16. hard to swallow

Whew! If I thought I was swimming in the deep end before I was sadly mistaken. I was still in the kiddie pool. I'm in the middle of the Atlantic now, and I think I see some swells moving in.

What's new? I have to rinse every half hour or risk choking on my own saliva/mucous. And as glamorous as that may sound -- after all who wouldn't want to be in the same company as Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin and all those other icons who died choking on their own spit? -- it's not that intriguing in real life. Besides, all those luminaries preceded their demise with exciting flashes of creative brilliance and self-destructiveness. Me, I'm just trying to finish watching '30 Rock' without having to run into the bathroom every two seconds. But there's more.

My biggest challenge of the day has now become surviving my radiation treatment. The process takes about half an hour all together. My new technique is to gargle with my special mouthwash just before I go in, in the hopes that that will control my saliva long enough to get through. Then I run and gargle again as soon as the treatment's over. Sounds simple enough. I thought so too. But that's where we're both wrong.

Here's a breakdown of steps, and time, involved in the treatment.

As I've described in previous posts, step one is the insertion of the 'mouth gag' - a plastic-like red popsicle that holds my tongue down. Since my mouth is really just a cesspool of blisters, cold sores, burns, and viscous saliva this simple act is becoming increasingly difficult and taking longer. So far I have managed to do it while suppressing most of my gag reflex, but the longer it takes the more likelihood there is of saliva build up and consequently, choking. Once the gag is in place (that can take up to 5 minutes), the restraining mask is put over my face and anchored down, holding the mouth gag in place and pinning my head to the slab. This takes another 5 minutes. I'm slid into the machine and a cat scan is performed to make sure I'm properly aligned. This takes about 10 minutes. Then I'm slid back out and must wait without moving for a doctor to go to the control area and confirm that everything is ok. This usually takes about 15 minutes. Then, finally I'm put back into the machine and the radiation is zapped into me. This, the heart of the operation, only takes 10 minutes. Then I'm done. Total: 35 minutes, more or less. For the first weeks this was fairly easily accomplished. My job was to lie there and be a target. I was surprisingly good at it. But in the last few days things have changed.

Take today, for instance. As per my new routine, I gargled immediately before going in. Mouth clear of mucous, I proceeded to the treatment room. It took a couple of tries to get the gag in. Finally I closed my eyes, pushed it in, and waited for the throat pain to subside. Good to go. Mere minutes elapsed. The mask was placed on me, arms put down in position. I was slid in for the cat scan. About half way through, about 15 minutes elapsed, I noticed a slight rasp in my inhalation. Very subtle, but unmistakable. However, since it didn't interfere with my breathing, by the time I was slid back out of the cat scan I felt like it had gone. As I lay there, waiting for the techs to get their go ahead to zap me, I noticed the rasp was back and becoming a little more regular. Finally, approval granted, I was slid back into the machine.

Before treatment had even begun the rasp was already more pronounced. In fact, it was present on both inhalation and exhalation. I began counting backwards from 50 - a self-hypnosis technique I've recently learned. For a while that did the trick. But it didn't last. I could feel the rasp in my throat, increasing with every breath. I tried to swallow to get rid of it. I couldn't do it and almost choked, but managed to control myself. I had managed to shift my saliva a little because the rasp was a little less obvious. I continued counting. "30 in and out, 29 in and out, 28 in and out..." Then it got bad again - very noticeable. I tried to swallow. No good. I was in pre-panic mode. I said to myself "calm down, you can do this." I slowed my breath. I concentrated. And something happened. I felt some sort of shift or something and suddenly I could breathe clearly. I don't know where the saliva went or how it happened, but at that moment I knew I was going to make it. Soon after, the radiation zapper stopped its rotations, I was slid out, and it was all over. I felt positively jubilant as I put on my shirt and hit the bathroom for my celebratory gargle.

This day is one that will live on in infamy in my personal journal of minor victories. I have to admit it: I felt proud.