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WOW! What a worrying time for you , @JulieVT11 - I am so happy for your scan results - but such a worry in the mean time . xx0
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Hello kind friends,
I typed "prognosis" into the search bar, hoping to find some answers. I found this thread with all of your eloquent words. I thought I was doing well, reading up on BC, keeping my records in a file, writing my questions down before appointments, eating better, giving up alcohol...doing the Oncotype DX test and deciding not to do chemo...preparing to start radiotherapy soon - but I seem to have just woken up to the realisation that I do not know what my 'reality' is.
I'm doubting my choice re chemo. Am I a deluded fool to skip it? I simply could not (still can't really) believe I have cancer - there's nothing wrong with me, apart from what the medical people have done to me! I've been passed from one type of doctor to another and had one chat on the phone with the BC nurse, but there is no one person I can identify as 'in charge', with a comprehensive understanding regarding my case. Everything I've experienced is fragmented, all isolated events with different people who only know what they need to know to do their jobs. I don't know my prognosis. Does anyone ever get a prognosis? The "being alive in 5 years, 10 years, 15 years" stats leave me cold. Are we with BC supposed to be grateful? Are we to assume that we definitely have shortened life spans - even though no one has spelled it out? I just don't know how to 'plan' for my future. How do you do it?
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Facing our own mortality is a bit like walking into a closed door - unexpected, shocking and it hurts. Most of us assume we will live to old age - although of course our idea of what is defined as old age changes as we get older! That’s because it’s difficult and confusing to imagine anything else. But very few of us know our prognosis, healthy or otherwise. Cancer makes the assumption of living a long time harder to maintain, and we resent that. But many of us will live a long time after a cancer diagnosis, it’s just that, like life without cancer, there are no guarantees. We understand that much better than we used to and it takes some adjusting to. Your medical people are doing their jobs, they all have specialised bits of physical treatment and healing to do and you will benefit by their knowledge but a counsellor may be much better able to help you reconstruct your sense of and faith in the future. Many of us have found even a short time with a skilled ‘outsider’ - not a friend or family member - has helped immensely. Best wishes.5
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Thanks Afraser. My mental health is the first thing this cancer diagnosis messed with, and it wasn't that good to start with. When well-meaning people tell me things like "a good outcome is all about your mental attitude", I feel angry. There is an implication of blame. Yet I know I need to get a grip and that a "positive attitude" will help me in many ways. I have to change antidepressants as my current one is not compatible with Tamoxifen, which starts in a few weeks. Counselling is a good idea. This is all so exhausting. Genetic counselling and test appointment later this morning. It' 4am now. Thank goodness for this forum. Sleepless in ...0
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The illness has nothing to do with attitude - coping with treatment, well-intentioned others, scans and tests is certainly easier with some positivity and a black sense of humour!! Our good friend here @Zoffiel has some excellent ripostes for those situations. It does get better as time passes, but anything that helps that adjustment is a good thing. Best wishes.2
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Right, @BewilderedButHopeful seems like I've been called on to give my usual, and oft repeated advice. Be nice to people until you are pretty sure they are jerking you around then rip the gloves off and give them the old one-two. Do the same with yourself.
When others are not being honest, demand they front up. You have to do it too.There are dozens of ways to deliver a spanking and cancer keeps finding more variations.
My personal opinion about being positive is that it just makes it a shit lot easier for everyone else. Meh, when all their hair falls out they are entitled to an opinion. Mxx10 -
Afraser - I went to a counsellor to find a way to manage my responses to 'well intentioned others' - eight years ago I didn't know about this forum! If published as a book the spunk, wisdom and 'wicked' bits would make a best seller.
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