OK...2nd 'on' week of two a days rads and chemo week in the books. That 20 rad treatments down.

Side effect status....

No Nausea yet period....knock on wood.

Mouth/tounge sores starting to build a bit. Ulecerease helps there and NO pain yet. Dr. did give me script for Hydrocodone (liq) if case something comes up during 'off' week.

Biggest thing on the mouth sore thing seems to be my LIPS are a bit swollen. Using some samples of Aquaphor and Biafine that seems to help. Anybody else got any suggestions???

What's strange to me is EVERY day is DIFFERENT big time when I wake up on what I'm facing as far as side effects. One day it's the attack of the mucus (I have been taking Mucinex tabs that seems to help here a lot). The next day it's the harder to swallow thing. The next day it's the super dry mouth thing. The next day...sort of normal (NO mucus..NO swallowing problems). Weird. Not what I expected. I expected symtoms I've read about here to start and just get worse and worse. Not completely come and go.

The ONE thing that IS constant is I'm still losing my total desire to eat. I've been experimenting every day and just can't find ANYTHING that even resembles tasting decent.....period. A good tasting..satisfying meal is just a memory now which is a bit depressing. The best I can do is come up with some things that are tolerable to get down just so I can get the nutrition I know I need. Most of the time it's at least 4 cans of Boost w/protein and a couple litres of water day as my minimum goal. I'm dropping weight like crazy (had about 180 excess to start with) but the Dr. doesn't seem too concerned yet. My blood work keeps coming up good and I'm not feeling overly fatigued or anything (if anything...I've gained a bit of pep in my step from weight loss), so losing the weight is kind of something 'positive' thru this ordeal .. in my case in a way.

Still drving the 60 mile round trip to treatments twice a day and having no problem there. Sure hoping I can continue to do it this way and avoid that 'hosptial' stay option on those 'on' weeks...hopefully the WHOLE way. I think the pain meds if/when needed down the road will play into this.

Nobody has mentioned the Amifostine yet. Not sure I'd want to go that way or not? Been able to avoid the nausea thing totally so far and wouldn't want to push that envelope since my nutrition is almost bare minimum as it is. Any loss of nutrition and/or hydration due to vomiting could defenitely complicate things.