I thought I was doing okay
JSN
BrisbaneMember Posts: 34 ✭
I thought I was doing okay.
Finished treatment in April. Now part of the short grey hair brigade-hair has grown back grey and wirey so growing some length is not an option unless I want to look like 'the Doc' from Back to the future.
Back at work. It has taken the better part of 6 months to get my head around it all, renegotiating all my relationships, relationship to work stuff and myself etc. I honestly thought I was doing ok.
Then. Just in the last week I am an absolute panicky mess. A work colleague has just been diagnosed with cancer and someone I know who survived cancer has had a recurrence.
Now I can barely move off the bed. Nervous, anxious, scared and confronted.
I hate feeling like this and I hate remembering what I went through. Not because of the process it took-the surgery and treatment was active and I was doing something. It's the after part that is hard. I read in someone else's post that the advertisements, the billboards, the breast cancer reminders are everywhere and they kind of stalk you. I have had some counseling. I did a mindfulness workshop of 6 weeks duration and I still don't know if the fear and panic will ever end. It is so hard to live with. I find I am going along busy, happy, content, smiling and then I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror and wonder why I have cut my hair so short? Oh that's right I had cancer. I had breast cancer. Cancer. The thing that everyone fears. The thing that terrifies me. The thing that people die of.
I want to forget, I want there to be as much distance as possible between me and the diagnosis. I want to be 5 years post diagnosis, 15 years post diagnosis or even 20 years. I don't want to be tarred with this awful brush. I don't want to be the person people look at and think "she had cancer, oh yes she used to have shoulder length brown hair now she has grey short hair. She has put on a bit of weight too". I see colleagues at work, whom I previously had good relationships with, as shallow, superficial, judgemental and not my kind of people. I see people through different eyes. Through a different lens. Everything has changed. I have changed. I am still trying to work out what and who that is. I have periods where I forget. And then crashing reminders of what I had and went through. Breast cancer.
Every twinge, every ache, every small different feeling in my body and I'm 'oh that's right that itchy feeling is from the radiation". "Wait, I had radiation? I had breast cancer?" And the tumble of emotions, thoughts, feelings, reality all rolls back in.
I embark on an overseas holiday with my husband in a week. And now I am terrified and I don't want to go. I just want to stay on my bed. I keep thinking I should be happy and be doing as much as I can. Everything has changed. All my relationships. My relationship with myself, everything.
Thanks for listening while I am having this panic attack.
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Deep breaths. Take one day at a time ... and maybe start packing for your neat overseas holiday ....maybe buy a couple of new outfits and celebrate with hubby getting thru this year in one piece. He has been thru it as well and may even have similar fears .... are you able to chat with him about it?
Ive had more meltdowns in the last 3 weeks than the entire 13 months since detection .... so can really feel your stress and emotions. Xx
You can do this ... I hope your work colleague and buddy are being well looked after ... you just need to look after yourself at this point in time xx
Take care xxx thinking of you xx
I can relate to most of that, in one way or another. The bit that really frustrates me is that feeling there is no point doing things that are pleasurable, that everything will stuff up, that I won't cope in some way....phhfft. It's bloody exhausting.
I bought a camper trailer, on impulse, just after new year. The idea was that I could take my long suffering partner and the useless hound away for minibreaks in relative comfort compared to my previous holiday provisions of a swag, a blue tarp and a length of rope. It's happened three times. It's too hot or too cold or likely to be too crowded. I'm tired, I have sore legs...On and on it goes. The truth? I simply can't get myself organized and the thought that anything might go wrong is overwhelming. So I don't go. How sad is that? On the occasions I have made the effort, I've had a lovely time, but only after I've literally dragged myself out of bed mumbling, 'If I'm going to die, it might as well be of snakebite or by being exsanguinated by mosquitoes.'
