Simulated and ready to go!

On Thursday I went in to be simulated. This is actually a pretty interesting process. You have to lie on this board, with your arms positioned over your head and they run you through an x-ray machine. Through this process they determine how the radiation beams will be directed.

The appointment was an easy one except for a few things:

• They rubberband your feet together so that you can't move them and so that you are straight on the board.
• They tell you to breathe normally while in the x-ray machine and don't take any deep breaths. Well any time someone tells you to breathe normally you are automatically very aware of how you breathe and you breathe all weird! And what constitutes a deep breath?!
• Your arms are over your head on boards. You have to decide how you will hold your hands each time during this appointment because any change in how your body is lined up can throw off the radiation process. For the record, I chose to hold my left hand in my right.
• While you are on this board, with your feet rubber banded together and your arms over your head oh yeah and topless, they take a lot of pictures of you. Awkward!!! I would hate to see those. 
• At the end of the process they have to give you tatoos. I had wondered how this was done. From what I can tell, they drop some ink on you and then prick you with a needle to push the ink under your skin. So now I have three faint black dots on my body which will help like up the (insert Dr. Evil voice) lasers.

I will have 33 radiation appointments (beginning the day after Memorial Day). Why 33 you may ask? No idea. Right now I have a 3:45pm appointment time. That works well with school, but once school is out it's going to be slightly annoying to have to be somewhere everyday at 3:45. Luckily the appointments are only between 15-30 mins.

This should be the last big thing I have to do in this process. Glad to finally see the light at the end of the tunnel!