Our Cancer Journey Week 27

Fatigue.   It's not clear whether it's the daily strain of driving to and from the hospital for 7 weeks or Kathy's body trying to rebuild the damage done by 15 consecutive radiation doses, but she is tired.

We still get up at 5am each day to care for the chickens/guinea fowl, turn the compost, refill water/food, manage the woodlot, and ready our property for the llama (our new guard llama is pictured above) and alpacas which are arriving in a month.

Kathy generally keeps my schedule and is on the go 20 hours a day.   Now that she's in the third week of radiation therapy, she's ready for sleep by 8:30pm.  

She has no pain, swelling or discomfort (other than continued numbness in her feet which impacts her ability to stand for long periods), but the home stretch in our cancer journey is like the last few miles of a marathon.   The joy of completion is offset by dwindling energy reserves and a desire for it to be over.

By July 31, the treatment phase of chemotherapy, surgery, and radiation will be done.   We hope that the miracle of remission will continue for many years to come.    However, it is clear that as the journey ends, the celebratory dancing will have to wait until the fatigue, the emotional drain, and residual numbness resolve with time.

Radiation therapy is far more benign than chemotherapy, but daily dosing feels unrelenting.   All will be well and the exhaustion will be replaced by endless energy as our barnyard expands with the animals and plants we've envisioned.