Hi.
I am writing this as I’m feeling confused and lost. My dad was diagnosed with bowel cancer 3 years ago, he had this removed with a stoma bag now fitted. He had the all clear for 12 weeks only. Since his diagnosis as you can Imagen, it has been very up and down with scan results showing his cancer has spread. More recently, he had bad belly pains for 14 weeks, with belly pains, becoming unbearable. He has now been in hospital for 3 weeks, he has a current bowel obstruction. Within the 14 weeks of pain, he was treated for IBS, and it was a “chemo side effect”. He has been told this week they cannot operate on his obstruction due to his cancer. I also feel the hospital have been poor with how they have treated him and us as a family, but this is the situation we are in now.
I am struggling to understand how my dad appears so well in himself, because they can’t operate on his obstruction, he is now end of life. I guess it’s hard to accept as he appears so well outside. He is going home with a plan of hospice care when needed. I guess this is cancer, and what it does, I just was not expecting it to end like this for him. It’s just going to be and is so sad to have to watch him deteriorate with no timescales of how this can or may look. I know the doctors know best with operations and cancer but it seems so unfair. He can’t eat food due to his obstruction and will have all drips. It’s all happened so suddenly, and I’m scared for the future of having to watch him deteriorate.
I guess I’m looking for advice or to speak with others who have been through this with close family or friends. I need to accept this but it’s hard, I assume others would have defiantly felt this way.
Hi KAL12 and a very warm welcome to the online community which I hope you'll find is both an informative and supportive place to be.
I'm sorry to read that your dad's cancer has progressed and it's natural to be feeling as you do.
The online community is divided into different support forums so I thought you might also like to consider joining the supporting someone with incurable cancer forum as you'll then connect directly with others who are supporting people with an incurable diagnosis.
To join, just click on the link I've created and, once you've joined, you can start a new post in the same way as you did here and join in with existing conversations by clicking on 'reply'.
When you feel up to it, it would be great if you could put something about your dad's diagnosis and treatment into your profile as it really helps others when replying to you and also when looking for someone on a similar pathway. It also means that you don't have to keep repeating yourself. To do this click on your username and then select 'Profile'. You can amend it at any time and if you're not sure what to write you can take a look at mine by clicking on my username.
"Never regret a day in your life, good days give you happiness, bad days give you experience"
