I’m wondering if anyone can share how they’ve felt after finishing cervical cancer treatment. I assumed I’d feel relief once I got the all-clear: no more appointments, no more treatment plans, no more anxiety, no more pain and bleeding. But honestly, the past two months have been harder than the seven months of procedures and recovery.
I know I should feel grateful, it was caught early and treated with surgery alone. But since then, I’ve been dealing with intense fatigue, muscle and neck pain, migraines, and tingling sensations. Doctors think it might be a stress response: after months of anxiety, my body is finally letting go, but also crashing.
It’s tough to accept. Mentally, I feel ready to move on and live life to the full, but physically I’m drained. I’ve been advised to take extended time off work to recover, which I didn’t do during treatment. I took one week off work in total. I guess I expected to bounce back quickly after the all clear, but that hasn’t happened.
Has anyone else felt this way? How did you cope? Does it just take time? Am I being too hard on myself?
Hi Bris1725
From personal experience, and reading the experiences of others, your feelings can be very normal! And yes, I’d say you might be being too hard on yourself. It takes time to get beyond a cancer diagnosis and treatment, whatever it is, and you may find this article useful to read
After the treatment finishes-then what?
I think we all expect to feel relief when we have surgery or other treatment, and assume that we can move on but it’s not that easy. I had a NED result after treatment (no evidence of disease) and thought I would be ecstatic but in reality felt quite flat. We live with a fear of recurrence, fear of every twinge and pain afterwards and it did take time for me to get to grips with that and be able to move on.
Maybe try not to have too many expectations from yourself, and please do consider taking some time off to recover. It’s not a sign of weakness to do that-it’s a recognition that you’ve been through a major life experience and need to accept that and learn to live at peace with it.
I hope you’ll find the article helpful-I know many of us in the community do.
Sarah xx
