It's officially been a week since my dose of radioactive iodine! I survived with minimal side effects and have yet to turn into the hulk or start shooting lasers out of my eyes!
All of last week was a bit of a struggle, but all things considered, survivable. One of the hardest parts of being radioactive was the isolation. My poor dog Malcolm is still not fully convinced I still love him. I had to carry a squirt bottle around so every time he came too close I had to squirt him and yell at him (the cats caught on pretty quickly and avoided me, but he's not so clever). He also usually sleep at the foot of my bed, so I had several night of him scratching and whining at my door all night. It was a very sad and confusing time for him. But apart from that and not being able to hug people it wasn't too terrible. I was exhausted and felt pretty sick still for most of it, so I spent most of my time sleeping anyways. The only real side effects I noticed was a bit of tingling, aching and swelling in my throat, and waves of nausea. I also had to suck on sour lemon candy every half hour, and after a while the roof of my mouth and tongue where a mess! By far the most frustrating thing was that despite being able to go back on my meds and eating real food again, I was still incredibly exhausted and felt too sick to eat much, not to mention I was still an emotional wreck. And thanks to having been off my meds thus slowing my metabolism (and i blame thanksgiving too) I managed to gain almost 10 pounds in 2 weeks! I was also overly hopeful about really starting to feeling better right away, and instead found myself still stick in bed for another week which was not surprising but very frustrating.
But the good news is I am finally starting to feel better!!! Today is the first real day I'm starting to feel like myself again. I even managed to watch Toystory 3 and only cry at the parts that were actually sad/cry worthy! And I've managed to make it out of the house for several hours today and get some errands done in preparation for my return home! I'm still exhausted and not feeling %100 yet, but I finally feel like I'm on the road to recovery! I've even worked off a few pounds now that my metabolism is back! And yesterday we had a really wonderful "Christmas/Hanukkah" brunch with some family which was really special and made me feel much better too! It's really hard to be leaving everyone so close to the holidays!
So now all I've got left treatment wise is a body scan on Friday! We wont get the results back from in for 2 weeks after it, but it should tell us where and how much radioactive iodine was absorbed and will give a good indication of if and where it might have spread. But the prognosis is very good, and all my blood work indicates it hasn't spread and that this dose of radioactivity should kill off any cancerous cells that are left!!! It's all very scary, but exciting and very surreal!
And finally, on Saturday, I catch my flight back to Australia! It's so strange to think by this time next week I'll be back in Tasmania again! It's hard to believe i'll have been back here for over 4 months! Yet at the same time, It seems like i'm leaving all too soon! Everyone has been so wonderful and supportive! It's going to be hard to leave all these people who I love so much and have been here for me through everything! But it will also be so wonderful to reunite with everyone who has been so wonderful and supportive from across the globe! I just wish my two homes didn't have to be so far apart!
So, we'll let everyone know how the scan goes and keep this up to date if anything new comes up, but this may be one of my last entries for this blog! It's been bittersweet! It's been scary and awful and unfair, and I do not wish this upon anyone. Yet it has also helped me find who I am. I never would have dreamed that an experience like this could have been in any way good, but in a lot of ways, it has reminded me how wonderful life is and just how lucky I am. I've had times where I had started to doubt my faith in humanity, and this brought me back to remembering all the small blessings we have. It's reminded me how much love there is in this world, and how very important that is. I love everyone so much and could never find the right words to express how greatful I am to have so much love and support in my life! I could never have come through this without It! Thanks you!
