Hello Nicole and Minska

I was diagnosed with Stage 2B in October ... started chemoradiotheray on 25th Nov (only managed 4 out of 5 chemo) and had brachytherapy over two days at end of Dec... it all ended on 3rd Jan.  It's hard to explain the brachytherapy as the drawings you'll find in the MacMillan books don't really give you a good idea of what to expect.  The equipment is inserted and done under general anaesthetic, and I was then obliged to lie down for a day and a half, so I also had a catheter.  There are three "tubes" that are external, they are then "plugged" into the brachytherapy machine, which happens three times.  Disconcertingly the team came into the room afterwards with a Geiger counter (!).... I have no idea how much radiation my body has received, what with 25 days of radiotherapy and then brachytherapy.  I think they put it on "high" for the last session as i definitely felt it... I'm surprised I wasn't glowing.  The worst part was the removal... I had previously asked them to remove the morphine drip which was attached to me, as I had no pain with the equipment, at all.  It was relatively painful removing everything, as they had packed me with gauze ... but it's over relatively quickly ... say 3 minutes to remove it all... felt like 3 hours... At the end I didn't know whether to thank them or press charges !  I can laugh about it now, but it wasn't funny... though I still think about it...  Hopefully the treatment has been successful, I won't find out until my appt. in February .... So I wish you good luck, the month seemed to take forever ... but now it's over I don't give it a second thought.  And that's a good thing.  I think cervical cancer is treated as being curable by oncologists, I was certainly told that.  And I also asked to see the MRI's of the tumour, so it was huge to start with, 4cm, then went down to 2cm, the last MRI was 1.5 ... and I hope after it was nuked by brachy... it should have disappeared as nothing could survive that !  All the best Diane