The Woman in the Plastic Mask

The treatment today turned out not to be a treatment at all. It was another planning session.

I got clamped down into a simulator that took x-rays every way from Sunday to make sure that Dr. Han’s plan for treatment would hit all the parts that the radiation needs to hit and miss as much of everything else as possible.

For those of you who are technically minded, Dr. Han is going to treat me with 2080 centiGray of radiation divided over 13 sessions.

Today’s session was long and uncomfortable, unlike an actual treatment, which will be only about 15 minutes long. The headrest that my head fits onto is comfortable for only about the first 5 minutes or so. Then this spot on the back of my head started to get sore. Then it really started to hurt.

Dr. Han modified the pig head by removing some of the mesh around my right eye, the eye that is being treated. They wrapped the edges of the mask with adhesive tape and readjusted the tape when I said that the edges were tickling my eye.

When the x-ray camera (or whatever it is) was overhead, I could see a reflection of myself in it. I could make out the mesh mask and the eye cut-out. It reminded my of Dumas’ “The Man in the Iron Mask,” except that I am a woman and it is plastic and I am not the pretender to the throne of France and the Musketeers are not coming to the rescue unless I buy a candy bar.

I held still quite well, however. I put my mind into a sort of zen state and let it wander around. Still, the mask was tight and the head rest was just starting to drive me crazy when Erika, the tech today, said that we were done.

Then I took the mask off and took one look at myself in the mirror. I had a wonderful mesh imprint all over my face. I looked liked I had kissed the front grill of my car for a prolonged period. Or maybe someone had been carrying me around head down in a plastic mesh onion bag.

Tomorrow, I go again. Again, I will get clamped into the simulator because Dr. Han wants to take some X-rays with some lead blocks in place that will also block radiation from parts where we do not want it to hit. However, I have been promised that the simulation tomorrow will be short and that it will be followed by a real treatment.