CANCER SUPPORT THREAD 60! Here we are again... join us if you have any sort of cancer (or if you're waiting for cancer test results)

[WhatWouldLeslieKnopeDo]

Welcome everyone to a shiny new thread :)

It's a club nobody wants to join, but if you need us, you are more than welcome. If you're waiting to find out if you have cancer or not then pull up a chair. We hope you won't need to be here long, but we are here as long as you need us. And if you do have cancer then this is the place for you. Swear, rant, scream, laugh, cry... someone will have at least an inkling of what you're going through!

We only have one rule, which is do not Google. Though perhaps we should update that to please Google responsibly as few can resist completely!

I hope this thread will be a source of support for all who need it

Our previous thread can be found here

Thanks to everyone.I am inspired by your stories.

TQ, I'm hope you get the support when you need it.I'm finding family or friends often don't want to talk about it but I know it because often there are no right words.
I'm about an hour south away from you and used to work in Reading.

purple I often feel like I'm about 80 these days how are you feeling? I'm in a complete muddle with dates now - are you having your first internal treatment this week coming?

nicky at 10.5 litres and at the croissant!

Twitter I hope you got a better night's sleep last night

Waving to all

I'm not bad, a bit sick and bloated but 5 lots of chemo are done and I had my last external radio on Saturday. Yep, Monday and Tuesday are internal radio days for the next 2 weeks so I've finally decided to take a bit of time off work. Although depending on how I'm feeling I might get round to getting the decorating done

I know cancer affects all ages but all the chemo and radio sessions I've had I've been the youngest there by at leat 10 years. It's shit for anyone but it seems so much more unfair for someone your age. Although for what it's worth I think you're amazing

purple I know what you mean. I turned 33 during my radio sessions and probably was at least 25 years younger than anyone else there... but they we're mostly prostate patients so I guess the nature of the illness is an older demographic?

Yes I think with the number of older men at my chemo sessions I'm guessing it was prostrate related for a lot of them.

Is it this week that you start your chemo littlegrey? Do you have to have it weekly? I've noticed a few people only have it every few weeks, I'm guessing it must be a stronger one if it's not needed every week. I'm looking forward to the side effects of my last chemo to wear off so I can finally get my tastebuds back and enjoy a cup of coffee ☕️

HI everyone, well I’ve just spent a lovely day celebrating my 40th. It’s not quite the celebration I’d hoped for but DH and the DCs gave me lots of pampering and had a really nice day.

I’m going to the hospital tomorrow (it’s 3 weeks since my first appointment at the breast clinic). I’m hoping I should get full results for the various biopsies they did last week and the MRI scan. I guess they will tell me if the cancer has spread and hopefully how they plan to treat me. The children have just been asking loads of questions. It’s hard to give a sensible when I don’t know what the treatment will be...

I hope everyone is doing well and that anyone with appointments or treatment is feeling as well as they can.

I told my boss on Thursday that I have breast cancer and she seemed to think I’d be OK working most of the time. Has anyone here carried on working during their treatment? It doesn’t seem likely i’ll be well enough but maybe it’s feasible??

Best wishes to everyone!

Happy birthday Ghoul! I can think of better ways to spend your birthday though...
I worked through my chemo for ovarian cancer last year, but I wfh and could have nap or step away when I wanted to. I also didn't have to dress up, put on make-up or drive anywhere. Most of the time I was fine, but be kind to yourself and don't push yourself too hard.

Happy birthday Ghoul! I've managed to work through mine, although I've had to have Monday's off as that was my chemo day and I managed to get my radiotherapy appointments in the afternoons so I could go there straight from work. I guess it all depends on what your treatment will be be, luckily other than feeling a bit sick and tired I was fine to work. But as Twitter says, don't push yourself if you don't feel up to it

Thanks ladies :)

It good to hear you both felt OK to work some of the time. I’ll speak to the consultant about it tomorrow I think. Working from home sounds like it might be a good option. I think my boss would be happy enough about that. But I guess it’s one of those things you don’t know until you have tried the treatment....

