Dear Colon Clubers,
Thank you so much for your replies. I intend to keep visiting the forum and paying it forward as CRGuy said, but at the moment I really need to take a pause from cancer until I feel I've recovered emotionally.
We are having a hard time still with all the side effects and getting used to the new normal. I'm so happy I only did 4 Oxi! I'm having Lhermiette and massive Neuropathy 2 months after stopping it and its not getting better. Fatigue and nausea are still there. I'm angry and tense sometimes, and concentrating is still a challenge..
It is unbelievable all the strains that cancer adds up to your life. My relationship with my husband has suffered a great deal, but we love each other and we will make it work I'm sure. I still feel like a handicapped mother but it's getting better a little bit everyday. The chores at home are heavy as usual and sometimes it's hard to accept that I'm so tired still. I'm going to get a promotion at work but I'm overwhelmed at the moment, that sometimes I question the sense of it. And I'm back to the university - so, you have that as well. And my parents left since Summer, so here we are again, alone in the middle of Europe with a toddler in our hands.
Oh! And my mother in law as been diagnosed with advanced multiple myelom 3000KM away. I mean, WHAT THE FU**? My husband is struggling to keep his game on.
What a fuck*** year.
My colostomy is behaving very well and I'm proud of it and used to it. Although I have still some issues, I'm starting irrigation this next Friday and I know it will get better..
I feel so many things changed that I don't know exactly where to start. Some days I will feel myself at my limit, some days I will feel happy.. some days i can't believe this happened to me.
Sometimes I'm sure I will live to became 80.. sometimes I'm afraid of dying in the next couple of years. I guess this is why they call it survivorship- it really doesn't end with treatment.
It doesn't end and that is why you have to find your new normal...and things will never be the way they were. It's like losing your innocence. And im happy its over and i hope im free for a long time, but its always a bittersweet taste the stays with you after treatment.
But ima gonna work it.
So long I'm alive, everything will be manageable, somehow. One day at a time...
Thank you all so much for everything..
Very best of luck for those still in treatment..
I will see you soon
Love,
Ana
Dx @ 29 yo. Mum (2 y.o.) & Wife
12/2016: Rectal AdenoCa G2. CEA 4.3. RAS Wild. MSS. IIIB.
01 - 03/2017: 28 RTx + CHT 2,5 g/d Capecit.
03 - 06/2017: Suplemments and Cimetidine.
05/2017: TME/TAMIS + permanent Colostomy CEA 0.5
05/2017: ypT2N2aM0 (4/15), good cCR, limited pCR
06 - 8/2017: 4x CapOx 3,5 g/d (2x Oxi reduced to 80%)
09 -11/2017: 3x Capecit. monotherapy 4g/d
12/2017: Aspirin, Vit. D3, Curcumin, Multivitamin.