Why am I sad?

Hi T10,

I’m sorry that you’re feeling sad.... it’s not terribly surprising though, after all you’ve been through. I know one of the community champions has talked about this article before:

https://www.workingwithcancer.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/After-the-treatment-finishes-then-what.pdf

When I first read it, I thought that he really summed up how I felt. You’re still in pain, you’ve had the shock of diagnosis and hormonal upheaval. You need time to recover. 

I had surgery, chemotherapy, radiotherapy and hormone treatment (zoladex and exemestane) and I was tearful at times throughout. My husband, sisters and friends have been really supportive though and they understood how I felt. Other relatives have been downright depressing and I’ve tended to spend less time with them for my own sanity.  I’m sure your friends and relatives are relieved that the intensive treatment has finished and they want you to feel better. I think it’s important that you can be honest about how you feel though. It will take time to adjust to the hormonal changes and to heal and it’s important that they appreciate it. Perhaps you could share the article with them? I know people on this forum have also talked about how useful counselling has been to help them to come to terms with things.

Take care,

Sarah

T10

Huge hugs. I'm on my second lumpectomy and due to start radiotherapy.

I know exactly how you feel. I didn't hit my wall till I was declared clear after FIVE years then I fell apart. It's a combination of stiff upper lip and shock. While you are doing it,the appointments and the treatments you feel supported cared for and dare I say special. Then all of a sudden it all stops and reality sets in. You've got to get back to normal, but you're not like you were. EVERYTHING is different. Pain, wayward nipples, scars and self confidence totally destroyed. Your body betrayed you!. The worse thing is they cut the cancer out of your boob but not out of your head.

So that's the emotions, then there's the physical side. Surgery takes much longer than we think to heal. 12 years ago we stayed in hospital for a week. Now because we are thrown out in the same day we think it's minor surgery and its not. Radiotherapy is hard. No doubt you've said  " No I didn't have chemo, JUST radiotherapy". There is no just about it. Radiotherapy can be awful. The skin splits, extreme tiredness, the travelling and the waiting. Shall we mention the being moved about like a slab of meat until we are in the perfect position to be zapped. Stripped to the waist, like that's normal to display yourself in front of a group of strangers that can be different every time. I had to undress in front of a man I'd never seen before one time while talking about traffic through Leeds. That was nobodies fault, some low life had broken in and stolen the computer from my usual treatment room.

AND THEN they give you drugs that put you back into menopausal symptoms. My feet hurt so bad I have to force myself to walk across the floor and as for the hot sweats.

So, is how your feeling normal, to be expected, well yes. To be honest I'm amazed sometimes I'm not rocking in a corner.

P.S. the everyone else that tells you you should be ecstatic, are they the same ones who said " We can fight this, we will get through it together"

P.P.S did I say that out loud?

Hi , totally agree with your sentiments. The only time I felt vaguely ecstatic was when I woke up from the operation, still on a high from the drugs (I’m a weird person who actually likes the anaesthetic) and thought ‘I’m still alive!’. After my radiotherapy a friend suggested we have a ‘celebration’ - I had to tell her as tactfully as possible, through slightly gritted teeth, that I was tired and sore and didn’t really feel in a celebratory mood. She is lovely and meant well, she just didn’t get it. One of my biggest post ‘active treatment’ pleasures is long walks with another close friend, usually incorporating a cafe along the way. Simple, undemanding things.

Re the letrozole, yes the ‘non-active’ ? treatment ie hormone ‘therapy’, in my case anastrozole, can have many nasty little tricks up its sleeve. I seem to have so far escaped many of the possible side effects but have ongoing issues with fatigue. I haven’t worked full time since my operation, luckily I have a very supportive employer, but my new normal is very different to pre cancer.

Sorry, very rambly and long winded way of saying that you’re absolutely not alone in how you’re feeling! Love and hugs, HFxx

Hi,

I had a lumpectomy 10th June and finished rads 10 days ago. I felt exactly as you do. 

At the end of my rads i was in tears. The radiographers got me to see a mental health nurse at the hosp who told me i had been very ill even if i didnt realise it and what i was feeling was normal. 

In a weird way it is reassuring to have rads everyday, having people doing things. Plus it has been a whirlwind of appointments etc. 

I also went into a maggies centre and had a chat with a counsellor there which helped. I am on waiting list to see a counsellor through hospital macmillan centre. 

It may be worth giving macmillan or breast cancer care helpline a call, i have done that in the past, they are brill. 

There is an article written by a psychologist Dr peter harvey i think ‘after treatment what happens next’ i think its called, it explains everything so well. Try googling for it. I will see if i can link it not sure how to. 

Hugs xxxx

yvonne

Hi,

https://www.workingwithcancer.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/After-the-treatment-finishes-then-what.pdf

Here is the link. 

Yvonne

Thank you Happy Feet,  Thank you for your words, one of my treats is to walk my dog finishing at a cafe. I have joined The Primrose Center in Orpington for some counselling and mindfulness sessions.

I know that months after my active treatment finished....I still felt like I was living in a parallel universe. Everyone, family and friends had moved on....treatment was finished....everything was sorted...but I never felt it was over, I never felt I could walk away head held high. I think it’s just weird, everyone and everything running as normal and yet.....you....can’t really catch up...

I genuinely hope it gets better....and in the future, I see life beyond cancer. My doctor told me that one day I will wake up and my first thought won’t be cancer. A year and a bit on from my diagnosis I am not there but I really hope it won’t be long. I can’t live, worrying like this forever.......

Galligirl,

that is spot on, exactly how i feel. The parallel universe. It is almost like i am watching myself live my life. 

Yvonne

well done for being so honest.  I smile and say to folk that 'I am fine'  when asked, and on the outside I look brilliant although my treatment is ongoing and seems endless   I am, but my inner me is totally crap.  I ache for hours in a day and find everything harder to cope with.  Mood swings are awful and I could have happily killed the cat for demanding food for the umpteenth time. Skin looking like someone who is turning into a prune and odd things happen !   I can't do mental arithmetic any more, or  remember phone numbers I phone every day!   Names are a complete no-no !   got advised to keep my brain ticking along with crosswords etc...

On a good note the fact they don't want to see you until June is a fantastic bonus....That is MONTHS away!!!

   I just live from appt to appt. and can't see a blank box hardly on the calendar!  I am getting physio now on scar tissue and that is no picnic, so don't be afraid to speak up if you have pain due to that.  If this had been treated immediately I wouldn't be in so much pain still.  (I am a year post op in Oct! and moaned from day 1 something not right)  I have to admit as well I don't feel ecstatic and few people can understand why not.  

Letrozol not easy either but that's another post for another day!

Take care xx

Hi 

I have posted previously on this phenomenon and sadly its rarely talked about by our medical teams. Sad because forewarned is forearmed as it were.

As others have said, with active treatment we are getting on with the doing of it. We hammer n smash n squeeze all sorts of shocking and terrible events into little boxes just to be able to get to the next day and the next ones. The tension is holding us together.

Then ....often when active treatment ends, when life may be going well and we actually feel OK.,.it is like the elastic band that has streeeeeeeeeetched....finally snaps back! It may be a wishy washy twang with uncertainty and fragility and flat emptiness or a hefty thwack with crushing panic and anger and confusion and anxiety etc It may be the time that some or all of those experiences we bashed into boxes pop back to be properly looked at.

One of my pet hates is the notion of ' oh but he /she is strong, he/she copes well '…....siiiiiiigh whatever our outsides look like, even if we blindly manage to put one foot in front of the other to do what is expected, we don't feel or fear any less than anyone else!

OK stepping down from my soap box...

Take care