Returning to work after treatment

I sure will depend on several things. How physical the job is and demanding, along with how long are the days. It will depend on what all treatment he had and where. Stage 4 BOT with chemo and Rads can take time to get ready to return. I know some do better than others with the treatment than others do. If, he has felt like he could have gone back to work two to three weeks ago, then it might be close to. If he "thinks" he is just now, this week, he is ready I would say no, give it a few more weeks.

I had to be ready to go back and I did push myself because I had a time limit they would hold my job. They would always have a job, just not what I was doing. I was told by my manager not to worry and take all the time I needed and "My job" will always be there for me even if he has to creat a new position. He would really do that for me. I never had chemo or radition, I had surgery and was cut from ear to ear and my larynx was removed and a neck dissection on both sides L-2-5 and a total of 86 lymph glands. My job was running the shipping department on my shift. Talking was required to my crew and all the truck drivers and a lot of phone calls. We shipped refrigerated so we had a cold box 34 degrees I would have to go into several times a day.

I really felt ready and did go back in 10 weeks. The first days really kicked my bottom, but I did it. The second week was better and I felt I was incontroll as it is a high stress job. I knew I had to be ready because I was cleaning the stove at home. I had a lot to overcome with my speech but did manage to do it. We had two hours to set up the load and load the truck or we went into penitallys at $1:00 per minute, whitch could add up real quick it there was any problems.

It would be good if he can go back halif shift or part time the first week to make it easier on him. I wish you both all the best, and you will always be in my thoughts and prayers.

Bill

Hard physical work would be difficult to return to if a person is still very fatigued.  I went back 6 weeks after treatment, but I had a desk job, and I worked nights, so I didn't have to deal with anybody except consumers.  Is it possible for him to test it out, and then maybe go part time for a couple weeks, and gradually get back into the swing of it?

One thing, I remember....when I went back to work, I died when I came home....and on weekends I'd sleep non-stop for 12 hours easy. 

p

JM0377 said:

Have to return after one week

I just finished 33 radiation sessions yesterday. I am active duty military and they gave me one week before I have to return to work. Maybe I'll heal in the next week??! hahaha

 

Jennifer

that is just absurd. I cannot imagine returning to work a week after rads. I hope that decision will be revisited and changed to something more realistic.

Barbara

JM0377 said:

Have to return after one week

I just finished 33 radiation sessions yesterday. I am active duty military and they gave me one week before I have to return to work. Maybe I'll heal in the next week??! hahaha

 

Jennifer

OMG can the doctor write you a NOTE????  

CivilMatt said:

work

NJMOM,

I like the 50, 60, 70 thing, so true.  Other than what everyone else said, don’t forget to check his thyroid periodically, mine slowly succumbed to rads.

Matt

I'm a cop in UK anyway back after 5 months which was considered rapid!  Keith has wise words.  Build up exercise and stamina. 

Jennifer how will you pass bft after a week? 

Regards Gary 

JM0377 said:

BFT-basic fitness test?

Gary,

If you mean fitness test, I became due in October while I was undergoing treatment. I will still have to test once I go back to work. Due to the treatment, I will do a limited test. However, in six months I will be required to complete a full test with the run, push-ups, sit-ups and waist measurement. Hmmmm, how will I pass? I figured I would be back in the gym tomorrow. I was in pretty good shape before I entered treatment. I seriously doubt I could even run half a lap, do five push-ups or sit-ups at the moment. I figure I will just build it up a little each day. 

Jennifer

I had a co-worker who only got rads, due to a growth around his larynx, and he only missed a couple days during tx, and was back to work the day after his last rad. Thing is- he was only getting zapped a couple places in the neck, and had no Op for any kind of tumor removal. I see from your initial post that you had an Op, so they found the Primary and removed it? I guess I'm just wondering how many places you got zapped by the rads? I talked a number of times to my co-worker, and was very concerned about his just getting a couple zaps/day being able to take care of it, but it appears it did, because he's close to 4 years out to the good. With your rads being a follow-up from the Op is different than what he had.  

kcass

JM0377 said:

Surgery and Radiation

Kent,

Yes, I had surgery in January under the impression we were removing a benign growth and my submandibular salivary gland. Once they removed the growth and gland, pathology ran another test and it turned out it was adenoid cystic carcinoma. I had positive margins and perineural invasion (my cancer uses the nerves as a pathway to spread). Radiation is pretty standard after surgery. However, my surgeon did not feel radiation was necessary. His mindset was that it is a slow growing cancer and we'll just wait until it comes back and deal with it at the time. I couldn't just sit with the idea that cancer cells were now roaming around just waiting for it to grow again. I met with a couple radiation oncologists, got an opinon from a head and neck oncologist and they all recommended raditaion. During my radiation, there wasn't a specific tumor or even detectable cancer cells they were targeting. I had the most targeted doses of radiation to the tumor bed where the gland/tumor was located. Everything else from my spinal cord, brain steam, etc were in the radiation treatment area, just at lower doses. I guess I don't know what you mean by how many places were zapped. My treatment plan records indicate many areas were hit with radiation, just at different levels. I received 20 Gy of carbon-ion radiation and 50 Gy of IMRT, so a total of 70Gy in 33 sessions. 

