Mental Issues

rrob said:

Cancer's mind games
Beth,

I am so sorry you are having to deal with this. When I was diagnosed in Oct. 07, I was so scared, so desparate, so angry. I couldn't stand to be by myself, I couldn't sleep at night, and I felt like I was about to break into a million pieces. One night, it was late and I was awake and so alone and so, so scared. I prayed to God to please send my guardian angel to watch over me. Believe it or not, that night as I finally fell asleep, I felt as though I were cradled in someone's arms and I slept through the entire night peacefully. And no, I hadn't taken any meds! In my eyes, this was God's way of comforting me and letting me know that he would be with me every step and that I could lean on him when I needed. Lots of times I forget that and struggle with being in control and making things work out my way. Okay, enough said.

Now, you and I have posted about Stage iv before, so here's the latest. On Dec. 8, I had a colonoscopy. In my original surgeries, we weren't able to remove the flat lesion that started the problem. So I had 6 mos of FOLFOX w/Avastin. After my scope, my gastro told me there was no sign of any lesion, that my colon looked absolutely normal, healthy, and he couldn't even tell where the lesion had been. That chemo is an awesome miracle!

Then on Dec. 12, I went in for surgery to remove the original area in my sigmoid colon and part of my rectum where the cancer originated. My oncologist wanted the surgery; my surgeon was more inclined to wait and see. I decided if this gave me any chance to avoid a recurrance, go for it. So I had my surgery laprascopically and went home on the 16th. My surgeon had a pathologist in the OR who examined the area removed and said it looked absolutely normal. The path reports on the colon, the mesentary, and the 7 nodes they removed showed NED.

On Dec. 30, I had my PET scan. I saw my oncologist Friday, Jan 9th, for results. Let me preface this by saying that all along I have been telling my onc that I was going to be his victory and that in 10 years, I would be cheering on his new patients and telling them they could be victories, too. I just could not get him on board; he was too grounded in the realities and I believe was afraid to give me false hope. So Friday morning, he came in and said my PET showed NED with the only areas of inflammation in the incision and resection sites. He then told me he has been reading the book "Anti-Cancer," which made him think of me. He actually told me that he believes that I am going to be one of his patients that beats this--now how awesome is that!

Now here's the part I really want you to hear. The last week I have been very depressed because it is really hard to wrap my mind around the statistics sometimes. And how stupid is it to be depressed when I've had such good news lately?! So when I went to see my oncologist and he said those words to me, I swear it was like a message straight from God--get my chin up off the ground, count my blessings, and keep on fighting! So you go see a counselor, see your doctor, get your meds upped, cause we are in this for the long haul. I am going to beat this and so are you! We are not going to let statistics drag us down--we are not average and we are not going to be average. Email me if you want, post and I'll answer, but just remember, we are going to fight every step of the way. Now, here's one last little thing that has helped me. I see a counselor once a month. One day he told me it was okay to have a pity party, I deserved it. I told him if I walked out of his office and got hit by a car, I had sure wasted some good time feeling sorry for myself. So on the days that I am really down, I have a good cry and the get back up and thank God for the fact that I'm here right now with everything I love (and a lot of things I don't like at all-LOL).

Sorry this is so long, but I believe!

Rebecca