I have Endometrium Cancer, Papillary Serous with clear cells Grade 111C, or should I say I was diagnosed with it, had the op, the chemo treatments, the radio therapy (two cycles of it) and have already had one 'all clear' (from the first scan).
In a few weeks I'll be having my second scan - and hope and presume I'll be OK.
I'm feeling very well. And it feels extraordinary. (?)
And this is why I'm writing. When I was living the days of chemo and then again all those days of the three months of radio therapy I was emotionally low, sometimes fighting depression. You'll all know what I'm talking about. Those dreadfully grey months and months. (Which began in January and ended the first days of November last year).
I lived then with the notion that since this is a nasty cancer, with 25% survival rate, I should prepare myself for perhaps not living very long. "Why should I necessarily be one of the survivors?", I asked myself. "Wouldn't it be better to be realistic and look the truth fair and square in the face - and be prepared?".
I thought like this because I was sure it would help me lead a more fulfilled, serene life, concentrate on having a truly 'better quality of life' than the one I was leading just before I was diagnosed - thereby heading off the dastarly cancer cells in the future if /when they thought they might like to re-form. "If I'm in a good place emotionally, my immune system will figh the cancer cells in the future, so the cancer simply CAN'T re-form!!!". (So get serene and try to stay that way- and you could win out on this - but stay real).
To cut a long story short (five months after cancer treatments is a long story), I came across information which informed me more specifically on how the survival rate statistics come about. And according to this information if a cancer patient has the exact same op and treatments as I had, even Grade 111C patients have a 100% chance of survival. (If they are unable to finish the treatments, or they dont have the exact same op, i was told, then their chances are reduced to 50%, and if they dont have some of the those treatments, their chances go down from 25%. etc etc)
I was suddenly in the 100% survival rate bracket !!!- and it turned my head around. (and inside out too).. A shroud was lifted; I felt new again and extremely happy. Everyone said how incrediby well I looked.
It had been excellent to re-think life, to think of ways of living it less stressfully, of finding peace - and I still hold on to ALL of that wonderful experience.
But since then, I've learned that the statistics don't necessarily apply to Grade 111C'ers!! Just to Grade 1 ers.(a-hem, silly me!)
The incredible thing is though that I don't care what the statistics are any more. I'm so up for living now because I enjoyed it so much after that first news (without the fear of death or more chemo niggling at me) and I'm really attempting to do it right and to enjoy the decisions I've made from a less controlling feraful place
My oncoloogist told me that right now he is treating two women (with my same cancer) with more chemo after 7 years without it, so I might have seven years, which is good news too. But it honestly isn't affecting me,much. (I'm 63)
I find living happily is all about just looking for ways to find the bliss - and trying to find it makes me feel really good. (Taking care of health and convalescing is priority. It means making choices that make the day more pleasant and easier). That's ALL I really know. (Why go to dark side places which may or may not be in my life story - that's maybe tomorrow's trip. Isn't itall a trip?, this last year was a trip..which I'm looking back on now...which i couldn't have imagined to be doing when I was really really ill with everything, but I am,- extraordinarily)
I'm surprised and wanted you to know how surprised and yet how real this has been to me, this roller coaster ride, this being inside the tumble dryer while it bashes me from side to side and how I feel happy, today.
Living after cancer (?) is like this for me. Bless.
