Had my first session of chemotherapy today. FOLFOX, it's a standard one. However, we kicked off with two unforeseen delights. Firstly, the nurse was called Rommel. Secondly, at my last visit there had been an admin cock-up and they had accidentally given me somebody else's form. The upshot was that I popped home to get it. All the staff were really nice, and it was a pleasant ward with natural light. A couple of friends had very kindly offered to come with me, but I felt fine going on my own and it's just as well I did - it would have been a complete waste of their time. I mean other than the pleasure of my company, obviously.
Once we got going properly the whole thing took about 3.5 hours. Just a succession of clear drips, although one was in a crimson bag, presumably for the reassurance of patients. 🙄. (A permanent line (PICC) was inserted into my arm on Monday. I mean permanent for the duration, not for ever.) I just sat there and read the booklets I was supposed to read before I came, dozed a little, checked my phone to see if the internet was still there, etc. Felt completely normal the whole time. Still do.
At the end they plugged me into a bottle and sent me home. The bottle drips into my arm over two days under pressure, and comes in a handy-dandy carrying case so that it's not too much of a nuisance. I go back on Friday to be unplugged. I'm to have six fortnightly sessions, so about three months. Then another round of scans.
Happily, my hair is not expected to fall out. There is an impressive list of possible side effects but we'll just have to see which ones, if any, turn up. I'm not concerned; que sera sera.
TL:DR The History Of Not Especially Memorable Days just got a new entry.
I'm glad to hear this update. I am like you; I couldn't see having anyone waste their time going with me when I didn't need anyone. I think of you often.
I haven’t updated in awhile. I had a follow up with my surgeon today. She removed all of the surgical staples. All the incisions have healed nicely. I get a sharp pain in the lower right part of my abdomen but the surgeon said that will eventually go away. Sorry for the tmi but I’m having normal bowel movements. I got a UTI due to the catheter but the antibiotics have pretty much taken care of that. I will be having a few rounds of chemo to make sure they kill it all. That will be starting on September 9th. I’m still extremely optimistic. I go back to work on Monday. I will be on light duty for four weeks. I’ll still be spending time out in the field but won’t be performing any actual physical field work. That’s it for now.
@Morpheus well, that could hardly have gone better. Very happy news, thank you! Sounds like you're going to be totally fine.
@achetocuddle thank you, that's very kind. It's a bit strange to think of people around the world thinking of me, but it's nice and it helps.
My update since I'm here: it's been a week since the first session of my fortnightly chemo. The only significant side effect is that it has really helped my IBS, which is the best it's been since the very early days in about 2007. Yep you read that right, I had chemo and the side effects made me better.
Thanks for the update. You're awesome.
It's wonderful to hear that your chemo is making you feel better!
Just checking back for news on @CuddleDuncan & @Morpheus It sounds like you’re both doing well as expected and have some good news. Hoping the best for you both!🤗🙏🏻😊
I read this whole thread just now since I am a newbie. Very encouraged by all the kind people. Best wishes to @CuddleDuncan and @Morpheus .
Ok glad you’re doing well @CuddleDuncan. Thank you as well for updating.
@CuddleDuncan Glad the first round went well!
My mom had a PICC line during kidney failure, years ago. They placed it in a sterile room, but the doctor unceremoniously removed it with me at her bedside. It was trippy as hell to watch him casually draw twelve inches of line straight from her heart, out of her neck, like a magician's handkerchief! 😆
~ Sunset Snuggles
🫂 Enthusiast 🌄 Travel Fiend 🐄 Animal Lover
@Morpheous , I’m hoping that your operation went well and you are feeling better doing better… I will be adding you to my prayers
Hello all, so….
My Chemo has been scheduled. I start September 13th. I will be having 4 rounds of chemo. Each round consists of 21 days. 1 day will be IV and pills. 13 days will be pills only. 7 days will be rest. Then it starts over again 3 more times.
They gave me the option is doing what @CuddleDuncan is doing but I decided I didn’t want to have to carry a device around with me.
At this point, the plan is I will still be going to work but I will reassess once I start and see how I feel. I’m still extremely positive and optimistic about all of this.
@Morpheus This plan worked well for a family member of mine. I hope it does the same for you. He was extremely positive and I do think that helps.
After 27 days, I went back to work yesterday. I’m on light duty until September 16th but it was nice to get back even though I was enjoying my couch. Chemo starts on September 13th so I’m just trying to relax as best as I can for now.
Wow, you are really flying through this @Morpheus. Well done.
Thank you sir @CuddleDuncan
Officially started chemo today. I was in the chair with an IV for 4 hours. I’ll be on pill chemo for 13 days, rest 7, then start all over again for 3 more rounds.
I felt fine the entire time I was in the chair but when I left the hospital, I felt a wave of utter crappiness. I felt better around 30 minutes later. I’m sensitive to cold, feel like I have a minor sore throat and I’m having trouble talking.
84 more days to go.
