Dealing with stage 4 colon cancer to the liver

[Lunabird]

hello friends. On November 26, 2020 I was taken to the Emergency room due to severe abdominal pain and weakness. It turned out that my bowel ruptured and I needed immediate surgery.  I honestly wasn't upset when I was told I had a very large mass in the sigmoid colon and lesions on my liver. I wasn't even upset about needing a colostomy. The colon mass was removed with clean margins but the liver lesions would eventually be treated with chemotherapy after recovering from my surgery. It's really weird that when the oncologist gave me a prognosis of 5 years, more or less, that didn't even bother me. I've always been a positive person and I guess I'm determined to live longer.

So far I've had 7 rounds of FOLFOX and I've responded well to the treatment. Most of my liver lesions have disappeared, one is almost gone and two have been considerably reduced. My only side effects until recently were skin issues; hand an foot syndrome and a rash on my face. Now I'm having neuropathy mostly in the hands, some in the feet and back. I'm also experiencing diminished night vision. With the exception of the vision problems, the other symptoms are being treated with pretty good results. I've never been sick and have regained some much needed weight. For the most part, I don't feel sick. Now I'll be having a consult with a liver surgeon in 2 weeks. For the first time since November, I'm scared. I know this surgeon and he's brilliant but the thought of cutting my liver terrifies me. Has anybody else here gone through liver surgery? From my experience as a surgical tech, and having assisted this surgeon in the past, I know if he can successfully remove the lesions, my survival rate will greatly improve, with a slim chance of a cure, but I'm terrified of the surgery.

[stirling]

Hi Lunabird.

Sorry to hear about your close call and glad to hear you got thru it along with the colon mass. Well done you. Obviously you are strong and positive. I had some ablations last year and thought everything was good but then needed a resection due to the return of the tumors. 

It still required 8 days of hospital recovery then further recovery at home. Yes, I was concerned but just went with it. I was terrified in the pre-surgery room, I was shaking and think its why they had difficulty with the live blood pressure insertion.

I experienced the obvious recovery effects of fatigue and digestion issues not to mention personal worry. Exercise got me thru. About 100 meters in the beginning (no medication),  then got to 4 klms a day. Unfortunately, the little buggars came back again. So I recently had something called TACE. That was a pretty weird experience so far all clear.  Im happy to share my TACE experience if you like, its quite a new technique so you'll find it everywhere online.  Basically they take the chemo right to the location of the tumors and nuke them individually.

My eyesight is largely diminished and extremely poor now. So far the nausea has gone and the most worrying after effect is dizzyness. There are others  like fatique and lack of clarity so I'm hoping they will fade eventually.

I hope this goes some way to help you continue to push. GBY

Stirling