As with radiation, I will begin on the 10th of June.  Again, let's get this party started!