@mensana But at last you have action! I hope it all goes most excellently for you! Dee x ... View more

@jesus2170 Sorry... "chemo brain" strikes again... I forgot to ask what type of radiation I'm having. Dr still wants to see me weekly for the next few months even after treatment ends. He said I'll have side effects and feel yuck for another 3 months but then should expect to see improvements. Its 3 months after treatment that they do another scan too to see if they got it all. They put me on the nebulizer again today after treatment.. to loosen the phlegm and mucus cobweb blocking my throat and making swallowing etc difficult. It does help actually... The Dr was very pleased with me today - lask week of of 7 weeks of treatment and I don't have any mouth ulcers and my skin is only peeling in a couple of small places from rad. burn on the outside. I think he just wishes I weighed more 🙂 So get some Oral7 toothpaste, mouthwash and mouth gel and use it daily! Excellent stuff. Cheers Dee ... View more

@jesus2170    Hi,  offhand sitting here replying I don't know the type if radiation I'm being zapped with but I will ask them today at my treatment and let you know.     I had hpv cancer in left tonsil, so had a full tonsillectomy to be on the safe side.  Alas is it had spread to my lymph nodes in neck so my treatment for that was the 3 chemo sessions spread out over the 7 week radiation course.      I had my last chemo session last week which was the worst of them all and made me the sickest... and the radiation is now burning my skin.   Funnily enough I find just the pain patches I wear help with the pain and I don't need to gargle the "pink lady" as often as some - if ever.  However, I am having trouble swallowing... anything... unless its as watery as water.    I leave tackling other things until end of the day.   Like I bought one of those healthy type organic packet soups - think it was chicken, corn and chia.  It also had carrot in it.  But all tiny swallowable pieces and very soft - I chewed them all anyway to be on the safe side and the resultant mush went down.   If its not mushed I can't eat it just now...  I can't swallow it rather.   I have often been told by my oncology team that I am doing so much better than others on the same regime as myself and they are very impressed with me.  I put this down to going to a naturopath / dietitican at the very start once I found out I had cancer even before my treatment started.  This person looked at where my body was in terms of minerals and nutrients and health and where I should be and changed my diet and supplements and got me in probably the best health I have ever been in my life so even just 2 weeks later starting treatment, I was starting on a very healthy footing - much stronger than most who don't bother to do that and we believe that has made the difference.   It wasn't cheap but it was well worth it and I'd do it again.  Also Reiki.  I put off trying Reiki this whole time thinking it was a bit suss... then I gave in and tried it a couple of weeks ago for 2 weeks... jeez, if I know what I know now about the experience of Reiki, at the beginning when I started, I would have been having Reiki every week!     So get your diet/health sorted and look into some professional reiki sessions - even just once a week - here is the diff...  after Reiki the pain is not as bad AND I could drink a glass of water!  Normally if someone offered me a glass of water I'd balk - would take me forever to sip my way through and wouldn't feel comfortable doing it either but after my first Reiki session they made me drink a glass of water and low and belold I could swallow and drink the whole glass like a normal person!  I was blown away!     After my last chemo session last week I had chemo brain and forgot my reiki session and really missed it... definitely booking in for this week!      I also have to give up some supplements and find them in powdered or liquid format or crush the tablets but not all tablets are allowed to be crushed so for those I just can't take them right now... I had a tablet stuck in  my throat for what felt like a few hours on the weekend and wondered if I shoudl go to the hospital because I couldn't swallow anything with it sitting there and I was afraid I would choke but then I noticed some of the water/saliva I did manage to hit it with made it sizzle and dissolve - so that's how I ended up moving it... waiting for it to dissolve while stuck at the top of my throat...   I also splashed out and got a cleaning lady who comes in once a fortnight and does the basics for me so my house is clean...  fatigue and tiredness are very real enemies.   As for working - I have been allowd to work from home during this... but working about half the hours I normally would.  Too tired near the end to try and focus on putting in the equivalent of 8 hours a day!  Couldn't do it anyway given time off for appointments/treatments etc.  I'm up around the 4 hour/day mark now and if it were not for chemo after effects I can sometimes manage 5 hours/day - but not all in one sitting.  I have been known to fall asleep at my laptop!   So I put in time during the day when I can and keep a running timesheet for my employer.  I might work half an hour at 2 oçlock in the morning and 2 hours at 11 o'clock at night and a few hours in the afternoon type thing...     I do not look forward to returning to work too soon given how I currently feel nor the fact I have an hour drive to get to to work and another hour drive home in peak hour traffic on top...   keep praying for a lotto win.   I am 62.  Told I look much younger - which goes against me because nobody offers a seat for me or offers to pick up heavy things etc.  They think I'm young enough to do it myself.  They were like that where I worked too until one day they found out how old I really was and then everyone changed and was nicer to me 🙂      Maybe I should have a t shirt printed ha ha....  Because I had to stand in the chemist the other day while this young family including the 2 young primary school kids sat in the only waiting chairs there and made the rest of us stand - although there was an older person than me also standing, plus me having just had chemo, and I would have loved to have said something... but one doesn't...   just mentioning this so you know other age groups going through this...   I also went through this alone.  My husband died of cancer 6 years ago.  My only surviving child is living interstate completing her masters at Uni and I have not told her about this and won't until she visits me next month on a uni break holiday.  I have no family except one estranged brother who I made the mistake of telling and he basically said he didn't want to know about it or me.  Working out of town every day means I have few close friends locally but I picked one who I could rely on who I know will help me if I need it but because I am a stubbornly independent type, she's a bit annoyed I haven't called on her more often I think.   I did let her take my dog for a walk yesterday though 🙂   I won't sugar coat this for you - I shouldn't imagine at 83 it will be an easy ride for you either but on the bright side at least you don't have to have chemo as well.  Chemo is hell.  My regime was sitting 5 hours in the chair at each chemo session... looking on the bright side I didn't lose my hair - I chose the cold cap option at the same time... and can quite understand why some women refuse it and would rather go bald... it freezes your scalp... it is very unpleasant to put it mildly.  But I have my hair still so it was worth it.   I'll let you know what my radiation program was when I get home later...   Good luck with yours! ... 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@mensana It's horrible and why should it be necessary for medical people who profess to care about humanity behave in such opposite ways... I do hope things work out for you... x Dee ... View more

