Making sense of it all…

Guess the 11 Cancer posts at once was a bit overwhelming? Sometimes that’s how I roll… all or nothing!! 🙂

It’s best to read them in the following order:

1. MY JOURNEY WITH RECTAL CANCER
2. DISCOVERY AND DIAGNOSIS
3. FIRST GLIMMER OF HOPE 
4. PREPARING FOR BATTLE
5. INTO BATTLE I GO 
6. TREATMENT CONTINUES
7. THE ROAD AHEAD 
8. TIME TO CUT IT OUT
9. TAKING IT DAY BY DAY 
10. NO CHEMO!! 
11. 2014 – A NEW YEAR 

Next week I will post an update for 2015, as well as some tips that helped me get through the tough times.

STAY POSITIVE!

2014 – A NEW YEAR

14 January 2014

First check-up for 2014 done and dusted! Surgeon very happy with my progress. Today was quick and easy though – Feb there’s another CT scan and lots of blood tests; March there’s a follow up colonoscopy… and so the new cycle begins!

18 February 2014

Just had the first check-up for the year with the oncologist… Blood results are all normal. Cholesterol is slightly up – but he’s not concerned about it and I must just watch what I eat (difficult for a cheese addict). CT scan…all clear, EXCEPT for a small area in the sacrum.

NO CHEMO!!

17 August 2013

Had a good chat to the oncologist and discussed all the pros and cons of having preventative chemo and the benefits thereof, as well as quality of life which he feels is most important and something they advocate quite strongly. As the post-op histology report was so positive there was no significant benefit to me having the chemo – especially when weighed up against the side effects I could / would experience. (It affects the mouth, throat, oesophagus and stomach linings!) He said the decision was up to me and I could take my time and mull it over. I was going to wait a week or so BUT before I left his rooms I made the decision NOT to go ahead with the treatment!! The oncologist was very supportive of my decision. Obviously they will monitor me every 3 months for at least the next 2 years and then less often in the years after. Now I can get on with living without the shadow of chemo hanging over me…