I am scared ....

Hi breastcancerrea..., (sorry I don't know your name) you mention wanting to keep a handle on your femininity during chemo, a problem we share when bald or with very short hair during/after chemo..

After the experience of being greeted by the Qantas club barista "Hello Sir and what can I do for you?" which rather upset me at the time, I started using jewelery esp big dangly earings for this, and pretty scarves, and sometimes a fringe (you can buy these very cheaply, and having a tiny bit of hair can make the world of difference. But my mainstay was  lovely celtic hanging earings and other pretty, feminine but fairly bold ear jewelery helped me to keep a handle on my feminity even when I did not feel up to makeup, and made it easier for baristas and other strangers to  see that I am female.

Hi Reeta & JT82

My experience of fear has been different from what you are both describing and not long-term (except for the first 10 days) and then, just very immediate. This may help....

I have had two unforgettable moments over the last 6 years where I have 'all of a sudden been numb and scared'. Where I could have reached for a slog (or more) of vodka medication, I ended up googling Post Traumatic Stress Disorder Cancer, and got the Cancer Counselling Hotline. You can get in touch with them and they can refer you to a counsellor. The guy on the phone gave me some deep breathing exercises to do at the time and that really helped.

When I was first diagosed almost six years ago, exercise became my 'crutch'. It was after reading Lance Armstrong's book "It's not about the Bike" that completely changed my mindset. There are some really good books out there that can help or even just adjust the way we think. I was very scared for the first 10 days of diagnosis and ignored, and frankly, hated all the mundane jobs I had to do for my Son in order to keep the household ticking. I was in my own headspace and nothing else mattered and if an issue came up, I would think "really???? I've got cancer and you're worried about that???"

Another one that I have read, "it's not just one in eight" highlights the affect of our diagnosis' on those around us.

I could keep going on with other books that were comforting, supportive and just good reads - if you happen to be a reader, maybe give it a try???

This website was really good for me too.

If I can be of any further help - just sing out.

Alex xx 

Hi Reeta & JT82

My experience of fear has been different from what you are both describing and not long-term (except for the first 10 days) and then, just very immediate. This may help....

I have had two unforgettable moments over the last 6 years where I have 'all of a sudden been numb and scared'. Where I could have reached for a slog (or more) of vodka medication, I ended up googling Post Traumatic Stress Disorder Cancer, and got the Cancer Counselling Hotline. You can get in touch with them and they can refer you to a counsellor. The guy on the phone gave me some deep breathing exercises to do at the time and that really helped.

When I was first diagosed almost six years ago, exercise became my 'crutch'. It was after reading Lance Armstrong's book "It's not about the Bike" that completely changed my mindset. There are some really good books out there that can help or even just adjust the way we think. I was very scared for the first 10 days of diagnosis and ignored, and frankly, hated all the mundane jobs I had to do for my Son in order to keep the household ticking. I was in my own headspace and nothing else mattered and if an issue came up, I would think "really???? I've got cancer and you're worried about that???"

Another one that I have read, "it's not just one in eight" highlights the affect of our diagnosis' on those around us.

I could keep going on with other books that were comforting, supportive and just good reads - if you happen to be a reader, maybe give it a try???

This website was really good for me too.

If I can be of any further help - just sing out.

Alex xx 

Thanks for raising this subject, which I think reeds to be looked at because it affects us all so deeply. As a psychologist and counsellor myself as well as a breast cancer patient , I believe our challenge is to understand that breast cancer throws powerful, primal experiences. These fill us with often-overwhelming emotions and it is vital for us to use this as a chance to learn powerful skills of selfcare and resource management to deepen and strengthen our capacity to live well through difficult times.

It is not healthy to immediately block off hese strong and often distressing feelings by numbing them with either denial or of medication in order to keep up a brave face pretending all is fine when it isn't. It is not a sign of weakness or incompetence to cry or show/feel other signs of emotion at a time like this.

Nor is it healthy to just sit and dwell on our pain and fear and wind up our fear, pain, rage, loneliness, etc becoming deeply agitated and increasingly unable to function. 