@Budgie Hi...  Both - the mask, and tattoos I had the stick on ones, not the permanent tattoos... but that's their job isn't it? Doing those things?  Isn't that part of it?  Anyhow, she told me this morning she'd spoken to my oncology doctor about my weight loss and they looked into it and he said I'll be fine but try not to loose to much more - ha ha... well that's not like something I can promise... I'm not trying to lose it now... it's just coming off... mind you, I started with spare weight to begin with so as far as I'm concerned I'm hardly at risk of malnutrition although I gather thats not what bothered her - the radiation program was set up for me at the weight I was when I started, not the weight I am now... but seeing as mostly everyone does lose weight with cancer you'd think they'd factor that in... no? ... View more

@mensana its a risk I'm willing to take. You see her father died from cancer 6 years ago and she made me promise I wouldn't go doing anything like that to her. We are very close - and in addition to that when I die she will have nobody here. I AM her only real family. She has no living brothers/sisters. She doesn't even have any cousins here. She does in Norway but that's a long way from here. Last year she moved to Melbourne to do her Masters at Uni and no sooner arrived they went into lockdown for the year - but not before her boyfriend decided to join her and also went into lockdown. It was a shocking year for them. Then days before Xmas he broke it off and moved back to Perth soon as the borders opened. Can't blame anyone from wanting to escape Victoria! So THIS year she has a nice new apartment, back at Uni, things are finally on track for her and she is finally starting to sound happy. I am not going to take that away from her. This is her final year there and it is important for her career and future and as I said, she is actually happy now. That means more to me than gold. And I do believe she will understand why I didn't tell her while it is happening to me. If I told her now she would be distraught and worried sick and not concentrate and the happiness would go again. I refuse to do that to her. She is my last surviving child and the 'baby' of my shrinking family. She means more to me than life itself... she is the reason I get up every morning... so perhaps you can see why there is no way on gods green earth I am going to tell her about this now... I will tell her when she completes her masters and I see her at the end of this year. 🙂 ... View more

@mensana Sounds promising... nice that you have that wonderful outback so close to escape to as well! I hope things continue on an upper for you... Know what you mean about family - I have just an older brother who doesn't want to now about me or my cancer - we didn't grow up together - when our parents split when I was 4 he went with my dad and my mum took me... and that leaves my daughter - who is living interstate this year doing her final year of Masters at Uni and I don't want her to know - she made me promise I wouldn't go getting cancer or dying on her when h er father died from cancer 6 years ago! If I go she'll be alone... I will tell her one day when this is over and she comes back to visit but for now she's not to know... so I find the only place I can vent to as well is on here 🙂 ... View more

@mensana Any time! I'm in W.A. - not sure of time diff - is it 2 hours or just 1? Anyhow I am working from home while I have treatment so I'm online on my laptop most of the day and evening - always here if you want a chat or to offload or vent. With sleeping, since my hubby died six years ago (also of cancer... at this moment in time including him and myself, I am aware of 6 people in my street who have/had cancer!!), anyhow, even though I changed the bedroom as much as I could and I have a TV in there, I still find it easier to sleep in the loungeroom on the leather sofa in front of the tv... I pull the legrest up and push the back backwards and it is so comfy. (It's an L shape and only the two very end parts have that capacity - the rest is normal sofa.) I have a marvellous sleep on it and have given up thinking I HAVE to sleep in a bedroom if I don't feel like it. When winter sets in I will probably go back to my bed because its warmer in there. As I was saying to another Cancer council friend, I'm a great believer in quality of life, not quantity. So you do things that give your life meaning and quality and forget about other people's opinions (including mine if they don't gel 🙂 ) and the shoulds and oughts... Save me going back thru posts here - do you work at the moment? Because if you do but time is flexible for you or if you don't then when you sleep doesn't matter - be awake when it works for you, and sleep when it works for you and again, don't care about if its normal people hours... you're not normal people just now so those rules dont count. Only YOUR rules count. ... View more