The Monster Under My Bed

Remember that feeling being a kid home alone at night, when every time the house creeks the only reasonable conclusion is that there's a monster just waiting for you around the corner? 

Cancer is my monster. 

Lately I was noticing/coping with new constant pain on my hip, it rang some loud alarm bells. After a few weeks hoping it would go away I decided to have it looked at. In addition to the pain I was getting very lethargic; waking up from not even knowing what I was doing before and sleeping 14-16 hours a day. 

Because of the changes I decided to get things checked out. A couple of weeks ago I got x-rays on my hip to see if the tumor had any new friends hanging out. 

Side note: 

Not that hospital gowns need to be fashionable, but the last one was on the verge of humiliating. It was not one size fits all. If I was any taller I would've needed to make the ensemble a two piece. My waist is only 33", but I was still too wide, the x-ray technician was helping it close in the back when I needed to lie on my side.

The Paper Gown Patient

Anywho... If you are like me, I did not know the names of where the pain was/is. My pain was in my sacrum and ilium area on my left side. 

Yesterday I received the results: nothing there, I had no new friends! What about the tumor pretending to be a kiwi beside my hip joint? The x-ray technician just commented that that area was noticeable, meaning s/he could tell some work was done there. I still have to wait until sometime in December for a thorough examination. The more radiation the longer one waits.

The pain is just my body healing from being burned by radiation.

For perspective a year ago an acquaintance of mine with prostate cancer got about 10 seconds of radiation a day for 6 weeks = approx 5 minutes in total. Recently he just had surgery due to complications from the radiation.

In contrast my radiation was for a little over 2 minutes of radiation for 5 weeks = about 1 hour in total. That means side effects should not surprise anyone.

The lethargy is just an expected and unwelcome side effect from the radiation treatment.

Last night when I came home I was in enough pain that I vented to Faith about it. While doing so remembered the x-ray results - no new friends! It was like looking under the bed and seeing no monster.

When I look back on all these worries, I remember the story of the old man who said on his deathbed that he had had a lot of trouble in his life, most of which had never happened.

- Winston Churchill