Chemo in three days

JanJan63 said:

Thank you Kim! It's funny

Thank you Kim! It's funny what you said about your husband because I'm in a similar boat. I'd never want him to suffer through what I am but I was always worried about him because he's a smoker and eats badly. I don't eat as well as I should but he eats far worse. He finally quit smoking once I got my diagnosis but he smoked since he was a kid. And if it had been him he'd have been well covered financially while I'm entitled to no benefits at all. He might very well get cancer, though, or already have it brewing. His dad had bladder cancer and his doctor told him that while there's been no studies on it he's never had a patient with bladder cancer that wasn't a smoker. His dad had quit smoking years before.

People on here do seem really great. I try not to talk to my cancer free friends about it because they can't really understand and it's kind of a burden to put on them because there's so little they can do to help. My friends that have been treated for cancer are the best ones to talk to but I don't want to drag them through it again. And none have had colorectal cancer.

Jan 

We picked up my prescriptions that I have to take with my chemo. All three are for neausea. Two are to be taken before and after the chemo and the other one is for long term effects. That's scary but hopefully will help a lot.

Today I'm feeling much stronger both physically and mentally. I'm looking forward to poisoning those cancer cells now.

Annabelle41415 said:

Great

Glad that you are going to tackle those cells.  Just rest assured that you will be fine if you communicate with your doctors if you don't feel well and keep us posted to your happenings.  Keep your chin up - we are here for you.

Kim

The day didn't go very well but I feel okay so far. They got blood draw for the first two drugs and then didn't get it for the baby bottle line. They tried for an hour with my doing everything from being almost on my head to marching up and down the halls swinging my arms. They even replaced the line so I got poked twice which was surprisingly painful the second time.

Finally got sent for an x-ray and they used the stuff to clear whatever was blocking it, possibly a flap or something. So a three hour day ended up being an over six hour day.

So far no nausea, just a prickly sensation on the pads of my fingers when I take something out of the fridge. And my whole inside of my mouth and throat felt prickly when I drank some cold milk last night.

Akroger said:

Don't be sorry

Jan, I tend to believe that there is no such thing as "complaining too much." No one can completely understand the personal torment and suffering of another individual, and from my mom I know that with cancer there is a seemingly endless parade of emotional, physical and mental distress. Towards the end of the two weeks after a chemo session, my mom tends to do really well, with relatively occasional pain/fatigue, and she is a lot more active. Yesterday, I visited her in the evening after she had gotten her erbitux infusion earlier that day, and it was a complete reversal. I know that if I never get used to seeing her feeling so much pain and devastation, that she certainly can't get used to the feeling herself. She says, on days like yesterday, "Alex, I'm not well." And a part of me always gets frustrated when she says things like that, like, well, obviously! But I too, can only respond with the same things every time, "I know Ma. But don't worry, it'll get better, just like every time. There are three or four hard days, but then you have 10 really good days!" The implicit message being, at least you are still living and able to enjoy life some of the time, surrounded by your loved ones who would do anything for you. And every time I know that hearing that doesn't make it any better. Because this is basically what my mom has to look forward to the rest of her life, as long as the chemo keeps working. Even as it keeps hurting her, too.

There should be better options, you're right. They should, more importantly, be able to know based on looking at a person's health profile and genetics and the genetics of the cancer cells what the best solutions for them would be. Are they dietary? Are they exercise? Are they chemo? Which chemo? Why is it a crap shoot that a patient has to experience the torment of various different chemo regimens, levels, combinations, etc., until the right one is found, in spite of all the damage done in the meantime? My dad and my mom's friends and I are always lamenting the lack of a better way. It also doesn't help my mom that she's pretty stubborn, and refuses to try any technique not expressly recommended by her doctor. No dietary modifications or holistic medicine ideas or anything like that. Which, maybe that's for the best, but since her doctor can't know that and she won't try it, who can really say?

My brother is in the genetic research field, and he tells me all the time about how hard it is to get to those eureka discoveries, how expensive it is. He's working towards a PhD right now, and knowing all that that takes, and then seeing how my mom suffers too, he feels pretty helpless a lot of the time too. He tries to stay positive about moving forward though. He's really a source of inspiration for my mom and I. We can't help it when we feel angry and in despair and in pain. But we try to grab the good moments and take as much advantage of them as we can. At the end of the day, isn't that what the whole fight is for, and what makes it worth it? I hope this message didn't come across as too discombobulated or confusing, all I really wanted to say was that you have my deepest sympathies, and even if I can't know exactly what you're suffering, I hurt for you and for everyone who is going through this. And if venting your emotions helps you at all, keep doing it, whatever helps you to get through this fight.

Thank you so much. Sometimes I feel bad for complaining because people have gone through so much worse. But my time might be coming for that. Or I'll get lucky and never deal with this again, who knows, it's a total crap shoot. I really appreciate your words, thank you so very much. Everyone on here is so great, I'm so glad to have found this board.

I was reading in the cancer magazine they supply at the centre about a breakthrough in breast cancer cells and treatment. They give woman this high dose of a chemo that is very hard on them but have figured out that not all cancer cell types are responsive to the chemo. So now they want to test the cells and see if the specific chemo will have an effect or if the woman are going through something that isn't going to help anyway. So some women will have the specific cells that will be killed by the chemo but not all. It's nice to think that some people will be able to avoid having a nasty chemo if it can't help anyway.