the progress of the radiating

matt has gone to radiation eight times now, which means he is 28.57% done with this part of his treatment. so far, it hasn't been that overwhelming, although he has had to take little naps in the afternoon and seems more sensitive to smells and tastes. he claimed there was something rotten in the fridge for two days before i noticed it (garlicky beans and greens from the week before. the chickens didn't mind the smell). he has also occasionally felt slightly queasy, especially after he ate 23 twizzlers from the bag that jen sent us. he took a cool picture of the radiator machine, which i hope he will post on his blog, along with a description of how it works. i asked, but it sounds like they won't let me in to the room to take a bloggable photo. geez.

the 7:30 time slot is working out well. matt gets up at 6:11 and takes a shower to wash off the previous day's sharpie marks on his stomach. they draw circles around the tatoos in order to make the points more visible as they line up the equipment. he usually leaves the house around 6:45 and so far has not had any trouble with traffic on either his way to or trip home from boston. i am waiting for the morning when 6:11 will not feel early but it hasn't happened yet.

ruthann has been hard at work collecting information from all matt's relatives about any cancer history in the family. she originally made 120 copies of a letter and then realized that that wouldn't be enough! she is hoping to organize all the responses before matt's october meeting with a genetic counselor. the replies from family members might help the doctor understand the origin of his tumors. ruthann says she has already received many letters in the mail and had to get a three-ring binder from the dover dump in order to keep everything organized. they're going to have a lot of information for the genetic counselor. a lot.