Lois,

Well, I am answering you again as you seem to be just a little behind us in the process and you have the same questions, I had.

Bill is horribly claustrophobic so the mask thing was definitely a worry for us. His last MRI (closed in) required 2 ativan before he was able to get thru it.

Scroll forward to the mask fitting. He was surprised that he was able to get thru the process by simply going somewhere else in his mind (he is a pilot and took a "cross country.") And the subsequent treatments have been OK...he is able to do them without meds (its pretty quick...maybe 5-10 minutes) and I am so thankful as it would have been awful to sedate him twice a day...yikes. Hopefully Buzz will adjust since the mask is open mesh.

I think the Amifostine is prohibitively expensive...probably one reason it is not used on everyone...our RO is not a big fan of it. I worried about it and decided that I couldn't control everything about his treatment and had to trust our docs (a little bit) to do the right thing.

Doesn't it just make you crazy to have all these decisions that seem to be life altering?? On one hand, you have to be your own advocate, on the other, you just want someone else to take care of you. ACKKKK!

I wish you the best and Buzz, a little bit of comfort getting thru his fitting! I am glad you are getting the PEG placed early...Bill was pretty pitiful for about 4 days. I would have hated for him to go thru that when everything else was yucky too.

Good luck, Deb