Good luck to everyone with treatments this week and fingers crossed for your appointment ghoul. I worked during one chemo regime and agree that the commuting is the hard part. Also if you have younger kids, I found I had less energy for them when we all got home, whereas when I worked a bit less/more flexibly, it was easier to keep things more normal at home.

In answer to your question about how I managed to move with 10.5l TQ - very little and really slowly! Poor kids had to help me get my pants and socks on! Hope you are feeling ok today x

Thanks Nicky. I do have over an hour’s comute each way which is OK normally but I would probably prefer to avoid it if possible. My boss wants to have another chat after I’ve been at hospital so we can discuss options then.

Happy birthday Ghoul!

purple I'm having oral chemo treatment as this is what works best from brain primaries apparently - 5 days then 23 days off for 12 cycles. Hopefully this means I'm able to work through it somehow or other - my full pay is about to run out so have to go back (husband is a SAHP so it's the only income we have). Also I need him to drive me about as I can't drive for the next couple of years I'm a secondary teacher though so really worrying how feasible this all is... ho hum. I'm being referred to occupational health by the head before I can go back so hopefully we'll be able to plan it properly!

I had oral chemo for initial management of leukaemia - twice daily tablets for two weeks. The list of possible side effects was quite daunting, but aside from tiredness I was OK. I’m also OK on the drug I take now (also cytotoxic) which is also a good thing as I could be on it long-term. Well, I hope I will be as that would mean it’s working and I’d be stable on it.

Which currently I am, as today’s bloods were normal.

So I’ve reached my first milestone of 3 months, and have an appointment for next bone marrow aspiration next week (takes about 2 weeks to run the tests on it, so quite a long time before I’ll know how I’m doing at that level)

Hi Leslie and everyone else- sorry haven't posted for ages , was so busy at work and then had trip to Canada over Xmas. It was wonderful to be with my family and it was very cold and very snowy so felt very xmassy too.
I've had my appointment with the surgeon today , I have to have a right Hemi-colectomy as there is a tumour in the caecum which could be a neuroendocrine tumour or it could be benign , so whip the bugger out and see whats going on.
I'm feeling better now there is a plan , worst thing is going to be telling my parents in Canada. Did think about not saying anything but dh thinks I should .

Good morning lacies

ggirlI am glad you had a good trip. Fingers crossed for it being benign, but I am sure it'll be a relief to have it removed :) it's difficult knowing how much to tell people about what's going on, but I am sure they would want to know and to support you

iVampire yippee for normal bloods, and for the 3 month milestone I hope your bone marrow results are good too

Ghoul a belated happy birthday from me how was your appointment?

purpleunicorns I hope you are not too ridiculously bored and that the radiotherapy is going OK

Waving to everyone

ggirl telling my mum was the thing I dreaded most (worse than telling DC, bizarrely)

But I am so glad I did - she’s been fantastic.

Also, do remember that if you don’t tell your parents, you can’t really tell anyone who might mention it to them. Because it would be awful if they found out from someone other than you (or DH if you think you really can’t get the words out).

The one thing that helped was waiting until I had a treatment plan, so I wasn’t just telling her I have leukaemia but also what progress I’d made already and what should happen next.

I have been lurking and reading the posts on here, you are all amazing!

I don't know how you all keep up and remember each other's names I really struggle and although I recognise names I can't tie your posts to them when trying to reply - sorry 😐

@ggirl I wanted to reply to say my tumour was a Neuroendocrine tumour in my ileum, I've had an extended right hemi-colectomy. I'm sure others have too but I wanted to offer a hand to you anyway.

Since I last posted I've had more scans, most good although my thyroid nodule has increased quite a lot in size so am waiting for follow up on that in February. The ultrasound dr said he wants it out as it's the only way for them to know for sure what it is although my oncologist doesn't think it's Neuroendocrine. I've also broken my ankle which made me point out a lump on my shin to the orthopaedic consultant who after 5 weeks looked at it again and has now referred me for a scan on a 2 week referral. I'm sure it'll be something as nothing but this roller coaster doesn't stop does it?

Good luck to all waiting for results.

