Hi,
Although my wife passed a year ago, I wanted to briefly share the positive side of our story to hopefully help others.
My wife had incurable Breast Cancer which upon initial diagnosis in January 2020 had metastasized to her lower spine.
It is important at this point to say that the Cancer did not cause her death. Indeed her ongoing treatment at that time was going along nicely. What happened is that she had a swift but fatal infection that brought on Sepsis and despite fantastic NHS Critical care treatment, she passed.
At the time of her death, she was anxiously awaiting the result of her routine scans. It was always a worrying time for her and did bring her down. She felt a bit unwell and queasy and went to bed early putting it down to a few maybe's i.e. side effects from treatment or a bug or worst of all a worsening of her Cancer condition. I being a positive person comforted her but nothing alarmed me. Upon waking it was apparent something was seriously wrong as she couln't get out of bed and could not stand but was lucid and coherent. I immediately phoned emergency services. A paramedic nurse arrived within 15 min and he immediately called an ambulance which arrived 20 min later. (I should explain, we live on the Isle of Wight, services are pretty good here in my experience) Intravenous anti-biotics were started in the ambulance and Sepsis was quickly diagnosed at the hospital. As I have already said, it didn't end well.
Now the positive!
After the devastating diagnosis, her treatment began immediately. They zapped her spine with radiography and as result, stopped that in it's tracks. In the following 3 years it never caused a problem. She began a regular hormonal treatment for the Breast I'm not up on that but HER2 rings a bell? Again up until her death, that had done the trick. She did have a setback early in 2021 when some small tumours were discovered in her head but not in the brain. These were successfully zapped with radiography. (She lost her hair but eventually it grew back).
A few days after she had passed, her specialist nurse phoned me offering condolences but also telling me her scan results were good. Not a lot of comfort to me at the time but it recently dawned on me that her Cancer care was a Positive outcome and could give hope to current sufferers.
The other massively important lesson is don't let the Cancer take your focus away from the signs of other potentially threatening illnesses.
Love and support to all,
Dave
Hi Hawaiin Dave and warm welcome to the Macmillan Community but so sorry to hear about your wife.... my sincere condolences.
There are indeed different facets to the cancer journey and from my many years first hand experience unwanted infections can come along and missed as we can be completely focused on the actual cancer........ having had Pneumonia and Neutropenic Sepsis a number of time we learned the hard way.
This New to Community area is like our reception desk where we try to direct you to the best part of the Community for you to give and get support.
The Community is actually divided into dedicated Support Groups (Discussion Rooms) so you may benefit from joining and posting in our........
and/or our
Bereaved Spouses and Partners Group
……. support groups where you will connect with a wide range of members navigating the exact same challenges both in supporting family during treatment or dealing with the loss of a family member.
To connect with a group click on the “Bold Italic Links” I have created above …… then once the group page opens click in the [Black - Click to Join - Banner] that appears at the bottom of the page and this will then confirm that you have joined the group.
When you are ready……. you can introduce yourself by putting up your very own post by clicking [+ Create new post] or [+] in the top right of the group page.
You may find it helpful to call the Macmillan Support Line open 8am-8pm (timings may differ across services) 7 days a week on 0808 808 00 00. This service provides cancer information, practical information, emotional support or just a listening ear.
Please do get back to me if you need further help navigating the community.
