Support from others with same experience

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Hello everyone 

my GP recommended I join a support group, to talk with others who have had a similar experience, so here I am

I had lung surgery last December to remove the top right lobe, which had cancer in it. The surgery was successful,with no further treatment needed, and a 5 year follow up

Despite this I cannot shake the feeling of doom, and anxiety about the future. This is partially due to the knowledge that I have a ground glass nodule in the other lung, which I have been told, may become cancer. Consequently I’m dreading the follow up scan due in October. If it shows cancer, I don’t know if I can face the thought of going through the process again, and I wonder if you can have a lobe removed on the other side as well. Has anyone got any experience of this please

  • Hi   welcome to the group, but sorry you find yourself here. What you are feeling is completely normal. I think once you have been given a cancer diagnoses, it is always there in your mind, no matter how hard you try to push the thoughts away. 
    Scanxiety is real, and this can happen at any time, either with the build up to the scan, the scan itself, or waiting for results. For me it used to be all 3, now I just anxiety on the day of the scan itself, well because I don’t like them. I have learnt that it is no point getting myself worked up about the results, because no amount of worrying will change the outcome. This is not easy to do mind, but I have been on this cancer road a very long time! 
    We have to learn to live for today. Take the good days over the bad, and if you are having a bad day, know that tomorrow can always be better. 

    As for whether you can have both top lobes removed, I don’t honestly know, but I wouldn’t be worrying about something that may never happen. 

    “Try to be a rainbow, in somebody else's cloud” ~ Maya Angelou
    Chelle 

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  • I love the word scanxiety. It is now in my vocabulary!
    Thank you for your reassuring words

  • Namaste69590c, welcome to our group, though sorry you find yourself here.  Like you, I had my top right lobe removed (in 2017) and later my pulmonologist found ground glass nodules in my left lung.  At the time he said he would keep an eye on this.  Last year I was discharged back to my GP with no further surveillance because I'd had no recurrence since two mediastinal nodes had become involved at the end of 2018 (and were treated with radiotherapy and a couple of rounds of chemo).  At my final appointment I asked about the ground glass nodules, and my pulmonologist looked surprised - he'd clearly forgotten about them, but then went through the scan while I was there, several times, hunting for them.  They'd apparently disappeared!  My further sleuthing reveals that they can be transient, and most often not serious. I hope this gives you hope.  

  • It certainly does give me hope. Thank you. I hope that you now have the all clear, and it remains that way