Cancer Support thread 86 - Stay Positive

[LemonDrizzle10]

New thread as other one nearly full.

@dotty2 it’s interesting to hear people victim blaming with cancer. It’s almost as though they are othering us. “Cancer is more common in people who drink heavily/are obese/don’t exercise/eat unhealthily so I won’t get it”
Then somebody like me comes along who was slim and sporty, drank little and ate healthily and still got it twice. It must be my fault somehow or they might be at risk! None of my family have had cancer until I got it so I don’t even have a extra genetic risk. I am a freak of nature.

@Whattodotomorrow when I was diagnosed with the HER2 positive cancer I was told treatment would take 18 months. That seemed endless but it passed much more quickly than I expected. I had six different forms of treatment too!
It all seems overwhelming at the beginning but you take it day by day and it becomes manageable somehow.

Resting now after a busy day. I had to cycle everywhere as I don’t have my car
Top x

The victim blaming us awful isn't it? Because my cancer is 'often caused by sun damage' lots of assumptions from people that I've used sun beds.

I'm ginger and have always used factor 50.

According to my mother Im just like my father. The one who smoked sixty fags a day and was an alcholic who loved fine wine, food and women. I do none of those things but any inkling of a good time such as going to Glastonbury once a year or out for a drink in the afternoon or god forbid an afternoon tea causes cancer so basically Ive asked for it. Its just bloody bad luck. Ive just had my second to last chemo and my throat and mouth is feeling sore but Im not complaining. I do wonder if its worked and if it is indeed hpv which he strongly suspects. Even without any bits left.

tonight is a big night. Succession the final season. I want to be all prepared for it. Im beside myself with excitement.

@dotty2 there was a thread on here a few weeks back basically saying that if you had multiple partners that you were at more risk of getting HP.V leading on to cervical cancer (which I had) There was literally no point to the thread at all. I think up to 80% of people are carriers of it ffs.

I've been very open to colleagues/friends etc and probably over shared with anyone willing to listen but now makes me wonder what they thought.

@EachandEveryone that says a lot about your mother and her own issues. Even joyless teetotallers get cancer so forgoing all fun wouldn’t prevent it either. Shame she can’t separate her feelings about your father from supporting you though. It must sting! You are doing really well getting through the chemo. I can’t believe you have nearly finished. Will they operate to remove the lymph nodes afterwards?

I don’t know. Initially he said Chemo then Radio “to mop it up” I really haven’t read about it too much cos the primary thing just devastates me all over again. The lump has deffo gone down. It was nowhere else on the PET scan initially but then we had that big break of investigating before they started. Who know? I can’t change anything. If the chemo is working well so wouldn’t mind having more of it because I have to say it’s been manageable. I will just do as I’m told.

mother is financially very good in that she will bung £100 into my account but she does not do feelings and she lives in the past all her ten siblings do especially the women. They are fiercely competitive she’s 74 and still plays netball and obviously has an amazing figure but she’s a Debbie downer literally can’t stand anyone having a drink and a laugh so I suppose I am more like my father in that way. Saying that I haven’t had a drink since Xmas I just don’t fancy it any more.

@dotty2 I think it’s only natural to try to put a reason on ‘why me’, I certainly did/do. I’ve had lots of fertility treatment which in my head is the reason I have a hormone fed cancer. But as others have said…it’s just bad luck at the end of the day for so many of us. I’m slim, eat reasonably well, don’t drink often and fairly active. It’s just bloody unfair.

@EachandEveryone Since my diagnosis I’ve found the relationship with my mum has changed massively - for the worst. Your mum sounds like she’s trying to make sense of your diagnosis and failing miserably.

We are just about to start the third season of Succession…it’s so good! I’m also almost looking forward to my next round of chemo and the couple of bed bound days as I’m going to start watching The Crown after a lovely friend of mine gave me a Netflix voucher.

I can’t my head around 18 months. I really hadn’t thought it would be that long, I thought a year. I was hoping to return to work…is anyone on here a teacher and have experience of extended sick leave?

