So many different emotions

Hi Jax2u

Do not feel that you have to stay positive all the time. Cancer is indeed an emotional rollercoaster and I found it easier to go with the flow and accept that some days would be better than others. Your feelings are totally normal and I also found I was up and down to begin with. One minute I could be fine and seemed outwardly to be coping well and then next moment I would be in pieces. I found it hardest at diagnosis and then it got better and things started to feel more in control once I had a treatment plan and knew what was going to happen and when. With cancer being diagnosed everything can feel out of control and it is no wonder that it can make us feel very wobbly.

Getting accurate information for me was important and also peer support on here. Post here as much as you need to, we have all been where you are now and have been there ourselves. I found sometimes just writing down how you are feeling can help. There are a lovely bunch of ladies on here that will want to offer support. Talking things through with those around you can also help- I did so with family and friends but there is also the Support Line on here that are brilliant- if you just need to get things off your chest. 

To have it happen so soon after your husband must also bring up a huge range of emotions. What I know from my own experience is that after bereavement, when something else happens, it can bring all of those feeling back to the surface. When I was sat in the waiting room at my hospital I used to look around at the people who were also waiting. They were all different ages, cultures, back grounds, shapes and sizes. It struck me how random cancer is. It is not your fault that you have got cancer. You should not feel shame in anyway. To be affected by cancer so soon after your husband I can understand the questions that you have going around in your head. Looking back to how I felt at the time- I can identify with many of them.

The what if questions are hard to manage. I coped by trying to deal with one thing at a time and to break that into steps. To begin with I focussed on the operation- what did I need to prepare for it etc. Although it is good to know that there may indeed be some follow up treatment needed, at the moment no one knows so try to put it to one side and if it does happen then worry about it then. When you think to far ahead about all the possibilities that can make it feel overwhelming. 

It is good that your garden is like a safe place to you. Safe places are important. I am not saying the next few weeks are going to be easy and there will certainly be times when it feels like you are reaching your limit but looking back at my journey (click on my name and my profile will come up) it was doable. I had 6 months where I had some pretty intensive treatment but with support I came out the other side. When I had hard days I would rest. On better days I would try and go for a walk and get out an about. On days where I wasn't up to it I would have a wander around in my garden. Being in nature and noticing the smaller things helped. If a day seems too much then break it down into the morning/afternoon. But do not feel you have to be positive or upbeat all the time. Cancer is rubbish and it is natural to struggle at times. 

I can understand that you feel like you do not want to burden your family with how you are feeling and I felt similar. However my son did actually want to stay in the loop and would want to know when I was feeling low. With children it is hard because you do somehow want to protect them. I found honesty the best policy and when he would ask I would just say if it had been a rubbish day. Sometimes talking to people who are more neutral can help which is where the Support Line can come in. If you prefer not to phone, you can contact them through online chat or via email. They can also have a look to see if there is any support in your local area.

I will pop a link to some of the ways that Macmillan can offer emotional support.

Help with how you're feeling | Macmillan Cancer Support

So take a deep breath, we can not take your diagnosis away but we can support you through your journey. 

Take care

Jane

Hi Jacki, bless you and well done for writing it all down and getting it out! I’m going to say it again - there’s no need to be positive, and putting yourself under pressure to be positive will likely exhaust you and increase your feelings of failure. The emotional rollercoaster is unfortunately the norm, and it’s a case of learning coping skills to allow things to settle and regain your sense of balance. Which can be done. Anyone can learn these skills, even if it doesn’t feel like it. You matter, you’re significant and important, and your feelings are real and I’m not undermining them at all, but there’s nothing I’ve read in your posts that suggests you’re someone who can’t learn to cope. You need help and support, as we all do, and it’s okay to need, ask for it and receive it. During my time, I once read that anxiety isn’t actually about fearing what may happen, it’s about fearing not having control. So part of us learning to cope is coming to accept that the cancer diagnosis itself is happening, and that we can’t control it. As someone with PTSD from my childhood, not having control is extremely hard for me. Adjustment to this over my cancer took time, but I learned to accept that I had it and for me also one way of coping was to be as proactive about it as possible, and really “own” my diagnosis. Pragmatism kicked in as well and I took one step forward at a time just getting done what needed to be done to resolve my cancer situation. Which included phoning people for support (my CNS, the Macmillan helpline and even my GP who was a sweetheart and phoned me one evening after surgery),

Do you have your date yet for your staging. MRI/CT? If not, if it was me I’d chase it with my CNS or consultant’s secretary or both. Once you have the predicted staging info from the results it may help. Then once you have your pre assessment for surgery (I also chased that for me lol) and your surgery date, you may feel a bit better. 