I met a lady here that had the same type of cancer as mine. She had an inoperable tumor that wrapped around her brainstem. They utilized the same carbon-ion and IMRT combo and she's been good for 15 years since her treatment. She did lose 85% of her hearing on the treatment side eight years out from radiation; but other than that she had minimal long term side effects. My radiation oncologist felt that there was about an 80% chance that my cancer would not return due to catching it when it was Stage II. If I had negative margins and no perineural invasion after surgery, I don't think we would have done the radiation at all.

Jennifer

Guess what I was referring to was the number of places that got zapped with each rad session. The machine moves, then the buzzing sound that's the zapping, then stops and you hear the machine move to a new spot, stop, and then the buzzing again. That's why I mentioned that my co-worker was only getting zapped with rads in a couple spots. Some people only get around 5, and others twice that many, and some four times that many. That is what determines the length of the rad sessions. Some people are only under the mask for 5 minutes, and others as long as 20-25 minutes. What were you?

I profess ignorance on your C. Mine was in the lymphs, as are most, and my two enlargements did me a favor by letting me know there was a problem, and I got right on it. If, Jennifer, your nerves were zapped with rads, then be prepared for potential future complications, and let your Drs know of them. I was unknown Primary, so they had to zap me most everywhere. One would think that'd spread it out and cause less damage, but not the case. Took a couple years for the neck spasms to start to the point of being an issue I had to deal with, and am currently under the care of a Neurologist who has me on two meds- neither of which stop the spasms on both sides, but they have eliminated the severity of them. 6800gy was my total, I'm told, and am looking at Osteoradionecrosis taking a toll down the road because anything over 6000 opens the door to damage of the tiny blood vessels in the jaw area. That might sound like a lot, but the tech gal who walked me out of my last rad, and who had worked at Mayos, said what I had just completed was the most intense rads anybody gets, to which I replied that I had nothing against her, but really never wanted to see her again!

At your total dosage, you should have nothing to worry about. But, please keep this episode very much alive in your mind: a lovely young gal like you getting C is just not right. Could be nothing more than your body's immune system had a hiccup and wasn't able to eliminate the C cells we all have in our bodies, or it could be something else. Has anyone over there mentioned anything about Apricot seeds and the anthrax thing? 4 seeds a day is not a bad idea.

With this past weekend's events in Paris, figure you're gonna be very busy over the next few months...

kcass 

Kent Cass said:

Jennifer

Guess what I was referring to was the number of places that got zapped with each rad session. The machine moves, then the buzzing sound that's the zapping, then stops and you hear the machine move to a new spot, stop, and then the buzzing again. That's why I mentioned that my co-worker was only getting zapped with rads in a couple spots. Some people only get around 5, and others twice that many, and some four times that many. That is what determines the length of the rad sessions. Some people are only under the mask for 5 minutes, and others as long as 20-25 minutes. What were you?

I profess ignorance on your C. Mine was in the lymphs, as are most, and my two enlargements did me a favor by letting me know there was a problem, and I got right on it. If, Jennifer, your nerves were zapped with rads, then be prepared for potential future complications, and let your Drs know of them. I was unknown Primary, so they had to zap me most everywhere. One would think that'd spread it out and cause less damage, but not the case. Took a couple years for the neck spasms to start to the point of being an issue I had to deal with, and am currently under the care of a Neurologist who has me on two meds- neither of which stop the spasms on both sides, but they have eliminated the severity of them. 6800gy was my total, I'm told, and am looking at Osteoradionecrosis taking a toll down the road because anything over 6000 opens the door to damage of the tiny blood vessels in the jaw area. That might sound like a lot, but the tech gal who walked me out of my last rad, and who had worked at Mayos, said what I had just completed was the most intense rads anybody gets, to which I replied that I had nothing against her, but really never wanted to see her again!

At your total dosage, you should have nothing to worry about. But, please keep this episode very much alive in your mind: a lovely young gal like you getting C is just not right. Could be nothing more than your body's immune system had a hiccup and wasn't able to eliminate the C cells we all have in our bodies, or it could be something else. Has anyone over there mentioned anything about Apricot seeds and the anthrax thing? 4 seeds a day is not a bad idea.

