Treatment on-going and arduous

I know how you feel because I am the same.

I feel anxious all the time. Ko appetite or motivation. It is so difficult but you are not the only one

Sending love

J

Thanks, J 

Hi Paulm

Welcome to the forum. I have been reading your post with great interest. You are describing exactly what my husband Jay is going through at this very moment! He is about to finish his 4th cycle of CAPOX Oxaliplatin and Capecitabine at the end of this week and really, this cycle has hit him like a ton of bricks. He had been tolerating the treatment well up until his 3rd cycle, he was doing so well, that they upped his dosage of both the Oxi infusion and Cap tablets but don't know now if it's starting to backfire or if the symptoms are beginning to kick in really bad now. All his tests have come back normal his liver, kidney functions and blood levels have been good he's been told. Last Tuesday/Wednesday he said he started to feel like `a bag of shit` would be the best way to describe it he said. Just as though he has no get up and go and just no interest in doing much of anything other than sleeping most of the time and eating very little. His mouth is as dry as the dessert and he has been belching quite a lot. His cancer has recurred after getting the operation back in January this year and as far as they were concerned, they had got rid of only to be told in June that it had come back. Heard it can come back within a few years but for us it was months. The only real side effect he's had is the neuropathy (the pins n needles in his fingers and toes). He's been sick a couple of times this cycle too which hadn't happen with the previous cycles. He was sent for a CT scan last Thursday and we will probably get those results when we see the oncologist again next week. Seems the further on the chemo goes on, the harder it gets. Take Care.

Vicky.

Sounds so similar. Send Jay my best wishes. This is one of the of worse side effects, my lust for life has gone, but we will get it back. I am trying to keep getting through chemo as my priority, but I worry about how it affects people around me. Good to hear your take, Vicky, hang on in there. X 

Will do Paul Thanks!

I love your enthusiasm at being determined to keep going. Please send some through cyber space and I can give it to Jay.  It really is horrible to see him like this as it's just not him at all. He's usually full of jokes and wee quips and one liners and can be a sarcastic besom at times too and i've missed all that this week. He's slowly but surely finding his way back though I think he's beginning to eat again but still only small portions but still eating. He's a big chunky bloke that loves his food too too much at one time I think, and this is probably how he ended up in this position good friends with KFC, MacDonalds, takeaway pizzas, indians, chinese you name it and because of the unsocial hours he used to work these would be consumed all hours of the day and night. Since he retired, he's had nothing but bad luck health wise beginning with a type 2 diabetes diagnosis and now cancer was warned years ago about his weight and it's more or less as they say come back to bite him on the backside. So the food portions have come down and he was doing really well tackling the diabetes before the cancer diagnosis we both took up exercise and health eating but then Covid threw the spanner in the works there and at the end of 2020 that was when the cancer started to rear its head which had apparently been lying dormant for 3 or 4 years according to his surgeon. He got the diagnosis in July 2021 got his bowel resection then in mid-July (same as yourself a permanent stoma) then the tumour operation in January this year when the surgeon and her team were adamant, they got it all but seemingly some of those wee hard to detect micro cells `escaped` and formed again back in his bowel lining and so here we are again back at square one. It's not operable just now don't know if it will be and so this is why they're giving him the chemo. See what the CT says next week hopefully not looking forward to that when the oncologist said CT my stomach just dropped again this is how we found out the cancer had come back after Jay's follow up blood tests and they find things with CTs you didn't think were there. Hopefully this time they will find that whatever was there has gone or on it's way out. Can only hope and pray. Take Care. 

Vicky

Hi Paulm

My mum is 13 years into a stage 4 diagnosis. I think honestly the two to three year stage where treatment was most intense was the hardest . Her liver surgeon mentioned once that even people with the most robust defences tire at that point . However I would say she picked up after a chemo break and got the chance to draw strength again . 
She has just found out about another recurrence. None of us have even started to unpack that yet . Treatment has allowed her to become an older lady and that in itself can change approaches but we shall see . 
Hope you get a change to regroup and get through this weary time .

Take care ,

Court