The Last Full Week!

This week was my last full week of radiation, my last chemo treatment, and I got to ring the bell. Those are big milestones, but what has really hit me is the wave of emotions. 

The treatments themselves have not gotten any easier. The throat pain is in full swing, and the mucus and spitting that come with that are just relentless, it’s just gruesome. The smallest things feel to take much more energy, but I continue to do them because it brings me my “normal”. Most weeks I have just focused on surviving the day, one step at a time, with tunnel vision not looking too far ahead. 

But Wednesday, during that final chemo treatment, something changed. For the first time in this whole journey, I allowed myself to look past the suffering and see the finish line. Instead of thinking “just get through this hour, then the next, then the day” I could finally think “You really are almost there”. Which that thought, has brought on a flood of emotions. 

They switched my chemo this week because a very common side effect of the Cisplastin I had prior is hearing loss. I was beginning to get a constant ringing in my ears so my Oncologist decided to switch the drug this week so there was no cost to my hearing. Another plus is that because this is my last treatment, and I only had 4 radiation treatments left following, I got a smaller dose of chemo. 

This time around has been a lot nicer to me, it really is showing me just how harsh those first two high dose Cisplastin treatments were. I truly would not wish that kind of misery on my worst enemy. 

Now I am down to my last two radiation treatments this coming week, Tuesday being my final one. Just saying that brings tears to my eyes. This has been a long, painful, uneven, emotional, road but it has truly shown me strength at a new level, and love and support that I just will never ever forget. 

I know the side effects won’t magically go away on Tuesday, and healing will be a road in itself. But knowing that I will not have to wake up and go to the treatments every single day, the hardest parts are so close to behind me. I can finally see the light, and it’s shining damn bright. 

Here’s to crossing this finish line!

-JD/JK

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