Merkel and Me

 Thursday May 7, 2026     Today is another one of those milestone days.  One year ago today I had my final radiation treatment. 5 weeks of 5 days -a-week treatments were finally completed. By that day I was finally starting to feel and see the effects: skin that was warm to the touch, redness, blistering and cracking, and some pain. For another week it would just get worse and then start to subside. One year later the site can still be dry but no heat, no redness, and all the scans are still clean. I had the blood test this week so we will be looking forward to another zero. No other cancer related tests, procedures, scan, or appointments until July.  I'm in the sweet in-between of necessary check-ups right now.      I do have a couple of appointments next week to go over the results of my second colonoscopy. I'm not too worried.  I'm assuming anything serious they would have been in more of a rush to talk and plan next steps. I've been livin...