The Unwelcome Guest

Probably like you, I’ve been sizzling in sun rays this summer, but very soon, as part of my prostate cancer treatment, I’ll be bathing in radio waves. I’ve known for some time that radiotherapy, the pointy end of my treatment, would start in September. It was established early on, that my prostate was not ripe for removal, so I’ve been on hormone therapy to shrink the Unwelcome Guest and that treatment, despite some irritating side-effects, seems to be working well. Now it’s nearly time to enjoy seven weeks as a guest on Radio Therapy.

You, dear reader, have almost certainly never had radiotherapy and I hope you never do, but this is the kind of cancer stuff that rarely gets talked about except among family and friends. So, I thought some of you might be interested to know what goes on. If you’d rather hack your arm off with a blunt penknife, I totally get it. Go find some more pleasant, diverting activity: take the dog for a walk, play guitar, read a book – I would probably do the same.

Anyone still here? OK well, it all starts, as does just about everything these days, with a PowerPoint presentation. To which you might say, Christ haven’t these poor bastards suffered enough? At 10am on a bright, clear, sunny day, the cancer contingent all trooped into a room in the urology department at Guy’s Hospital to find out our fate. Most were surprisingly chipper, though some looked as though life had taken a couple of chunks out of them. We all had a question on our lips: Radiotherapy, what’s that like then?

Jenna, the bright and breezy Urology Advanced Practitioner, had the answers. I’m to have radiotherapy five days a week for seven weeks at the same time and place every day. I get weekends off for good behaviour. The treatment doesn’t hurt and I’m not walking round like some kind of mobile Chernobyl, I’m safe to handle, but there are side effects. More about those in a moment.

I’ve never been a tattoo kind of guy. In my youth it was squaddies, crims and sailors who got inked, not nice middle-class boys like me. All that’s set to change. I’m now getting three tattoos, one on each hip and one just below my navel. These small dots will be used to line me up on the Intensity Modulated Radiotherapy do-dat in the same, correct position each time. Fairly soon, I have a terrible feeling I’m going to start talking about my ‘cancer journey’. If I do, a sharp blow to the head should fix it.

Us prostate people will also be drinking gallons of water over the coming weeks to enlarge our collective bladders (that might be an image you’re going to struggle to forget). This pushes the healthy organs out of the radio beam’s intrusive gaze and makes sure it’s just the prostate that receives both barrels. In fairness that’s not exactly the words Jenna used.

But hey, it’s not all just fun stuff. While the treatment may be pain free it does come with some baggage. It seems that about a month into the treatment I may start to feel dog tired and will have to take to my basket. I may be hopping to the loo twice a night and also my bowels…. whoa, whoa, whoa, actually you know what? You’ve suffered enough, if you want to know more Google it.

After the seven weeks the cancer should be nailed, but cancer is nothing if not a slippery bastard, so I’m then monitored every few months to see if the Guest has checked out or has decided to dash back because it had forgotten something.

Towards the end of the talk a little wizened man at the front who hadn’t said much suddenly piped up: “Can we drink alcohol during the treatment?” It was a sort of cartoon moment, there was total silence and total concentration as the room collectively held its breath. Well Jenna, well, can we?

I’ll keep you posted.