And so it begins...Radiation Day 1

Tonight, Kevin got the real thing...his first of 30 radiation treatments.  I had a meeting tonight so my trusty sidekick, Kailey, took her dad for his treatment.  Thankfully, they didn't take his blood pressure upon arrival since Kailey was the chauffeur (just kidding, she's a good driver).

 Since I wasn't part of the action tonight, Kailey gets to write the post (with Mom throwing in bits of humor because she can't resist).

Okay, so Mom's knocking my driving skills.  We got there just fine.  Lots of traffic but I turned where Dad told me to turn and we arrived early with no grabbing of the dash or pushing the imaginary brake on the passenger side.

Upon arrival, we checked in and waited about 10 minutes before they called Dad back...just enough time for me to make some hot chocolate. :) When the nurse came to get him, she said I could come along for the first few minutes. 

The nurse, who at this point will remain nameless (because we can't remember her name) [I asked Dad but he said "If I'd known there was going to be a test I would have studied for it" }...anyway...The nameless nurse said Mom will probably get to go back there tomorrow to check it all out since each person can tag along one time. 

Even though this was only the first official day, Dad was already an old pro, knowing he needed to recite his name and birthday before he could enter the room (I guess he studied for that test). Once in the room, they laid him down on a table and strapped the pre-made mask to his head. Nameless Nurse explained a bit of the process to me at this time, and then we left the room and went to their station so they could begin scans. When they were sure Dad was lined up perfectly where he needed to be, I was sent back to the waiting room. 

Even though the nurse was using plain English to describe the process, most of it still went right over my head. Basically, they lined up the big lasers on the wall with the marks made on Dad's mask during the test run yesterday. Then they went to the computer station to double check that everything was in the right position. When the radiation starts, Dad hears some humming noises, but the nurses at the computer station hear chirping. Unfortunately, that's all I could make sense of, so my smart mother will have to fill in all the gaping holes of information in tomorrow's post.  

When they kicked me out to the waiting room, I attempted to add some pieces to the community puzzle. For 10 whole minutes I sat there, and I was completely unsuccessful...not one piece was added by me. Thankfully Dad was done in that short amount of time, so I didn't have the opportunity to get too frustrated.


Dad left with a handy dandy scanner card to automate his check-in.  He will get to use it for the first time tomorrow night so we aren't sure if it will play some sort of fanfare music to announce his arrival or not.

We celebrated the completion of Day 1 by eating out at....Culver's! Those of you who know us well are really surprised by that choice...not! You just can't beat a tasty meal and oreo cheesecake ice cream (I mean custard) to top it all off.  

Writing this together was fun.  We had some good laughs and even got Kevin to chuckle.  Tonight we are thankful we can laugh at the end of a long day.

Our mouths were filled with laughter, our tongues with songs of joy. Then it was said among the nations, "The Lord has done great things for them." The Lord has done great things for us, and we are filled with joy.   Psalms 126:2-3.