Aching body!!

Hi GLD and welcome across to this little corner of the community. I see that you are a member of the Breast cancer support group so it's always worth putting up questions in there also as some post treatment challenges can be very specific to the actually type of cancer and the treatment used.

I have lived with and been treated for a rare incurable blood cancer and at time over my 24 years I have had prolonged periods of all over pain. This was due to many reasons, lack of activity, nerve and muscle damage where my mass was, the toxicity of the treatments, the prolonged effects of radiotherapy...... did you know that some types of radiotherapy can affect your body for rather a long time.

I have lived with Spinal Osteoarthritis for many years so was on regular pain meds but remarkably the last treatments i had (Stem Cell Transplant) actually improved my Spinal Osteoarthritis to the point I no longer take pain meds....... the body is a remarkable but complicated machines and at times there are no answers to what happens and why.

Lets see if anyone has first hand experience of this exact problem with the same treatment journey.

My Consultant told me that going through treatments like these was like doing a boxing match and a marathon every day over the months of treatments and this was done without any training. Think doing the London Marathon without any training and you had to finish it as your life depended on it……. this is the journey you have been on so it most likely will take much longer than you would think to get back to some normality

Some folks are lucky and bounce back quickly post treatment but more than often folks take a considerable amount of time to recover.….. at 3 months post my last treatment 8 years back I was just out of my wheelchair and able to do a few steps with my walking sticks….. so my recovery was a good 2 years.

As you learn to navigate the post treatment journey you may find it helpful to make a cuppa and have a look at this great paper After Treatment Finishes - Then What? by Dr Peter Harvey as it highlights the post treatment milestones.

Always around to chat.

Hi GLD, I had a lumpectomy in 2023, and a few weeks after the surgery I started to get pain & swelling in my fingers. Since then the pain has spread to every joint in my body. I'm in pain every day & take Co-codamol & Naproxen daily (although Naproxen is only short term). These make the pain less, but do not take the pain away completely.  I've been referred to Rheumatology and after a 10 month wait I'm finally being seen.  However, after talking to a friend who was a Physio, she suggested that it might be Fibromyalgia, as she has seen a few women get this after cancer treatment & going through the menopause.  I can't take HRT, because although my cancer was not hormone related, I have a higher risk of getting a hormonal cancer.  I have Zometa treatment once every 6 months for 3 years.

I hope your symptoms are better or at least controlled with medication.K

Kindest regards