I am supposed to be at a Royals game with Doug French right now. I'm not, because in spite of the fact he's in town this week only, I had to text him while bawling in the parking of KU Cancer Center in Lee's Summit and tell him I just couldn't do it. I needed to go home.

I went in to my third week of radiation expecting to be in and out in about fifteen minutes, like usual. That is not what happened.

Let me preface this by saying my cancer team is made up of decent, good people. There is not a bad apple among them. That said, I think it must be very easy for people who treat lots of cases to forget that for most people they treat, this is the first time. It's a good lesson to remember in any job you do, whether you drive a school bus or operate on people's spines or manage new college graduates -- if you interact with the public, some of the people you deal with are scared or intimidated, and it's not only your job to do your job, it's also your job to monitor them and respond in kind. If you want to be really good at what you do, that is. This is a lesson I'm internalizing through this experience, and I hope it makes me a better person overall.

Today after I lay down (this is the closest approximation visually I can find) and closed my eyes and listened for the beep and thought to myself that this is the second-to-last week, this will soon be over, the therapist came out and told me for the second half of treatment, the doctor would come out and draw on me for "the boost."*

I did not know what the boost was. I did not know the boost was coming. There was no warning about said boost.

I did not know they were going to fucking boost my radiation. With a large attachment that looked like the machine Dr. Evil uses. This is the best pic I could find that looks like the normal radiation machine. Now picture a huge scope that stops about an inch from the lumpectomy scar. That's the booster ray, or whatever it is technically called.

I'm lying there, and one of the therapists whips out a Sharpie and starts drawing on me, making some notes that she keeps on a piece of paper she rests on my stomach, like a desk. They chitted and chatted and breathed and sang to Phil Collins, and the longer it took, the more I started to get ANGRY. I was angry to be the one on the table. I was angry about the new bill that shows up every damn week saying I owe hundreds of dollars after insurance. I was angry this was taking so long. I was angry I was half-naked for the fifty-first time in front of virtual strangers.

At one point the therapist apologized for the awkward positioning, and I replied that everything about this entire experience is awkward, and she took it wrong. She said, "I suppose at some point, you're like, whatever," she says good-naturedly. "I don't even see nudity anymore. I just see tattoos."

I know she meant well, but I do not feel whatever about my health or my body. I still think of myself as having to lie there half-naked. I would still like my dignity back. I would still prefer not to have people draw on my secondary sex characteristics with permanent art supplies. I would still prefer to be a person and not a pound of flesh.

I would still prefer for this shit to be over and to have my chest back to myself, beat up, scarred, smaller and burned though it may be.

I refrained from punching her, because at no time has this experience become "whatever." At every time I have wished for my dignity back, and to not to have to bare my breasts to half of Jackson county, and to not have to have Sharpie marks and tattoos that mess up my expensive bras and to not have nurses tell me to just slather on creams to stop the itching that leach through said bras to my professional clothing, and oh, by the way, I haven't been able to stop working in that professional clothing during this experience, so if my left breast goes up in flames during a meeting about open enrollment, I can neither itch it or go slather on cream. I just have to white-knuckle my way through.

Life does not stop for cancer.

After all that is done, the radiation oncologist and I chit-chat about the typhoon we had in KC last night, and then he gives me some suggestions for other creams. The nurse explains to me what radiation feels like, even though she's never had it. Anger wells up in my chest again at this woman who thinks she knows what radiation feels like well enough to explain it to me.

I cry in the parking lot. I text Doug to tell him I can't do it. I just can't stop crying to make it to a baseball game in less than an hour. My mascara is around my knees and I'm still wearing my work clothes and I have to find itch cream.

I apologize. He's like, "For enduring radiation? Please." And that's how I know our eleven years of friendship is so worthwhile - those friendships I made while blogging are so worthwhile. I know I'm not around as much, but you are my people in a way the 90 percent of my people in my new day-to-day probably will never be, because I'll probably never show them as much of me as I have shown you.

I stopped crying finally. I drove to CVS. I looked on the shelf for the anti-itch new cream. I couldn't find it. I went to the pharmacy counter and got a guy to come look for me. Finally, he says, "What is this for?" And I say, "Radiation burns."

AND HE STARTED MANSPLAINING HOW RADIATION BURNS ARE JUST FOR MOISTURE BECAUSE THEY DON'T HURT.

Friends, that young man is really a lucky young man, because I am able to control myself.

I muttered I'd probably go with my radiation oncologist's recommendation and went home and cried some more. I told Doug I'd make this funny when I blogged it, but it's still not funny. It just sucks.

However, there are only eight more treatments left. Eight treatments until I get to stop thinking about cancer for the first time since April. Maybe there will be some smooth water.

This week is the one-year anniversary week of my lay-off from SheKnows Media.

It's been a year. I got laid off. I got a new job. Two months in, I got cancer. I'm almost done with cancer treatment. It's almost G's birthday. He'll be forty-four.

ONWARD.

*According to science, the boost does work for DCIS patients, of which I am one. SCIENCE.