‘ Bloody unfair’ sums it up really. The victim blaming probably hits a nerve as I do have a tendency to blame myself, though I know it’s nonsense. Thank you for your solidarity.

I am another Succession fan. DD1 has just started series 1 and I can’t decide whether to hold off on the new series until she catches up so I can watch it with her. I will enjoy it more with someone to chew it over with. But can I wait three or four weeks?

I started HRT not long before my diagnosis so beat myself up massively about that - until I found out I have the non-hormone receptive kind of breast cancer. I drink too much but don’t smoke, I exercise, I’m not fat and I eat healthily. I’m just unlucky.

@EachandEveryone you might have read on my posts that I used to work in a hospice as a physio for many years and I treated people with lymphoedema. I remember two patients, one, a gentleman, had an oedematous leg due to secondary tumour blocking lymph nodes, the other, a lady, had an oedematous arm caused by huge secondary lump ( size of orange) in axilla. In both cases the chemotherapy completely annihilated the secondaries and also neither primary tumour were ever discovered. Both patients were discharged from hospice care. I don’t know what happened to the gentleman patient but I know the lovely lady I treated is alive and well 18 years later. I’m just trying to illustrate by these to cases I came across that cancer can be such a random, weird and complex beast.

During my time in palliative care I have witnessed patients who have been given a very poor prognosis and subsequently their cancer somehow stabilised and they are still alive now many, many years later. This is also the case with my friend’s husband. He has an inoperable ( due to it its proximity and entanglement with the aortic arch) tumour in his duodenum. It is 9cm and it has not altered in 5 years. He is in pretty good health and has a full and active life.

I wish these cases, with good outcomes I have observed over the years, made me more positive about my cancer but I’m afraid I’m Eeyore as @TopOfTheCliff is Tigger. However, the reason for my pessimism is that my body seems to be telling me all is not well. A year on from diagnosis I am so fatigued and weak with constant nausea and poor appetite. I used to be so fit and I can tell my family are now concerned about me and that makes me feel guilty as I don’t want to burden them, especially my wonderful 87 year old mum.

Hello ladies, random post alert, but you're the only people who will understand: I'm on holiday. Earlier, in the pool, some random American woman started chatting to me while our children played with each other (so I had to make polite small talk and couldn't easily escape). She noticed my port scar, then told me her entire medical history (no cancer, but everything else that a person could possibly get), and then ... get this... "My mom had the stage 5 breast cancer, so I know a lot about it, and she beat it with acupuncture and herbs."

Thought you might chuckle. Or swear.

Sending love to you all.

I hope you got the details of the herbs to share with us all? 😕Hope you’re having a wonderful holiday in spite of that unwanted intrusion @KentishMama ?

@KentishMama It’s awful isn’t it.. as soon as people find out your having treatment they either try and offload their own medical history or tell you some shitty story about someone they know who either horribly and tragically died of it it, or was cured by drinking some herbal Wundermittel. I had some man tell me last week about his medical history at the gym !! Has anyone got any great comebacks when this happens ?

I really wish I had had a great comeback, but I just nodded and smiled and changed the topic! I guess if I see her again I could get a list of 'ERBS (imagine that in a very strong American accent) from her...

Holiday is glorious. Mexico! Much needed, somehow traveling is one of the only times when I feel like my old self. Apart from when some random stranger teaches me about stage 5 cancer, obviously! 🤔

@KentishMama oh my god why, why why do people do this. (Also “ERRRRBS” irrationally winds me up anyway 😂 so that plus unwanted medical “advice” would probably finish me off)

When I went into a well
known chain hairdresser last week in floods of tears to have my head shaved, the hairdresser cheerily said “this happens to loads of people and it’ll grow back but probably different. I had a client once I did this for, didn’t see her for ages and thought maybe she didn’t make it but she came back and I didn’t recognise her, she looked older and she’d gone (made a gesture that implied the poor woman had put on a lot of weight) and her hair was like WHITE”. I stood up and walked out. The second place I went was an independent one and a lot more supportive and kind. I will go there the next time I need a haircut. I’m actually in two minds about whether to send feedback to head office about training to try and spare someone else’s feelings…imagine saying to someone in their thirties that’s in floods of tears that they’re going to get old and really fat and go grey?

