Now that my treatment is finished

Hi Hazylowl. A very warm welcome to the group. I have seen that you have had a couple of reply’s in the new to the community post,  which are both really good advice. 
I understand the survival guilt. My step mum was diagnosed with lung cancer 6 months after me, and she passed away 12 weeks later, and I am here 6 years later. 

It is wonderful news that you have been given the all clear. With what you have experienced with the lobectomy and the chemo, you can really help others here by sharing your knowledge. I find it helps to put thoughts here into words where people know what I am going through, so I hope you will find it helpful to be here too.  

Take care 

Hi Hazylowl, So sorry to hear you have lost 3 of your family to lung cancer thats very hard. I also had a Lobectomy in Oct 2018, followed by adjuvant chemo , the Lobectomy went very well , the chemo left me anxious 3 months after the chemo finished the neuropathy really kicked in , I tried all sorts of medication , it did finely go. But although I had a clear result I still felt anxious and also suffered badly with insomnia , a year ago I was really bad  so the doctor put me on antidepressants which I really didnt want ,but they have helped quite a bit I still have a problem with sleeping but the anxiety has gone. My husband has had thyroid cancer , but we are still here and in our late seventies , you are in the right place here to get things off your chest , we are a very friendly group  all the best a keep in touch Ellen.

Hi Chelle. thanks, it already helps to know I'm not on my own about feeling guilty for still being here. My friends n family mean well but sometimes they invalidate my feelings and say my guilt is illogical and I need to stay positive! Its frustrating at times and Is end up answer back with comments like.. hey not everything is logical, my fear of ants is illogical but you know they still give me the heebie-jeebies! 

Losing your step mum on the heals of your own diagnosis is so sad and must have been so traumatic for you, I can only imagine from how I feel, how many times you must have said to yourself and others. Why?!

My dad, when he passed away I put my thoughts in a box and stuck the label "he had a good innings"  and learned to live with the loss, then my sister passed away when she was 43 and oddly I didn't focus too much on the type of cancer, it was more about it being cancer again and how young she was was and then 10 years later almost to the day, my brother passed away aged 51 with lung cancer too, it didn't seem fair , why him too? I didn't think I could come back from that loss, he and I were so close, but I did. I genuinely didn't think I would also be diagnosed with lung cancer, what's the odds? but now 10 years on from my brother death, here I am having had my own diagnosis aged 53! Breaking the news to my sister last June was soo soo hard. She's been a brick tho, and we have both since applied for genetic testing/mapping.

I've just been prescribed amitriptyline to help with the neuropathy, the sleeplessness etc GP says it'll be 3-4 weeks before I will notice any benefit, I do hope so, feeling like someone has erased my feet its just urghhhh. I was used to running couple times a week pre cancer, I accepted that it may be a while, if at all, of me doing that again, I wasnt prepared for the neuropathy to get worse many weeks after the chemo had finished and for it to affect my walking, so thank you for the hope that it may actually improve :) . I am sorry about your husband and that he has his own cancer journey, that must be tough on you both.  I don't know why I left it so long to join this community, just wasnt there yet I guess, anyway thank you for making me feel welcome.

Hi welcome to the group, I was diagnosed with SCLC and had 8 months of chemo last year, it was stopped in November and I have had a PET scan (5/1/21) but no results yet so I'm hoping I can join you on the treatment complete side.

I hope you do too! 
8 months of chemo, that must have been so tough on you, physically & emotionally. How have you been since your Chemo finished?  

Hi Athwhite. I hope you are feeling well after all of your treatment. Good luck with the scan results, I will keep everything crossed for you here. Please let us know how you get on.

Take care

It was weird as I only suffered sickness the last 3 sessions, I want this part to be over then I can concentrate on battling my Sensory Ataxia, I'll keep you updated on the results when they finally get here

Hi Hazlehowl,  as Chelle says, good you have the all clear, having two of your siblings and your Dad die, must have been so traumatic, trouble with trauma is it creeps up on you, handle one and  pull through, then another, how this effects everyone mentally is different, must have been difficult for you, and then your own self guilt, which some may find hard to understand, mental confusion of all this put in combination is an emotional trauma in its self, I can understand your dilemma, therapy would normally be advised, unfortunately due to Covid one to one therapy with a Psychotherapeutic counsellor, can not be had, due to Covid and even then you have to pay privately for it, as I have found out, I was referred to the NHS mental health, in February 2019, I still have not had any therapeutic treatment from them now, a month off 2 years ago, and that is after 5 assesments looks like I am out of their scope, mine is CPTSD from when I was a child and adolecent, have been living with all this dissacosiation all my life and did not even realise I had any mental problems, then suddenly all this started surfacing in 2018, the pain of re living all these dissociated events, I am now 60 and them being so traumatic, my brain dissacociated these from my conscious, even when diagnosed with LC, this did not become my prime agenda as I was in too much mental pain for it to register properly, I found a lovely private, Psychotherapeutic Counsellor in May 2019 due to not being able to get any treatment from the NHS, I had to,  unfortunately with Covid in March 2020 (just the same time I got my diagnosis of LC) those meetings had to be ended, telephone therapy does not work for me, as it has to be one to one for me.

It is good you have come here, I did not come here til recently also, nearly a year after being diagnosed, so at least you are talking of your feelings now, as you must have been diagnosed around the same time as me, the mental issues are sometimes worse than the physical diagnosis, at least your suffering is acknowledged here.

On reflection, I think a lot of illness is caused by mental issues, being the underlying cause, I will leave that to people at a far higher academic level than me, to decide though.

I wish you all the best in coming to terms with this mental anguish.

Hi BJG, it wasn’t until  after I had my surgery that the diagnosis hit me and I too had LC. I was fortunate that I have Health insurance through my work so I was able have therapy, but it was only for a specific no of sessions. It helped but it finished same time I finished chemo! I thought hey, Im doing ok now but as each week goes by since being given the ok I find my self being caught up in an avalanche of emotions.  I think our brains are the strongest part of our body but it’s also the most vulnerable part, easily damaged and often left untreated, it would seem that you’re dealing with a lot of mental injury, I think you should persevere with your therapy, does your counsellor offer one to one zoom type calls?.
Joining Macmillan community and this group has been a such a comfort to me, to know that actually how I’m feeling is quite normal and that I’m not going to fall of the edge after all. I know I will eventually climb up to the top again, it’s just that this time the mountain is so steep it’s almost vertical! 
I hope things get better for you, look after yourself and stay safe x