I had a good radiation experience!

That's good to know, thank you! I had my 24th of 28 today. I hope to have my exchange surgery later this summer or early fall....

Yorkiemom,

Radiation is a very patient-specific treatment.  Where and if a person turns pink or "burns" is going to depend on their skin type, how heavy they are, the shape of their chest, and the extent of the fields needed.  It's just not possible to extrapolate from one person to another what the experience will be.  

For example, as a very thin woman with a locally advanced cancer, I had mild burns on my back from my supraclavicular field.   A friend of mine who is heavy but with similar skin tone had burns on the front from radiation aimed to hit the same supraclavicular bed of lymph nodes.  For that particular area, the intensity needed to be higher for her to drop off the same amount of energy in the supraclavicular area, so it burned the front more, and the intensity of the drop off died out well before it hit the skin of her back, because it was a longer distance from front to back on her than on me, so it didn't burn her back at all.

It's simply a matter of physics, but complicated physics.  Radiation oncologists want the area receiving the highest dose of radiation to be the area where they think the most remaining tumor cells are, not the structures above or past that layer.  

Also, an additional thing to know about radiation is that the damaged tissues continue remodelling for at least 18 months - even years - after it's over.  Remodelling is similar to what you see on the surface with a skin scar changing over time.  I wish you best of luck, but six weeks out is too early to know what remodelling will bring.

I had no problems with Rads either, my skin went pink like mild sunburn towards the end but no blisters or skin breakdown.

I'm now over 2 yrs since finishing rads and have no skin discoloration, lumpiness or skrinkage.

I'm fair skinned but my RO said that was a myth that fair skin people burn more.

Two more for ne too. So far so good. Having 25 total. I am pink or near red under bra band,arm pit. I try to keep my affected arm up stretched out a lot. Damn muscle always wants to clamp downon torture expander. I put ny jammies on when home and take off the little bralet

Another good response here. I have only 4 more boosts to go. I didn't even start to turn pink until week 6. No pain or discomfort, no itching, no fatigue, no nuttin'! I've been using Miaderm, which I OK'd with my RO. She said to continue with it for two weeks after I'm done, then I can just use regular moisturizer. There is life after rads!

Yorkiemom, I'm fortunate in that since I'm retired and a very eary riser, I was able to get a 7:45 a.m. appointment. I figured that I'm up anyway, I might as well get the rads out of the way rather than have to watch the clock all day to be sure I get there in time. I'm usually back home by 8 and the rest of the day is mine. The cancer center I'm going to is very accommodating. By the way, we have the same ideas for our screen names....Snoopy is the name of my cat!

I am so happy to find this thread. I am 13 treatments in with 22 left to go. I keep waiting for something bad to happen. How sad is that? I had some fatigue but then realized hello it's my menstual cycle so that's totally normal for me.



Can I ask you ladies, did you follow any special diet or add anything to your routine, besides Excercise? I walk about 30 minutes a day at a brisk pace.



thanks!!

Yorkiemom

Thanks so much for posting your experiences of radtiation treatment.

I feel sure it will help other women like myself who are due to start rads later this year.

Best wishes

Alice the Cat

purple32, I had left breast rads and I have the chronic bronchitis form of COPD. I honestly do not notice any lingering breathing side effects from rads. Good luck. I hope you will have a safe and gentle rads experience.

I am 5 treatments away from finishing radiation.  Last nine treatments are boost to left breast area.  My skin has held up very well.....itchy and very red like a sunburn but no peeling etc.  

I had no problems with radiation either.  It went smoothly and I had no problems, and healed quickly- and well.

Infobabe... you will, probably, have what they call a "planning" consultation, where your radiation oncologist will use some sort of imaging (mine was a CT scan) to "map out" your chest area, i.e., where your heart- and lungs are situated in relation to your chest wall to minimise those organs exposure to the beam as much as possible.  In particular, they'll take a good look at how deeply your heart is situated in your chest; if it's not deep enough to avoid the beam, then they may ask you to practise deep breath-holding techniques before your treatments.  If your heart lies too close to the chest wall, then a deep breath pushes the chest wall away from the heart and takes the heart out of the beam's path during treatment.

I wanted to bump this up.  It is a little early to tell (2 weeks out) whether I am completely healed -- but my short-term side-effects are gone.  Skin pretty much cleared up (still a little itchy and peeling -- but completely tolerable).  I had a moderate skin reaction (painful, itchy rash) -- but the RO and nursing staff helped me out, and it healed pretty well once I stopped getting treated.  I would be happy to share my experience with anyone -- post here or send me a PM.

I ran (~20% less than I normally would) and worked all the way through treatment -- was a little tired the last 2 weeks, but I just napped when I could (I did take 3 1/2 days the last week) and really caught up on the weekend and made it though the work weeks just fine.

I am still cautiously optomistic (long term effects don't show up for a few months out) -- and very pleased with my decision to do radiation.

I think it is important to keep track of positive experiences, so that people are not so worried going into radiation therapy.

And, joining a BCO group (whether for chemo/rads/hormone therapy) is the most wonderful thing of all.  It really helps to have other people that can understand what you are going through.  It is a bond that you make that is pretty special, in my opinion.

Good luck everyone.