Struggling

Hi

Sorry you are struggling, we have all been there at times. There are lots of positive stories to reassure you. In fact there is a " positive stories" thread on the secondary breast cancer group which is kept pinned near the top most of the time. It will help to read some. In this group, the emphasis is on "living" with incurable camcer, and plenty have been for years.

xx

Thank you for replying, yes I’ve read the positive stories thread and it’s really helped me in the past but for some reason no matter what I read today it won’t help me. Maybe I need an early night and tomorrow is a new day. I’m so up and down all the time it’s exhausting xx

Give yourself a break - emotions are changeable, up sometimes, down at others. As you say each day is a new one, and it is suprising what can make the difference. 7 months since diagnosis is not very long, so it is not suprising you still struggle, and who are you supposed to be "doing better" than? You are doing the best you can in the face of something scarey. But hopefully, it becomes a bit less scarey over time and more normalised.

XX

Hi , I’m KT we all have our own story, I was diagnosed with metastatic melanoma back in July 2015, I was told I was incurable unsuitable for surgery and my first treatment was a targeted treatment drug called Dabrafenib which I was told usually worked at holding things back about 9 months but that there were some people who had been on the drug 2 years. I remember back then I felt really ill and as I had just been mourning my Mum’s death I too went onto mourning me and the life I thought I’d miss out on. I was delighted to find anndanv / Annette on this site who had been on the same drug as me for 2 years and it gave me some hope, some umph to try and eat better and start getting more exercise to help the drugs work as long as they could. I don’t know what gave Annette hope but maybe she will be along later. At 9 months my scan showed it was no longer working and I had a spread to my ovary but the NHS had just approved another treatment which I then started and it was scary waiting for that first scan to see if that treatment Pembrolizumab was going to work, but I had been keeping up with newspaper reports of how well it had worked for Jimmy Carter, but also warnings from medics that it doesn’t work for everyone. 

I don’t know anything about your drugs I’m afraid but I hope you find something or someone that becomes your catalyst to living days as if they matter and there is time in front of you to enjoy. I’ve just read your reply to ownedbystaffies, that positive thread sounds good.

I accepted that there would be some hard emotional times and sometimes planned ahead something to distract me and help me cope, at the times I knew would be tough, scan results time, etc, sometimes I obstinately wallowed. Id like to say be kind to yourself, find what works for you, to cope with uncertainty. I looked through the Macmillan info and support pages to look at the different methods suggested tried a few and rejected a few and retried some ways. If you can find a virtual or in person Macmillan HOPE course, I found that good, I put that off and wish I had done it years ago. Your own specialist nurse has a remit for looking after you emotionally so should know if there are any local centres that do courses like that or meditation courses or similar. Sometimes it’s just appreciating the now, sometimes it’s being able to look a bit further ahead to have something to look forward to.

I’m not sure my long post will help but I hope it does. 

Hi Lollipops, 

7 months isn’t really very long at all. All your feelings are familiar to us all, but it doesn’t help. Have you had any councelling? It might help you to get all those feelings sorted and then you can put them away in their box. Or have you had a chat with your GP, it could be that a course of anti depressants might help you. 
Until you can come to terms with what has happened to you, those thoughts are just going to overwhelm you and make it all seem much worse than it is.

Tomorrow will come regardless of how you feel, so let’s just concentrate on one day at a time. Sometimes it can help to try to write down the good things about today, if you try to do it every day it seems to become a little easier. I think it can help if a sad thought comes in to give it room and then try to find one good thing, it sort of balances the bad thing out. Try it it may help you feel a bit better, but you do have to keep on trying.

I can remember feeling much like you are now when my cancer came back, secondary and incurable. That was in 2014, now it’s inactive and I have to stay on Letrozole for life, but there is hope you see that the same can happen to you. 

In the meantime try to do something that you enjoy as often as you can, if you arrange it in advance it gives you something to look forward to and I found that that helped me a lot.

Lastly it takes time and for a lot of that we have been in lockdown so our usual support networks have not been there in the same way, I think that has had a big impact on many people who have fairly recently been diagnosed, the opportunity to be close to friends and family just hasn’t been there, and I know for me and many others particularly that was a big part of how we got through it. 

Don’t forget you are not dying from cancer you are learning to live with it!

love and hugs

Maggie xx

Hi

Sorry you're having a bad day. Just to answer your question about positive outcomes - I too am living with the effects of successful treatment after initially having poor responses to chemo. It was actually KTatHome who encouraged me as she was on the same drugs and responded well too. Our stories and situations change and we're all unique so it is extremely difficult and perhaps unhelpful to compare, but the concern and support from others in a similar boat doesn't change. We all understand how hard it can be. You've come to the right place. 

I hope you wake feeling more hopeful tomorrow. 

Thank you I think I need a good sleep and I will feel better tomorrow, I’m just fed up of feeling like I do xx

Thank you for your reply, tomorrow is a new day and I hope I feel better xx

Thank you for your lovely reply it’s given me hope I can be here and live well for many years I hope. I’m on very good medication that’s not even been out that long but has shown amazing results and for long periods of time so I’m hoping that’s me xx

Thank you for your amazing reply and it’s made me feel better, I’m hoping after a good sleep I feel better xx