Woo hoo I have hit the cancer jackpot, my magnesium levels are slightly low so I have to eat magnesium rich foods including dark chocolate! I can get behind that wholeheartedly, don't tell the diet police on aibu!

Oh @KentishMama I would have drowned her in the pool. Although as I have stage IV cancer I might have been interested to hear about this fascinating stage V cancer she speaks of.

I don’t have any particularly witty comebacks, but I am very blunt. I find “that’s a load of non-scientific bollocks actually, & I don’t appreciate you telling me that, as I have stage IV cancer and it absolutely will kill me” usually works. Said with a sweet smile and politely to confuse them. And @WorryMcGee JFC! So sorry you had to hear that. I would definitely tell head office so she can get some training and maybe half a brain cell if they have one spare. Imagine her saying that to someone else.

Anyway from one Kentish mama to another hope you are enjoying your holiday. I haven’t been cancering about much on mumsnet as I’m quite stable on my second line of treatment now (jinxes it) & also planning a holiday in two weeks woo hoo. Mexico would be amazing but it’s Tenerife instead. Or maybe not. The tour operator keeps sending emails about renovation noise & I don’t know whether to try to change holiday or not. I have never done an all-abusive package holiday before and I was quite looking forward to it. Just me and the 4.5 year old as DP is allergic to fun and she definitely is not.

Actually there is one cancer that can go stage v, but its a unique childhood cancer affecting kidneys. Guessing thats not what was meant in that discussion. 😀

Currently shopping for a beach holiday in May but I feel so uninspired. Work is a major drag and a lot of change happening there and I can't be bothered to arrange anything really. All the fun has gone out of travel it seems.

@Lisdeflores make sure you really put your back into that magnesium boosting diet, can’t afford to take any chances (actually semi serious because if it dips too much they put you on magnaspartate and that stuff is rank - lots of dark chocolate and nuts definitely preferable)

Hi folks. Thanks for the welcome and popping my head back in as I'm just out of my oncologist appointment.
The gremlin was a cancer. Currently considering it to be stage 2 regional as no evidence of anything else in my pelvis/abdomen but question mark hanging over if there's anything funky in my cervix.
Next step is a CT scan of abdomen and chest to check lymph nodes then off to the 6 hour away hospital for a hysterectomy and lymph node biopsy if needed.
First he's happy for me to go and spend 10 days with the nieces and nephews and my family/best friend though.
So here we go.

@LarryStylinson sorry to hear the cancer has been confirmed. I hope it helps having more of a plan to deal with it. Will you need to travel back and forth or can you stay down at the Big Hospital and get everything over with at once?
I'm trying to have a rest day today. I've been limiting my exertions to two things a day but tomorrow DH is dragging me off on a fifty mile bike ride on our tandem so I will need all my energy. The good news is my lovely yoga teacher took one look at me this week and cried "Oh your aura is getting brighter the energy is rising!" I was so proud. We have started Alpaca meditation now in a field with grumpy camelids. Truly she is a wondrous person and she has never promised to cure me with ERBS.
Love to all from a sofa bound TOP xx

PS I think some preventative magnesium maintenance is required here!

@TopOfTheCliff definitely helps to have something of a plan. Not good with the unknown here!
CT scan will be at the biggish hospital 2 1/2 hours away and then hysterectomy will be at the proper big hospital 6 hours away. Going to be a bit logistically interesting but onward.

Also alpaca meditation sounds awesome!

I wish I wasn’t so panicky now. My CT was 20th March. Had a phone appointment through for 20th April and said that is far too long. It’s now been rearranged as an in-person appointment on the 13th so I’m petrified that means it’s bad news?! Do you think?

Welcome @LarryStylinson sorry you are here. What a lot you’ve had going on! Where do they think the cancer is from? Cervix or womb or somewhere else?

@AGreatUsername try hard not to read too much into appointments (a wise women call @TopOfTheCliff told me this).

I've had bad news via a telephone appointment and good news via in person, also had it the other way around.