Try and knock the intrusive what if thoughts on the head. There’s apparent an old Chinese proverb that says you can’t stop birds flying into your hair but you don’t have to let them make a nest. In other words you can’t stop thoughts coming into your head but you can choose not to dwell on them. You can recognise them for what they are (just thoughts) and take action to shift them. Try and move away from the what ifs and focus on the what is, what is known today, what is now. 

I didn’t tell most friends because I didn’t want pity. I go to church, and didn’t want people being nice, lol. Though I was delighted to find two men at church who were having radiotherapy and found I immediately felt able to chat with them about it as I knew they’d understand, I didn’t want people bringing me down with shock, sympathy and how awfuls. I wanted to accept and absorb the experience into myself, process it, own it, identify with it, get through it and accept it as part of me. Please don’t get the impression that it was easy - it wasn’t, it was a daily battle, sometimes an hourly battle, sometimes minute by minute. 

I’ve sent you a friend request on here btw in case you ever want to chat one to one, 

Oh bless you Jacki, sending virtual hugs and love. Jane and MarmiteFan have put it perfectly. I definitely felt better once I had my treatment plan and I feel positive and hopeful until I need to feel otherwise. I haven't however lost my husband a year ago to this. You have been through so much, it's good you are letting your emotions out. Take care xx

Hi Jax2u 

You have had a difficult time and losing your husband to cancer must be bringing painful memories back. 

My mind was in shock when I received the news. The Consultant told me straight after my hysteroscopy and biopsies that I had cancer. I had prepared myself for a 2 week wait for biopsy results. I actually said "I thought you had to send biopsies away for analysis - how do you know for sure?" He was 100% sure and I was 100% in shock.

I was in a state of limbo for a long time and it took a long time to absorb the news. 

If I'm honest I did question myself a bit about why this has happened. I have had a lot of stress and a very traumatic bereavement in my life and I wondered if I could have managed or handled anything better. That didn't last long. What events happened to me were not in my control and no I couldn't have handled anything better. Cancer does not discriminate and it is not your fault. It is nobody's fault. 

Please be gentle with yourself. Try and put your needs first and talk to anyone you trust to lift you up. It took me time to learn this as I am  a support for a lot of loved ones. But I am coming out the other side a but now and look back at that frightened lady in August and I have a new strength and a new peace.

Lean on us here. We'll be there. 

Everything you are feeling is completely correct, and that suddenly our lives are out of control and this ghastly invasion takes over. I know certainly for me. My mind was everywhere and I was completely alone with no one to talk to initially and I was so over the moon to find MacMillian and this lovely online community. 

I made a point of telling very few people not out of shame, but because I didn't want to lose my identity in this and have people ask how my Cancer is doing rather than ask how I'm doing which is very often the case. At the moment I haven't been given any more treatment and obviously if chemotherapy does happen, I will have to to be honest and say that I seem to be having a bit of a health blip at the moment.

The way we are treated has changed so much over recent years and even though we do look at our own mortality the moment we given the life changing diagnosis of Cancer, it is definitely different now to the way it was let's say 20 years ago.

I also felt certainly a little bit of "what did I do wrong to end up with this?", I live in Cornwall where there's a huge incident of radon gas and wondered if that was it which is ridiculous. Perhaps not eating as healthily as I should been, having a little bit of weight that I shouldn't have. These all the things that go through our minds on this journey. What are the most important things really to deal with is the fact that we are now here and have to find the best way of coping and dealing with everything in order to get over it. Most certainly there's a wealth of information on this website which has been amazing and so helpful to me and suddenly for someone who really felt very alone at the beginning I don't feel alone on here.

Take your time to breathe, and look after your own mental health before you start considering others it's certainly a lot to take in and quantify before you start considering your loved ones around you. 

I'm sending you the biggest hug, we are all much too young to be dealing with this, but things will get better as we are surrounded by amazing people with fabulous experience at helping us to get over cancer. XX

Thank you all for sharing, I have been feeling the same, I also haven't told anyone, just my husband, but I don't like to talk with him about it as he is still processing it himself.