Try and put your brain on hold until your holiday--lie in bed if you have to--then go. Don't let this shit disease rob you of everything--we all know how easily that can happen. Mxx
think about big things, there are so many, mainly bloody annoying, small things to deal with and swat. So NOW you can panic. Just when you and everyone else thinks you should be "normal". Deep breaths. Concentrate on the fact you HAD cancer. If we spend our days worrying about every physical ailment that can affect us, every accident that can befall, we would be unable to do anything. Focus as much as you can on what you have achieved. And go on that holiday. Reconnecting with this extraordinary world will be a good thing. Happiness will come in its own time, possibly when you least expect it. A bit of wonder and a little bit of looking forward, not back, will suffice right now. All of this can pass - the hair (I looked like a geriatric poodle for months!!), the weariness, and at least some of the fear. When you get back from holiday, some one to one counselling about dealing with that brush with mortality may help. But right now, a holiday is possibly the best medicine. Take care, best wishes.
Hi! After what we have been through I think for all of us we have a heightened awareness of our bodies and every twitch, tinge has a fleeting thought of who the, what the! Our work colleagues haven't experienced what we have and we tend to look at them a little differently. It's not them that's changed it is us! We have had a brush with, I wish I could say fame, but no, it's our own mortality as we muddle our way through diagnosis and treatment path!
The most important thing about all this is you are here to tell the tale, you have your hubby by your side and you have a holiday planned!
Hopefully you will slowly pack that bag, one foot in front of the other and when you start to feel overwhelmed, take a deep breath and pat yourself down saying, yes this is me and bring yourself into the now!
I agree with @fraser "some one to one counselling about dealing with that brush with mortality may help. But right now, a holiday is possibly the best medicine. Take care, best wishes."
It's a tiring experience that takes it's toll but time is a healer as well as and as you rightly say " I want to be 5 years post diagnosis, 15 years post diagnosis or even 20 years."
One day at a time and you will get there and just don't let yourself get bogged down with the minutia, it is you and hubby and the holiday that is most important at present!
Take care and safe travels
wendy55
Pleased to read that the chemo tablets that you have been changed to have exactly the same fillers.
Hey you are allowed to feel misty eyed, it's one helluva journey to date and time for reflection occasionally as long as you don't stay there too long.
We're all here to help each other out where we can and hopefully bring a smile as well as a tear!
For me personally at present, I have been given a painkiller to take and no effect, so I've decided I am one tough nut to crack!
Take care and best wishes
Hugs
It's the aftermath that is never explained properly through the treatment stage and takes you by surprise. The tsunami after the earthquake so to speak.
A lot of us have posted very similar things after treatment ends. Your mortalitiy is now incredibly real and it plays on your mind. Every ache, pain, sneeze will give you that cold rush of fear fthinking it's back. It does calm with time and you will be able to stand your work collegues again. It's hard in the beginning listening to them complain about getting a latte instead of a flat white. They don't know any better and neither would we "before" and hopefully they never will. There were many times I had to hold my tongue while overhearing mundane everyday conversations.
It's very normal to feel that way for a bit. Treatment is over, you made it through and now life get's back to normal right? Or you vow to change your life, never waste another minute and do something fantastic then feel guitly because you are just stuck in limbo land.
Limbo land stinks and nobody wants to be there too long.
I rember thinking to myself one day how ironic it was that I was wishing time away so I could feel better when the whole treatment ordeal was to have more time. That one simple thought was a game changer. I just wish it haden't taken 18months to think of it
For me,(and every one is different) owning it helped. Yes I had cancer, yes I made it through and out the other side, yes those billboards are there for awareness for others and yes I can now deal with the cancer patients results and filing at work without getting the cold shivers. Maybe help someone else here and there.
There will be shaky parts, tears, frustration and anger along the way but you will get there. The first year is the hardest. Promise.
Don't sweat the small stuff and have a brilliant holiday. Stand proud lovely lady. YOU DID IT!
Hugs.
xoxox
If not and you're unable to access counselling with the Christmas period you may want to try one of the following:
Beyond blue - Call 1300 2244 36 24 hours 7 days a week or you can chat online 3 pm – 12 am 7 days a week,
Life line Australia National 13 11 14 24 hours 7 days a week
Cancer Council Helpline 13 11 20 Operating hours will be business hours (EADT) – not weekends or public holidays.