Instead, we need to give ourselves the care our hearts bodies and minds need at each point. In this way, we can make our way through each part of this experience and  bear its strong emotions without being totally disabled by them. We need to learn to use our resources and build our personal skills for comforting and calming ourselves and then for exploring and understanding how it is to be this way, maybe even finding creative inspiration and wisdom within the journey. Our emotions are part of our survival resources, and are helpful to us to direct us into the selfcare we need.

If we understand the goal as learning how to manage where we are and make in into a bearable and even good place, we can then draw on the help of a psychologist or counsellor to build valuable skills to help us live our emotional life more fully rather than help us escape from this part of ourselves.

In our culture, we learn to be very much afraid of any strong emotions, both good and bad. Emotions are seen as mad, bad and dangerous, the precursor to madness or violence. In fact they connect us to what matters and what things mean to us. But they take skill to manage and to make sure we don't just react blindly to them or even worse, wind ourselves up to a state of overwhelm and agitation.

Numbing ourselves with medication or pretending we are not emotionally distressed is not good for us, because the emotion is a necessary part of being alive and confronting the meaning that experience has for us. Medication should not be what we reach for straight away. We should build our coping/being-in-a-difficult-place skills first.

(I am not bagging people who use antidepressants, and believe these drugs have saved lives, but doctors prescribe them almost automatically, ond don't put a plan in place for how to come off the drug later. so you can find yourself on it for years. And I have clients who found particualar antidepressants made them suicidal, more anxious, full of rage etc and these are fairly ommon side effects of these powerful drugs. They can take the edge off a deep depression so a person stops feeling suicidal, but should only be used where really needed, and only for as long as needed. They do have other side effects, eg they stop the biochemicals involved in feeling "love", and your moods go all over the place for a week or two when you start or stop or change your dose.)

The skills to go into and live within our strong emotions, be they fear, love, rage, joy, great grief etc, are not taught. We pick up a grab-bag of ways to handle these things as we grow up, first from parents, then others on the way. Times like this are in fact a golden opportunity to discover what gets you up in the morning when it weighs heavily on you, how to console yourself when you are sick with chemo and waking each hour in a state of distress and loneliness, how to face the horror and fear that you could  be dead by the end of the year. 

I see this as my own wise mothering part of me taking care of the emotionally-distressed inner-child part of me. I/we need to develop this wise mother and spend time as a listening kind mind who hears the hurting part of us and intuits what will get that child-part through. I call it Mind-mothering. In my current training as an analytical psychologist, working out how to do this well personally and helping others do so too is my labour of love. I also find it exciting to hear all l the brilliant ways people have developed for getting themselves through bad times well. 

Hi girls,  try to stay positive, it is normal to get down some days, your body has been through a huge shock and runs on adrenaline for a while, but then you come down with a crash.  Way more people survive breast cancer than dont survive, so just know you are here on earth for a purpose and stay strong.  There will be good days ahead even through the treatment.  God Bless and all the best as you travel your journey .... Lots of Love Yvette

I am blogging my journey, for my own benefit and to try and encourage others on the same journey, or those supporting people, who have no idea what is involved my blog is breastcancerreadyornot.wordpress.com  you may relate to some of what is happening with me and maybe even have a laugh or cry sometimes.  

My oncologist said that if your tumor is HER2+ and is over 2cm, if you have only surgery and no chemo or herceptin/targetted therapy, you have about 50% chance, (ie one in two chance) your cancer will recur within 5 year as either a local or distant recurrence.If you are node negative it is about 45%, and if you are node negative, it is about 55%. That is far to great a risk for a healthy young woman who wants to see her children grow up, and it is a risk you do not have to take.Most people who die of breast cancer die of distant recurrence. So it is worth doing what you can to avoid it.  

But she also said that the good news is tthat the disease-free survival rates for node-negative is about 92% if Iyou have chemo and herceptin.  got quite sick with chemo, but I did get through it, and am very grateful there are these medications that are available for us that give us a much better chance of surviving primary breast cancer. 

With HER2+ cancer, if it is under 0.5cm, a new study shows that chemo may not be necessary.

They are also currently  running research trials where they only give targetted therapy plus a kind of chemo that is delivered directly to only cancer cells by the targetted therapy. I have a friend in the States who is on that drug trial. She said her hair has not fallen out and she has not had nausea or low white blood count, so such treatments are being developed now.  Maybe these will be the standard treatment in a few years time if we need further treatment then. 

Thinking of you today good luckx