It doesn't rain but it pours eh likeazebra! I hope your ankle is healing well and that the shin lump and thyroid nodule are both harmless

I agree with iVampire about not sharing news until there's also a plan. I found people were a lot less upset when I could say what treatment I'd be having. I also like to keep people a step behind so that I can process news myself before answering questions. I tend not to tell many people that I've had scans until I've got the results.

I hope everyone is having a relaxing evening. I'm still spluttering away but otherwise fine.

@likeazebra thanks for the hand hold , did you recover well from the operation? Hope you're other areas are found to be harmless and your oncologist is right.

I have told my parents tonight and they were fine ! Took me by surprise how well they took it..so thankfully don't have to worry about them.

Lying flat on my back with rods in for 29 hours wasn't fun, not painful as such but lying still for so long was sooo uncomfortable. Same again next week and that's it until my 8 week scan to see how it's working.

Littlegrey luckily I work in a supermarket so I'm able to swap shifts about. I have no idea how you're managing to deal with teenagers! Have you looked into getting help from Macmillan if you do end up on ssp? I don't qualify for anything as my husband works too but it might be worth asking if there's any help you can get.

Good luck with your results likeazebra and Vampire

29 hours purple! That is an unbelievable amount of time to keep still. I'm such a fidget, I don't think I'd manage that. That's a lot of podcasts and audio books ... you could be a fluent Mandarin speaker or something by the end of treatment! Fingers crossed all that effort paid off .
I hope your cough is improving leslie - judging by ours and everyone around us, this season's cough is a persistent beast so hope you can be rid of yours soon.
Good luck to everyone waiting for results and trying to negotiate good working terms. Having only two 12 year olds at home, I can't imagine facing a class of 30 littlegreycat - I hope they're kind to you!

ggirl I'm glad your parents were OK :)

purple ugh yes you must've been so uncomfortable. Did you get one of those special air mattresses to relieve the pressure a bit?! I hope you had some interesting books/audiobooks/telly to keep you entertained :)

nicky yes this year's cough/cold seems to be particularly difficult to shake off. I hope yours clears up soon too

I saw my oncologist today and I'm going to start on steroid inhalers for my asthma which should hopefully help with the breathlessness. He wanted a sputum sample too. Yuck. I don't actually have any sputum so he was disappointed

All I kept thinking about Nicky was what I could be doing for those 29 hours, I'm no good at lying around doing nothing, and I was too uncomfortable to concentrate on my kindle.

No special mattress Leslie although they came in every few hours to give me a "log roll" which consists of 4 nurses rolling me onto each side while keeping me in exactly the same position so they could change my sheets as I was flashing my bits at them. I've just had to google sputum, cancer is far from glamorous hope your breathing has eased up a bit

Ggirl I found that telling people was the hardest part of it, even now I tend to play it down so people don't worry about me. I'm glad your parents haven't taken it too badly.

Evening all, had my 6 monthly zoledronic acid today, and I'm still awake! Previously I've been asleep within 2 hours of getting home, so hopefully I'll last till proper bedtime and sleep it off overnight. Just my mammogram now to go this week.
I convinced the nurse to print me a copy of my bloods which was a bit naughty but if you don't ask... naughty because they were the oncology requested one's following my surprise period after nearly 2 years.
Everything looks ok (Dr Google thinks so anyway!). My vit D is low again despite a full year of supplements so I'll ask for some prescription ones.
Next stop oncology appt end of the month for all the results, and a plan if I need one.
Love to all, especially anyone waiting for results or procedures.

Hi ladies

Thanks for birthday wishes :)

I went back to see the breast clinic on Monday. They are said that they would prefer to give me chemo before any surgery. So I met the oncologist today who was fab. He has given me a super confusing amount of treatment: chemo plus Herceptin plus something else. They are also going to do bone scan and CT to check it hasn’t spread because lymph nodes were.

I think I need those first and then chemo will start soon after that.

Although I don’t have a start day for chemo I feel better knowing that my cancer will be being treated soon.

Thanks for all your reassurance - it does feel better to know the plan is in hand. Your comments have kept me sane(ish).