Most of us have hit a wall at some stage but if it's so bad that you can't manage anything, it sounds like you need to talk to a professional. There is no shame in reaching out. You've been knocked about with this disease and I think sometimes that it messes with your head more than it does with your body.
i will go on our planned holiday and I will keep on endeavouring to own all of it. It really is a warriors path.
Days when I think "I will die from this disease eventually" and days I truly believe I'm cured. I do know hearing of others with recurrence and losing their battle triggers it. Not in your face...oh this is why I am like this...but a gradual slide into sadness and feelings of hopelessness. ..and just bloody angry too...the thought of soldiers on the war path being picked off one by one by a sniper..is what comes to my mind.
The trouble is...rarely do others talk about the person who had breast cancer 20 years ago and survived. It's only on here we occasionally hear of it. Yes support groups might too...but I suspect many are filled with people under current or ongoing treatment. The others have eventually picked up their shattered confident self and moved on to this new normal life we live.
So lovely. ..have the holiday. Take stock of now. Enjoy the scenery, the smells, the food (and wine) just enjoy being. My recent holiday I did just this. I had a bloody horrid intrusive thought on one day ...well if I die from this...at least I had this holiday ...but ...it was just that, an intrusive thought, which I quickly dismissed, and deliberately decided I would give it no more of my time...and bring my self back to enjoying my holiday.
Most likely this will pass. But if you find the sadness and anxiety continues do seek help. A few sessions will help get you back on the path of ...just being. X
BOTH my brothers' mothers in law were diagnosed with BC roughly at my age (65) and that was an era when it was whip it off, take full strength chemo and then Tamoxifen for 10 years (whether you were menopausal or not!)
They are still bouncing around in their 90s now!! GO GRANNY!!
I hope you really enjoy your holiday - I treated myself to a trip to Norfolk Island at the end of my active treatment - it was the best medicine out there!
Wishing you a VERY Merry Xmas too!
Sending you a private message
from jennyss in Western NSW
I have not experienced it yet since my BC diagnosis, I have even been told by some people that I am too positive, who would have known there was such a thing?
I am however prepared for the panic attack, sadness because I retired 4 years ago and went through a very dark couple of years, with back injury, self imposed isolation, feeling useless, different etc
I had my very first panic attack and it was so powerful that I thought I must be going mad or having a heart attack.
I cancelled my overseas trip because like you I did not want to go, that is when I knew I was in trouble.
Innocent remarks like "well we have to go because some of us have to work in the morning" used to be like a knife in my heart, it just accumulated until the dam broke with the loss of my 20 year old furchild.
I could not stop the tears and I lost interest in everything I used to enjoy. Sometimes showering was too much trouble.
Finally dragged myself to the GP who referred me to a pyschologist, it was peeing down rain that day and I almost didnt go in because I was embarassed, which in hindsight was not necessary.
She was an absolute godsend - I was "normal". She gave me pearls of wisdom that I still use today, don't look at the big picture, break things down to small chunks maybe not even a day at a time, maybe an hour. Look after yourself, even pamper yourself. I only needed a couple of sessions and no meds and gradually I returned to my old self. I cried and laughed and felt so good when I came out for the first time in 6 months because she said it was normal to feel that way.
So if you go down that path, I hope you get someone as wonderful as I did.
I did have to ditch a couple of people because they were the same but I had changed, it's okay. Some other friendships blossomed.
I'm new to the diagnosis of BC but I have travelled with my older sister through every inch of her "journey", btw she hates that word. I like it because I associate it with travel, so proof that we are all different.
For all the ladies who want inspiration, my bis Sis was diagnosed in March 2004, I did all the chemo visits as they fell on my day off and I could pick up the kids, go to the supermarket, make dinner etc for them while she rested.
She has not had a recurrence and her last scan in March 2018 was the same. She has changed but in a good way, she is very thoughtful and supportive of me, so I think I have been "fortunate" to have her as a role model.