Chemo

Of all the treatments associated with cancer, I have been most apprehensive about having chemo.  You seldom hear people say that it was a good experience.  When I was in the hospital the lady in the next bed tried to convince me to skip it all together.  “It is your choice,” she said, “and to go through all that hell for a 7&  increase in your likely life expectancy seems like a poor return to me.  I chose not to have it.”

What I thought but didn’t say was, “But here you are five years down the line from your original surgery, and you are in a really bad state. You can’t eat properly. And you have been told you aren’t likely to go home for at least another month.  Perhaps the 7& would have made a year or two more of a decent life for you.”  

My sister had peritoneal mesothelioma.  She started chemo (which in those days was the only treatment mentioned for the problem) and had it every month for nine months. But in that time things had not got better. She, for awhile, didn’t get worse, but by the 9th month, she was needing to make a decision.  She wanted to be well enough to go to her son's college graduation ceremony.  Chemo meant that she would be in no fit state to do so. So she stopped it, knowing that she was decreasing her life expectancy - but her life in those days was pretty awful. She had a lot of pain, and was sick after each session for at least half of the month. She died just over a year from her initial diagnosis. 

My husband was misdiagnosed with testicular cancer.  When they got the histology back after the removal of his left testicle, they discovered that his diagnosis was way worse. He had non Hodgkin's lymphoma at stage 4.  He was started on chemo, which he coped with pretty well until he got an infection. He then had to be hospitalised for a few weeks, and in the end took the decision into his hands to stop the treatment for the infection - which didn’t seem to be improving.  His chemo was reintroduced but at a lower dose, and he had only 6 of the 8 expected sessions.  But he came out “cancer free” and had a year or so of almost normal life, before the beast returned, and at that stage, the chemo was totally ineffective. He died 3 months later. 

I had an aunt who had breast cancer for which she had surgery and lots of chemo.  She lived 20 years, but always with the chance of more chemo to look forward to. She had five recurrences.  But they were a mostly good 20 years, and I’m sure she would have said putting up with the awfulness of the treatment was worth it.  At her last recurrence she asked to not have to endure more chemo, and was told that she had still some usefulness in  her life, and she should try to keep living until the choice was taken from her.  I greatly admired her, but don’t want to have to undergo what she did. 

So I was nervous on Thursday when my daughter and I went for our first visit to the Oncologist, who works at Christie Hospital in Manchester, a very well regarded treatment centre. He was pleasant enough, but I found his Greek accent  pretty difficult to understand. He didn’t appreciate me asking him to repeat things over and over. But my daughter did a better job, so mostly he talked to her and she interpreted for me. 

I was rather hoping I had misunderstood his opening speech.  “You had 16 lymph glands with cancer, and the blood vessel wall. That makes your cancer very aggressive.  You have a 85% chance of getting it again. But with chemo, that will be reduced to 75%.

Although he had been sent the same letter as I had from my surgeon, so should have known what my case was about, he seemed very confused.  He hadn’t realised that I had an active breast cancer as well and was being treated for it with hormone therapy.

Chemo of every type has side effects, and these involve nausea and  either or both diarrhoea and constipation. So because of my stoma he was very hesitant about using the bog standard one most of the colon cases are given.  He thought that I wouldn’t be able to cope with taking two huge tablets twice a day, as well as the every 3 week IV aspect. 

So he brought out the details of his alternative - which I will be starting next week. It is called Fluorouracil, and is given as an infusion  at the hospital every week for six months.  He will start me on a half dose, and hopefully increase if all goes well.

So, wish me luck. I’ll write again after the first session on Thursday.