Reciprocity

My appointment yesterday with the Oncology team that will be handling my case went well. It was longer than I had anticipated as they really dig deep into your medical history. They also gave me information of how to access the online communication tool called MyChart. It's a way both patient & medical team can communicate between visits and for the administrators to communicate upcoming appointment details. Most of the time was spent with the nurse detailing my entire medical history then I had to wait awhile for the Doctor. He came in and basically said he agreed with the pulmonogist at the lung clinic that radiation treatment would be the best route for my situation and would have the least impact in terms of side effects etc. He then explained the process and reviewed possible side effects I might experience as a result of the treatment; the most common one being acute exhaustion. There were a number of others as well, just like there are when we quit smoking. There's plenty of possible symptoms we may experience when we quit but we don't experience them all normally. The next steps are; I will be contacted with an appointment date for what they call a "mapping session". This is a process where they will map on my chest exactly where the cancerous nodule is in my upper left lung that they want to zap with eacch radiation session. They will apparently use a number of precise measurements that will be fed into the radiation gizmo so it knows where to zap me. It will result in a series of three tatoos on me. One on each side and one in the center of my chest. After that's done they will schedule 10 sessions of radiation for me over roughly a month's time. They schedule each session a few days apart so the patient has time to recover before the next session in case they're experiencing negative effects. Each session will be about 30 mins. but only about 10 mins of that time will be actually getting zapped. I guess the balance of the time is ensuring they're zapping the correct spot? The Doc said he's pretty confident these sessions will do the trick in ridding me of this issue (75-80% was his guess). He also said he wanted to schedule a brain MIR for me at some point. That surprised me so I asked the reason for that. He said just a precaution and to establish a base starting point in case anything changed in future. He explained that often people with lung cancer find that it spreads to the brain. He said it would not at all be likely in my case but they want to just make sure of that and have that as part of my future medical file. So, now waiting to hear when my "mapping" appointment will be. All the appointments will be in this same town that's about a 45 minute drive from where I live. No big deal I just hope they schedule my appointments around rush hour times because there's only 1 main highway that goes there and it will be jammed at rush hour times.

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Congrats on being quit and smoke free for 11 years! Hope you do something nice for yourself to celebrate the milestone @Paula B.

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Have an initial appointment next Tuesday with the Oncology Dr. that will be handling my case. Unfortuanly it will be at a Cancer Centre in another town instead of at the hospital where I live so that means more travel time there and back for each visit. I suppose beggars can't be choosers though so I will just be happy that I'm getting timely treatment. I'll see what the plan is Tuesday.

-16 Pesky chicks ☹️

Congrats @Charmaine H 🥳 Isn't it amazing how our perception of smoking changes so dramatically once we've been quit for a number of years? When we smoked, we couldn't imaging not smoking. It seemed so important to us then yet once we've quit for some time we wonder why we ever wasted so much time & money doing something that was so unhealthy for us and commanded all out time & attention. Glad you're FREE now!!!

We can't say for sure but one reason you've been able to enjoy some of those things you mentioned doing in retirement was likely due in part at least to quitting. I know I've spent $$ travelling since I retired that otherwise would have been spent of cigs. That's just one of many things that makes quitting such a great idea!

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Hi @Britt & welcome to the best quit smoking support forum there is! I truly hope you make it in your journey to quit because being quit is the best thing ever!!! It's hard in the initial stages but very doable with committment & self discipline along the way. We've all been there where you are so we have all been through what you'll be experiencing. We've all dealt with the lows points in quitting and the very high point which is being successful in achieving your goal. You're quitting for a reason; or reasons so keep those reasons in mind when you're challenged by withdrawals. Come to the site often and don't hesitate to communicate, ask questions (there's no dumb questions) or just come on here to vent when needed. We're all here to help where we can. See you around!

Wow! 13 Years Quit!!! You're a teenager again😁

Nope!

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Nope!

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Nope! Couple watching the sunset over Lake Ontario

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