The actual administration of radiation shouldn't be too painful. It does make require you to visit the cancer center daily, and does require you to kick-start a number of skin care routines.

The daily xRT appointment: You can ask your scheduler or radiation therapist to give you a consistent appointment every day that meets your schedule. Consistency really helped ensure I showed up on time.

Your radiation song: During the actual radiation appointment, I was able to request songs. Over time, the team knew what my songs were and it played while getting the treatment. It helped me calm myself and drown out the loud machine noises.

Post-radiation fatigue: It's real, and it's cumulative. It really does take a toll on the body. Scheduling naps, and allowing yourself to go to sleep early really helps. By the end of the week of radiation, I was exhausted. I learned the hard way that I had to go particularly slow on Thursdays and Fridays.

Daily workouts: Radiation can change the way your tissues connect to each other. Gentle stretching of the part you are getting radiated in can help ensure that long-term pain or soreness doesn’t set in. Since I swim, my radiation oncologist okayed daily swimming for me, and even 10-15 minutes made a world of difference (but check with your own team first, since some centers advise staying out of chlorinated pools while skin is being treated). I scheduled that into the day.

Starting radiation therapy soon?

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Soaps, deodorants and sunscreen: Radiation forced me to detox my toiletries. My care team wanted me to switch to "fragrance-free", "paraben-free" and "aluminum-free" everything. The rationale was to avoid irritating the skin in the treated area. It’s worth knowing, though, that randomized trials have since found deodorant use (aluminum-containing or not) does not make radiation skin reactions worse, so ask your team what they actually want you to avoid.

After doing a bunch of research, I ended up purchasing these products from amazon/CVS/target.

  • A fragrance-free deodorant
  • A fragrance-free body wash
  • A mineral sunscreen

These products have of course come to become part of my daily life now. I am still doing a lot of research on other product options for those of us going through radiation, and of course cancer care broadly.