Following all these scans I was referred to Royal Berkshire Hospital to proceed with an oncology meeting and chemotherapy treatment. On Tuesday 2nd March off I went with my wife to Reading for an appointment at 9:30, we left with plenty of time to spare which was a great thing, as it took an age to find somewhere to park and by the time we did, it was a car park that accepted cash only, so my wife had to run across the road to a petrol station to withdraw some cash to allow us to park. This was all very stressful to go through ahead of a meeting, especially as we thought we were getting there early enough to get a space, so I would advise everyone to make sure you go to appointments with plenty of time to spare.
We also went in with a long list of questions, the chances are as things are explained to you, some of the questions will be answered, but I would recommend going in with questions, if you think they are silly still ask, if you want to ask it, it is something important to you, therefore it will only play on your mind if you don’t ask. Also most importantly (hence why this is in bold) make sure you go with someone, there is so much information to take on board, that you need someone else there with you, to be honest the oncologist will likely encourage you to bring someone with you, even during covid restrictions my wife was allowed with me to the meeting.
Anyway, the meeting, I was informed that my cancer was at a T4 N1 M0 stage (T4 means it was a large tumour, N1 means it had only spread to a few lymph nodes & M0 means the cancer hadn’t spread to another part of the body). From the scans however it appeared that the tumour may be inseparable from the inferior border of the liver edge, so they wanted to carry out chemotherapy treatment on me first, to ultimately reduce the size of the tumour before performing an operation.
The chemotherapy I would be given would be FOLFOXIRI (5-FU, irinotecan and oxalipatin) every two weeks over three months (well that was the plan, more on that later), therefore making it 6 treatments in total. Once I completed the treatments I would then have a CT and MRI scan to make sure the chemotherapy had worked. The common side effects I was warned about (and came across) was feeling lethargic, thinning of hair and also the touch of cold on my hands or feet could ultimately end up with me losing the feeling in my hands and feet in the long term, therefore I had to wear gloves when using the fridge at home when under treatment, could not go near the freezer and had to start wearing slipper socks when going to bed. This coldness could also affect me when going between different temperatures, for example walking outside in colder weather my throat could begin to seize up, so they advised walking with a warm drink that I could sip on should that happen.
A more serious side effect was also an impaired immune system, by this stage I had already had my first covid vaccine, and I was reassured that I could have my second one whilst undergoing treatment, however even now, they are still unsure what level of protection I could have from covid even with these two vaccine doses.
Almost at the end now of this rambling section, but as I was losing weight gradually, I was advised to eat higher calorie foods to either maintain my weight, but ideally boost my weight. For this I was given a Macmillan guide book to help with what foods to eat/how to make subtle changes to your diet to take on more calories, for example having whole milk on my cereal rather than semi skimmed as I was doing, simple things, yet beneficial.
Finally something else to consider on this treatment was if I wanted to use sperm bank facilities (as we were a childless couple) as the treatment would affect my fertility in the long term, but also during treatment they do not recommend trying for children. As it is we decided against using this service, as we are undecided if we want children, but it is certainly something to take into consideration if you should find yourself in this situation.
