Frightened as can’t have hysterectomy as cancer is in pelvis and lymph node so I’ve been told it will be 6 months of chemo. Don’t know what will happen then? I’m scared that this is far to advanced .
Hi Jools
Welcome to the Womb group.
I am sorry to hear of your diagnosis of womb cancer.
I can understand that it is a scary time.
I also had a grade 3 cancer and this simply means that the cancer cells look very different to the normal cells and can behave more aggressively. Stage 3c means that your cancer has spread but only within the pelvis and it has not gone out of the pelvic area. So although the cancer is more advanced than a stage 1 or stage 2- it is only locally advanced. It has not gone out of the pelvis and it has not gone to anywhere further afield. This means that it is treatable which is better news.
Whilst a hysterectomy is a common first line treatment for endometrial cancer- there are cases where for different reasons other treatments are offered first. For some ladies surgery is not recommended- there may be other medical conditions, there may be a high BMI or in your case it may be difficult to do the surgery as the cancer has already started to spread. For some ladies hormone therapy may be offered first where fertility is a consideration. For some ladies chemotherapy may be given first and followed up with surgery after the cancer has reduced.
I had chemotherapy (and radiotherapy ) for my cancer and these were done after the surgery.
Whilst chemotherapy is not easy and I had a lot of fears before it started, my experiences were not as bad as I thought they would be. Mine was done on a 21 day cycle and I had carboplatin and paclitaxel. These are often the first chemo drugs that are used. I would be in hospital for 1 day having the treatment and would return home the same evening. It would then be 20 days at home and the cycle would repeat. For the first week I did feel rough but it certainly was not unbearable. There were side effects, but most were manageable with medication.
Hair loss can be a big thing for some of us and I did scalp cooling and saved a lot of hair.
What I would expect to happen is that you will have scans to see how your cancer is responding to the chemotherapy. Some ladies seem to be offered one after the first 3 cycles. For others they complete the treatment and then have a scan. Once the scan is done they can then see how effective the treatment has been, whether any further treatment is needed or whether it is just monitoring and check ups. It may be that other treatments may then be offered. It would be hard to predict as they do not yet know how you will respond to the chemo.
Other possible treatments could be surgery (especially if your treatment is neo adjuvant) radiotherapy, hormonal treatment or immunotherapy/targeted therapy.
It is a worrying time having a diagnosis so do please give the Support Line a call if talking things through would help.
if there is anything you want to ask about please do so.
Jane
