Please Help

Please do stay positive!
First, I am so sorry this has happened to you! Second, I hope you've found a good oncologist - someone who listens to you - who stays abreast of the newest treatments and ideas. Third, I hope you have family or great friends who you can lean on and talk to. Don't know where you live but hopefully there is a good University near you or something similar (or better) where you can have the benefit of many good minds and a research.
I cannot possibly know how you feel right now but please know I and others who visit this site are rooting for you!!!!

dolly5550 said:

Please help
Thank you for your comments.I live in Australia and am attending a major local Hospital for treatment of my disease.I do not have any relatives apart from my husband and two children. Friends are few and I therefore feel scared and very much alone. We do have resources that deal with patients with cancer,maybe I might benfit with some sort of counselling.I am a nurse which makes this all the more difficult as I have nursed patients with cancer.One positive aspect of treatment in this country is that it is all free of charge.

Fellow Aussie
Hi there!
This is a very confusing and upsetting time for you- no doubt about it, it sucks! I had a partial nephrectomy on Sept 20th so I'm 5wks into recovery today. I had an open operation at a regional hospital (Wyong, NSW) and you're so right about Medicare- there was no compromising quality of care all through this rotten time, and I was fortunate to have my specialist do the Op- all free, including 5 days in hospital. All those scans and blood tests- I thought they'd never end! I have 2 young children still at home also, and that's a difficult situation- coping with everyone else's emotions and needs. It's hard.
One thing I did learn through this experience is that people really do want to help & support you. I've always been very independent- a typical caregiver who didn't express their own needs- but I've discovered that there are lots of people around me who do care, I just had to "let them in". So many people are just looking for an opportunity to be kind- if anyone offers to make you a casserole, or bring in the washing etc, let them! In a funny way, it restores your connection to humanity.
As a nurse you've seen so many people in pain and distress, but your experience will be different because you're you! As a survivor, I can tell you that yes, there'll be pain and you'll be feeling many emotions- not all of them pleasant- but it does pass and there IS light at the end of that frightening tunnel...

If you'd like to correspond, that'd be great! Remember to ask heaps of questions of your Dr, and be reassured that of all the cancers, this one is not so bad!
All the best,
Yvonne xx