With this past weekend's events in Paris, figure you're gonna be very busy over the next few months...

kcass 

Kent,

I'm tracking, now. In the beginning, I didn't really pay attention to the sounds of the machines other than they were buzzing all around me. I spent most of my time concentrating on trying not to gag from the mouthgaurds. Each session was a total of about 30 minutes. In time, I realized that the first five minutes were probably spent with the staff setting up the machines. After those five minutes, the table would move a little and then the buzzing would begin. It was odd to me, the staff didn't really explain the machines or what was going to be happening to me. Honestly, without this site and my own research, I would have been clueless to this whole ordeal. I never counted but the machine did anywhere from 8-10 passes. Of course my eyes were closed the entire time, but it seemed to move from one side of my head to the other. 

I am so worried about the long term effects. My ENT doc believes I will have the long term dry mouth. I had already lost the one salivary gland on one side and my parotid took a pretty decent hit during radiation. I like to be optimistic and think that I am too stubborn and one day it will come back to mostly normal. 6800 Gy??? Oh goodness...I could not even imagine. All of that in 6 weeks???

I was 37 when diagnosed. It was definitely a tough pill to swallow. I'm not married and I don't have kids. While I was thinking about my 5-yr life plan from a personal and professional perspective, cancer really threw a wrench in all of that. It could have been so easy to ignore a random, painless lump in my neck. As a woman, if you feel a lump in your breast, you're more conditioned to get that checked out. For two months, my mind kept nagging me to just go have someone look at it. I am glad I did. In my profession, a lot of us just ignore our aches and pains, pop 800mg of Motrin like it is nothing and keep going. I live a pretty healthy lifestyle. ACC is rare and they think it is possibly due to environmental factors as opposed to smoking, genetics, etc. 

I have not heard about apricot seeds and anthrax. What's that about? 

It's definitely an interesting time to be stationed in Europe, right now. 

Jennifer

I know it's not easy! My boyfreind went back to work 10 weeks after last treatment. He has deskjob but everday after work he looked so pale and tired. And he was still on high dose of pain med. He felt alot better after he quit the pain med.

Kent Cass said:

Answers

Anthrax occurs naturally in Apricot seeds, and is known to kill C cells, while healthy cells have a way of protecting themselves against it, if taken in moderation. Have read several places that Anthrax was the tx Steve McQueen went to Mexico for late in his C battle, but too late in his C fight. Health food stores sell them in large plastic bags. Just a thought for you, as I read an article years ago about it in Europe, and how some people had overdone it and the results were bad. Moderation is a must. I had wondered if Germany/Europe was into that, or not.  I also read that Erbitux was first established as a standard Chemo for H&N in Europe, before the USA, because it's more patient-friendly than the Cisplatin I got, and that the positive results in Europe were what convinced the USA to start using Erbitux.

No- my rads weren't in 6 weeks. I was too sick from the Chemo regiment to get any rads in weeks 5&6, spending the first 4 nights of week-6 in the hospital. I was getting zapped in 20 places, and would count them each time to know how soon it'd be over. Was supposed to get even more than I got, too. Last 3 sessions I only got zapped in 5 places, with 31 full zappings, and had been told at the start it'd be the typical 35. A little footnote was that the Rad Dr ordered a second eleventh-hour biopsy trying to find a Primary to focus on. I think it was because she knew what she was going to have done, and what the Chemo Dr's tx plan was, as it was the Chemo regiment that made my tx different from anyone else on this forum. And, yes, I'm the one who the Chemo Dr put on Morphine at the start of week #2, Jennifer, which is very untypical. Chopped-up Hydrocodone was what I preferred, and only used the Morph a couple times/day.   

Your C being rare and your taking a major hit to the saliva, your Dr is probably right about the dry mouth. My saliva came back typical to most, but it's not the same, and spitting is popular with me out of necessity. When I read that your C is nerve-related, well, that's what really caught my attention, because of the spasm problems I still live with, as do others, here, and truly do hope you don't take a major hit down the road with your H&N nerves.

kcass 

I've had some anthrax shots for work, but that's the extent of my dealing with it. My docs haven't been the best. I think they try, but they just tell me that I'm too complicated and they don't know how to help me. I found the German docs that deal with ACC through my own research. My ENT surgeon wasn't aware that I had a malignant tumor, so he did the best with the knowledge he was given from pathology. They told us twice it was benign. I am fortunate that my primary job in the AF is healthcare administration. I am lucky that I know how to work through the system to get the referrals that I needed. Plus, I got to a point that I just told them what they needed to do and to submit it. All 5'0 of me can be a little bossy at times. hahaha

Wow, your treatment sounds like it has been quite the ordeal. I don't think I could have dealt with all of that. However, I think we all dig in and do what we have to do to get to the other end. It's only been five days that I havent had a session and I am taking it day to day. The radiaton burns are something fierce at the moment. My left tonsil area hurts a lot too. Everyday, I wake up and hope some of it has cleared up. No such luck, yet. I certainly pray that I don't have long-term effects, but I know it's a real possibility. 2015 was a really crappy year and I just hope that my 2016 is better.

This group and everyone's posts has really been amazing help. You all are an inspiration as to what we can endure and survive.

Jennifer