The radioactive seed insertion procedure is done! It involved a lot of waiting, especially for the doctor \u2013 whom everyone seemed to need. Staff interacting with me wore clear masks, but as is typical with the Communicator mask, it wasn\u2019t always positioned correctly over their lips. \u201cCan you pull that down a little more, please? A little more. More. Good.\u201d Rinse, repeat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The procedure started with an ultrasound to find the right area of concern, which was marked with, well, a marker. Then I got three shots of lidocaine. The needles themselves didn\u2019t hurt so much as the lidocaine did going in \u2013 it burned. Then a needle with the radioactive seed was inserted. Now that was very unpleasant \u2013 it really burned.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Afterward, I had a couple of mammogram slides done so the radiologist could make sure the seed was in the right spot.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If for whatever reason I don\u2019t have surgery tomorrow, I\u2019m to call radiology as well as my surgeon, because the seed has to come out \u2013 and the only way that happens is with surgery. That seems ironic \u2013 if you can\u2019t have the key surgery, you need surgery anyway? Would that even be possible? I hope never to find out!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
During surgery, Dr. McAuliffe will use a handheld Geiger counter that finds radioactivity in order to see the right place in the tissue that needs to be removed. The seed (Iodine I-125) is of very low energy, and its placement is of little to no risk to me or anyone nearby. If you can\u2019t tell, this is from the brochure I got.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I was told I\u2019d get a call between 2-6 today informing me what time I\u2019m to report tomorrow. Just like the cable guys\u2026 The call came just before 3. I have to be at Magee before the crack of dawn! That\u2019s damn early, but at least it\u2019s in the morning since I can\u2019t eat after midnight.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I\u2019ve been asked if I\u2019m nervous. I\u2019d say more than anything, I\u2019m dreading waking up from the anesthesia (always weird), dealing with my historically poor reaction to anesthesia, the arm\/hand restrictions, and going stir crazy over the next two weeks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Whenever I\u2019m in an operating room, it brings back memories of getting my tubes in as a kid, which I had to do many times. Back then, they put the mask over my face to knock me out, which never agreed with me. I remember at least one time they had to reschedule the procedure!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Now I don\u2019t need tubes, and I\u2019ll get the anesthesia through an IV with some anti-nausea medication. Progress!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Thanks for all the good wishes! I\u2019ll see you on the flip side!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The radioactive seed insertion procedure is done! It involved a lot of waiting, especially for the doctor \u2013 whom everyone seemed to need. Staff interacting with me wore clear masks, but as is typical with the Communicator mask, it wasn\u2019t always positioned correctly over their lips. \u201cCan you pull that down a little more, please? […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-330","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inmyhead.com\/wordpress\/fcancer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/330","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inmyhead.com\/wordpress\/fcancer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inmyhead.com\/wordpress\/fcancer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inmyhead.com\/wordpress\/fcancer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inmyhead.com\/wordpress\/fcancer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=330"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/inmyhead.com\/wordpress\/fcancer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/330\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":331,"href":"https:\/\/inmyhead.com\/wordpress\/fcancer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/330\/revisions\/331"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inmyhead.com\/wordpress\/fcancer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=330"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inmyhead.com\/wordpress\/fcancer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=330"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inmyhead.com\/wordpress\/fcancer\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=330"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}