Gail,

I managed to coast through the first 2 weeks or so with very little noticeable impact, other than the fact that during that period I started to detect that my taste buds were deteriorating a bit. In general, I felt so good and upbeat at that stage that I thought all the advance warnings about radiation had been over-blown. (I was 39 and otherwise in good health at the time.)

There was a good team of oncology nurses at my radiation center who monitored me closely and kept track of my nutrition and medication, but even with that, I was surprised at how quickly some of the nasty side effects kicked in around the third week or so. From then on, until a good many weeks after the end of treatment, it was an ongoing battle against mouth sores, occasional infections, evil phlegm and swallowing problems. The good news is that over the years, many of the specifics have become a rather dim, distant memory for me.

Good luck to you and Barry as you keep going -- it sounds like you have a good routine set up to get through these next few weeks.

Cathy