Sending light, loving thoughts and healing vibrations…💫 ✨💛🤍💛✨💫 You got this You’re already wining with your awesome attitude. Stay in the light, nothing is said and done. it’s not what you go through, it’s how you get through it. I will keep you in my prayers 🫶🏻 @CuddleDuncan And @Morpheus 🌻🌻🌻
@Morpheus i am so incredibly sorry for all you’re going through. Sending lots of virtual cuddles 🫂🫂🫂🫂🫂 and healing energy! Keep pushing forward you’ve got this!!
Previously, in this thread. In June I was diagnosed with stage 4a malignant colon cancer, with secondary lesions on the liver.
Thank you everybody for your lovely comments. Been a while since my last update since there wasn't much to say, but I've now finished my run of six fortnightly chemotherapy doses. The first two were easy, the third was genuinely difficult for three or four days and the last three .... gained my attention.
Specific side effects have been irritating not serious, and although my hair has thinned a little it remains extant. I'm sensitive to cold, which gives an unpleasant pins-and-needles-like pain in my hands or feet. And frozen or chilled food can be a little startling if I've forgotten to be careful. The only big problem has been something of a physical decline over the duration. The chemo has left me very tired and lethargic and somewhat weak. It's all temporary, and my spirits remain excellent although they do flag a little at the low point of each cycle.
The end of chemo was celebrated with three different scans (CT, MRI and PET). I've only had the result of one so far, which was that the original and principal tumour in my colon (7cm) has shrunk signficantly. In other words the chemo worked, which is excellent news. It didn't come as a surprise - I was convinced, from the way my system had reacted, that this was the case.
The PICC line has been left in and for a brief period it looked as if I was going to continue with the chemo: it was working, after all. However the multi-disciplinary team in charge of my treatment have decided they want more information and thus I have another MRI on Friday. This will focus on the only secondary lesions detected, in my liver. If the MDT likes what they see they will schedule an operation, fairly quickly, and to keep that option open they want me chemo-free. From what I can gather the operation will be a major excercise with resections of the bowel and liver and presumably removal of the intermediate lymph nodes.
In other news, my sister - who also has cancer - is doing very well and her prognosis is excellent. Both my parents and my other sister are, to use the jargon, 'cancer survivors'. (My grandmother ... wasn't.) The pre-cancerous polyps in my oesophagus aren't worrying anybody, and the dodgy mole that turned up in the middle of all this turned out to be non-cancerous. As for my dysthymia, depression and general mental health, it's all still there and remains my biggest problem, but it isn't getting worse or interacting with the cancer stuff in any horrifying multiplicative way. In fact this has been my best year for some time in terms of mental health, thanks partly to the whole cancer saga. With the end of chemo the IBS is just starting to grumble a little, so I'll need to keep an eye on that.
TL:DR - Yeah, I'd have to say that was probably a good call, it's a lot of paragraphs for not much excitement.
Thanks for the update and good news. It sounds like you managed chemo better than some. And the fact that your sister is dealing with cancer, your whole family has survived it. You seem to have such a good outlook and determination to beat it, isn’t a positive attitude a big part of recovery and surviving? Wishing you only the best please continue to take care and keep us posted! I’ll be thinking about you 🤗
@CuddleDuncan thank you for sharing. Sending healing vibes your way!
@g_w_t_w I do have a good outlook. Haven't needed a meaningful amount of determination, none of this has been hard enough to require much of that. It's only cancer after all. A positive attitude is very helpful for recovery and managing the process, as much for the family and friends as for the patient.
However, contrary to popular opinion, a positive attitude has no effect at all on surival rates. Or at least, nobody has managed to find such a correlation. I suspect it does have a marginal effect in regard to special cases such as people who are so despondant that they don't do their treatment properly, or those who make no effort at all to tweak diet and lifestyle factors in a helpful direction. But in regard to survival rates, western medicine is the only thing that actually makes a difference. (Yes I went looking for studies, back when this all came up.) This is why I find the whole 'fight' cancer narrative so distasteful.
Don't get me wrong, I love my alternative therapy friends and I even do some of the things they tell me. I value their support greatly, it really helps. But I don't fool myself that it actually makes a difference to the outcome. What it does do - and this is the real benefit of a positive attitude - is make the whole wretched process more pleasant for all concerned.
I do not strive for a positive attitude, it's pretty much hardwired into me now.
Actually I’ve learned something I didn’t know from what you’ve written. If I am diagnosed with cancer at some point in the future, I’m afraid the fear would prevent much of a positive attitude from me so actually I’m a little relieved to read this I mean, of course a positive attitude in any situation will make some kind of a difference I’m sure But I would hate to think that my fear would make it that much worse. Hang in there and know that so many of us care about you!
Ah now, cancer's dirty little secret is that there is nothing to be afraid of.
There are two real things that cancer brings which might be considered undesirable. Illness and dying-earlier-than-you-were-hoping for. Well, illness can indeed be pretty grim and it's a hardy soul that would look forward to it. But it's only temporary, and we live in the time of history when it's better to be ill than in any other time. So, therefore, by the whole of the human experience, it must be not even slightly the worst. And of course that's assuming you are receiving treatment .... plenty of people don't. So if you are, you're well off.
