My "choices" regarding treatment spelt out
So on Thursday I had my first appointment with my oncologist My details were keyed into his computer and I was spit out as a statistic. My oncologist mentioned that he would respect any "choices" I ...
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This is a very interesting question. I tried to discuss something similar with my oncologist when I first saw him, and he said, "I can't say what would happen if you had no treatment, because everyone has the treatment". Apparently this was not correct. In any event my family would have dragged me to chemo, they were determined I should have all the treatment possible.
My biggest fear with cancer treatment was chemotherapy. I had a lot of anxiety during it. I suppose partly because we have all seen horrible depictions of it in films. I had nausea which I was successfully medicated for. I never vomited. At first I was amazed to discover some women work through chemo. But it is clear our reactions differ considerably. You can't predict how you will react. Most of us lose our hair, honestly this was ok for me. Quite liberating for me. More upsetting for others who looked at me. Other side effects such as constipation were medicated ok. But there are some chemos with potential long term side effects. Many of us are very tired long after it's over.
I am interested if you can tease out why you don't feel comfortable with having chemo. Is it a quite understandable fear of it, or some other reason? And will you be more anxious in the long run not having chemo and wondering if you should have had it, or having the chemo and dealing with the side effects?
One thing I learnt along the way was that it didn't matter if I wanted to turn up or didn't want to, if I was happy to turn up or unhappy, I just needed to turn up and have the treatment. There is research that shows that what mental attitude we have makes no outcome to the success of the treatment, you can hate every moment of it and it can still work. It might sound trite to some, but I find this very interesting.
My cancer counsellor said she had the job of trying to talk cancer patients who did not want treatment such as chemotherapy into having it. And also helping people like me who were very anxious about it. It might be worth having a session with a cancer counsellor, mine was very helpful. And she knew a lot.
So to to sum up, we don't know the outcome of our treatment, just statistics on a group of people. We don't know what chemo will be like until we try it.
We don't know whether the short term pain of doing it is worth the long term possible gain of doing it.
Nor do we know whether the long term negatives that might flow from chemo will outweigh the possible long term benefits of it.
It's certainly tricky.
The statistic I like is that 95% of breast cancer suffers survive 5 years, this is terrifically positive.
Useful books for me were "Breast cancer taking control" by Professor John Bayages which explains treatment very well and
"The emperor of all maladies - a biography of Cancer" by SIDDHARTHA MUKHERJEE which is not for the faint hearted but spells out the history of medical treatments for cancer.
good luck with your treatment. Best wishes Karen
My biggest fear with cancer treatment was chemotherapy. I had a lot of anxiety during it. I suppose partly because we have all seen horrible depictions of it in films. I had nausea which I was successfully medicated for. I never vomited. At first I was amazed to discover some women work through chemo. But it is clear our reactions differ considerably. You can't predict how you will react. Most of us lose our hair, honestly this was ok for me. Quite liberating for me. More upsetting for others who looked at me. Other side effects such as constipation were medicated ok. But there are some chemos with potential long term side effects. Many of us are very tired long after it's over.
I am interested if you can tease out why you don't feel comfortable with having chemo. Is it a quite understandable fear of it, or some other reason? And will you be more anxious in the long run not having chemo and wondering if you should have had it, or having the chemo and dealing with the side effects?
One thing I learnt along the way was that it didn't matter if I wanted to turn up or didn't want to, if I was happy to turn up or unhappy, I just needed to turn up and have the treatment. There is research that shows that what mental attitude we have makes no outcome to the success of the treatment, you can hate every moment of it and it can still work. It might sound trite to some, but I find this very interesting.
My cancer counsellor said she had the job of trying to talk cancer patients who did not want treatment such as chemotherapy into having it. And also helping people like me who were very anxious about it. It might be worth having a session with a cancer counsellor, mine was very helpful. And she knew a lot.
So to to sum up, we don't know the outcome of our treatment, just statistics on a group of people. We don't know what chemo will be like until we try it.
We don't know whether the short term pain of doing it is worth the long term possible gain of doing it.
Nor do we know whether the long term negatives that might flow from chemo will outweigh the possible long term benefits of it.
It's certainly tricky.
The statistic I like is that 95% of breast cancer suffers survive 5 years, this is terrifically positive.
Useful books for me were "Breast cancer taking control" by Professor John Bayages which explains treatment very well and
"The emperor of all maladies - a biography of Cancer" by SIDDHARTHA MUKHERJEE which is not for the faint hearted but spells out the history of medical treatments for cancer.
good luck with your treatment. Best wishes Karen