As for the whole death thing, well we're all going to die anyway. The 'loss' that people get upset about is a chunk of living which a) you weren't promised and b) you're not entitled to and c) might not have had anyway and d) might have been the worst chunk of your life for unrelated reasons even if you did have it and e) was always dependent on a vast number of pre-conditions over which you have no control.
I have observed, and I have been watching and thinking about this, that most of the misery that people experience around cancer is of three kinds and is little or nothing to do with the whole illness/death thing. Firstly, in a small number of cases, there is potentially a real loss: people with young children, for example. Secondly, the real loss to the bereaved: my parents are alive and well, and almost nobody - not even in their 80s - wants to bury their child. Or the primary carer, who may make real sacrifices to do the caring.
Thirdly, and most importantly, much the pain and fear comes from the loss of delusion. There are lots of people out there for whom the hand of mortality upon their shoulder comes as a blinding revelation. Others refuse to talk about it; to discuss funerals and wills and so on. It's being made to talk about such things, or having to fight hard to avoid it, that is the thing that actually distresses them.
And do not forget the benefits that cancer may bring. One of my friends, "Ow'rcome wi' emulsion" as we used to say in Scotland, told me she loved me, and that was nice. No way she'd have done it without a cancer diagnosis. The thing I have remarked on most since my diagnosis is how lucky I am. A sentiment shared by the Olympic multi-gold winner cyclist Sir Chris Hoy who recently announced his terminal cancer diagnosis. He said, 'I have terminal cancer but I still feel lucky'.
I don't mean that having cancer is easy or nice. It isn't. Of course it's unsettling and uncertain and the whole thing can be a bit scary. But if it's the toughest thing that ever happened to you, and you're over about 30 ..... well my goodness you've had an easy life. And if you think that cancer is the worst disease you can get, well then you have some reading to do. Start with lupus.
Spoiler alert: If you're reading this you have around a 50-50 chance of getting cancer. That means if you don't, your partner/child/best friend probably will. So, buckle up. This is just a normal part of modern life that happens, directly or indirectly, to nearly everybody.
I repeat. Yes, it's a bit shit. In spite of my relatively good experience I wouldn't go so far as to recommend it. If you're feeling a bit scared or anxious about it then I'm first in line to give you a big hug. But it's just life, and if you take it on the chin ... you'll be fine.
Peter: To die will be an awfully big adventure. J.M. Barrie, Peter Pan
This from you has given me so much to think about. Something has just come up this week about my 8 yr old grandson and I’m waiting to hear from my daughter and honestly we’re all terrified and hopeful and not really believing at the same time. On top of so many other worries, this is brand new. Your perspective might help but when it’s just a little boy I don’t even know what to think and I’m so far away and not able to do anything. We try to be accepting of what life throws at us that is so completely out of our control. We all just carry on.
I started my last round of chemo today. The Dr switched it up a bit. It’ll be one day of chair chemo, 7 days of rest and then 14 days of pills.
Every round has been different. I’ve felt more physical pain so far on this round.
I finally asked my Dr for a prognosis and she said it’s good. 80% chance that I’ll live past 5 years. Once you make it 5 years, your chances are much greater.
20 more days, let’s go!!!!
Great news @Morpheus Keep going strong!
I'm rather late to this party with Duncan, Morpheus and all in the Peanut Gallery (have I just dated myself?) but not to a cancer diagnosis: in my case, stage 3: pancreatic adenocarcinoma. To complicate things, I am also a caregiver spouse to my wife, bedridden with MS.
One of my first thoughts after diagnosis was the worry that I would predecease my wife. NO!! I did not want to abandon her, and I felt and still feel that once I am able to lay her to rest, whenever that time comes, my turn will be just fine.
The good news is that I am presently a twenty-month survivor, currently on maintenance chemotherapy and stable. My mass is inoperable, but if I am able to shrink it further on more aggressive chemotherapy, to begin after the first of the year, surgery might be a possibility. Time will tell.
My attitude is good, optimistic, and filled with gratitude for many blessings (and I am not a religious person, but you know what I mean). This site and its community have presented me with a combination of challenges, resolution of which has provided me with much support, comfort, therapeutic energy, and improved quality of life. As a consulting surgeon said to me in parting words recently, I am living with cancer as opposed to dying from it, at least thus far.
I wish all who read this a very happy Thanksgiving this coming week, and wish to express my own thanks for this very day.
So sorry to hear that! But happy that you are getting through it with all the support from the cuddle community. Kudos to the 3 you named. I met someone last year that only after a month of knowing him, he found out he had Stage 4 Lung Cancer. I stood by his side every step of the way, so I know how hard it is. My thoughts and prayers go out to you. Stay strong! You will overcome this. Lots of cuddles from afar 🤗🫂😘