Hi Esther Every week I have lunch with a friend who has a terminal and disabling illness, not cancer. We always go to the same restaurant, they know us and make excellent provision for the wheelchair. Sometimes I am there early and the lady who greets us chats to me. She nursed her husband through lung cancer and now her niece has cancer. She has said how awful she feels about it but that having cared for her husband she just feel she has no more to give another person - "I gave all I had to my husband and I have no more" Maybe your aunt is not be able to cope with your situation after having cared for two husbands with cancer. Maybe you might have to approach her and ask for her her advice, maybe ask how she managed. Regards Sailor At sea, I learned how little a person needs, not how much. Robin Lee Graham
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Hi Willow I think anyone has a right to feel overwhelmed when dealing with what you are dealing with. 2 am is good blogging time when you can't sleep so make the most of it. It is why this site exists. However, what you are dealing with you need some help with - when you go back for your next round of chemo ask to see a social worker and find what help is available for YOU. Things that will help you to keep going. You might be surprised at what is available through things like home and community services, or whatever they are called where you live. If you live in Victoria ask to get a copy of the services directory produced by your local integrated cancer service - they all have to produce them. Don't be afraid to call the cancer helpline 13 11 20. Don't be afraid to blog at anytime but too much 2 am ruins ones beauty sleep. Regards Sailor Never go into strange places on a falling tide without a pilot. Thomas Gibson Bowles ... View more

G'day Teacher Mum You left off the next two lines: Wild horses couldn't drag me away Wild, wild horses, we'll ride them some day. I reckon there are times when we are all riding the wild horses and struggling to stay on. Harker reckons that diagnosis causes cancer. The corollary of this is that: monitoring causes recurrence. However, it is something we all have to live with - that fear that the shadow has got out of its room, turned into a monster and threatens to overwhelm us. Monsters are things that used to be under the bed when we were kids, but to us they were real. 'Childhood living might be easy to do', but as adults with cancer we are afraid of the monster returning. As you say death is part of life, but the problem is that we live in a death denying society, we all act as if we are immortal until something inconvenient like cancer comes along and reminds us that we are mortal. So we have to confront that and so many of the people round about us do not want to do that and our confronting it makes us uncomfortable to them. It is said that in ancient Rome when a victorious general was given his 'triumph' or victory parade through the street, a slave was commissioned to whisper into his ear "memento mori" - 'remember you must die', I think cancer is like that slave, reminding us that we are mortal. I think the previous line of the Rolling Stones song is also important: "I have my freedom but I don't have much time." It is up to all of us to make the most of the time we have. To use a latin phrases again "Carpe diem" – from Horace 'Seize the day, trusting as little as possible in the future'. I was somewhere recently and I saw written up on a whiteboard in someone's office - 'remember the past/live for today/hope for tomorrow'. So good luck for Tuesday - ask the oncologist those questions you want answered and do not leave without good answers, answers that you understand. Cheers Sailor Ah to throw off the shackles and fly with the seagulls To where the green waves tumble before a driving sea wind. Eric Bogle, Safe in the Harbour ... View more

G'day Willow As Jules and Teacher Mum say - what you are going through is quite normal and in fact healthy. Don't be afraid to cry. Doesn't make it easier at the time. We can't go back to what things were like beforehand and you are in the process of trying to make sense of what has happened and what is happening. We have all been there and know what it is like. You have so much more than all those other people as you now have a different set of values to look at things and so much of what goes on around you is trivial and not worth putting up with. So take care of yourself as you work out where to put your efforts and don't be afraid to seek help. Dump whatever you want to on this site - it is why it is here. Regards Sailor Have you stood by the ocean on a diamond hard morning And felt the horizon stir deep in your soul? Eric Bogle, Safe in the Harbour ... View more

Hi Helen That is not a good news cancer! That being the case, there are people around who consistently live a lot longer than the average and have a good quality of life whilst doing so. One friend of mine was very active and had a chemotherapy pump that she wore like a shoulder bag all the time and she lived a lot longer than anticipated. So don;t think that all aggressive chemo is going to knock a person out and leave them with a poor quality of life. It is still not good news. You need to do some thinking about yourself and don;t be afraid to ask for help for yourself. The cancer helpline 13 11 20 is a good place to start.. Regards Sailor Any fool can carry on, but a wise man knows how to shorten sail in time. Joseph Conrad ... View more

Hi Helen37 Tough to get that news - I'm assuming it is not a good cancer to have. What type is it? Regards Sailor A ship is safe in harbor, but that is not what a ship is for. Anon ... View more

Hi Mitch One of the side effects of any hormone therapy for hormone sensitive cancer can be mood swings, fatigue, concentration problems, short term memory loss, hot flushes, etc., etc. I'm told it's just like going through menopause! Happens to us males as well on hormone therapy. Speak to your Onc about it as they can give you stuff to counter the side effects. Cheers Sailor Any fool can carry on, but a wise man knows how to shorten sail in time. Joseph Conrad ... View more

Hi There Folks Cancer 101 - well I'm not the person to run this course. Also what I know about the immune system you could write on the back of a postage stamp in quite large letters. However, from what I have learned over the years is that cancer is an overall name for a variety of diseases, just as infection is a generic name for a wide variety of diseases. So some cancers are linked to an infectious agent such as human papilloma virus, hence a vaccine can be developed to prevent the HPV infection ending up as cancer. Other cancers are caused by agents that damage the DNA of normal cells and the resulting damaged cells develop into cancerous cells - so UV radiation and melanoma, smoking and certain types of lung cancer and head and neck cancer. Similarly there are a group of cancers that are occupation linked, so from what is known there are cancer causing agents in those particular workplaces that can result in cancer - for example the rubber industry and certain types of bladder cancer. Other cancer there are certain genes that are linked. However, the problem is that we are dealing with population studies to find these things out and there is an awful lot of things we do not know. Most of us have at some stage or another been exposed to asbestos, but most of us will not get mesothelioma, only some will. So having a cancer linked gene increases the risk for the individual, it doesn't say they will get cancer. There are other factors involved. I think that somewhere on the cancer councils website is a "what is cancer" section. Hope that helps Sailor Never go into strange places on a falling tide without a pilot. Thomas Gibson Bowles ... View more

It not only sucks, but it knocks you about a lot as well. Makes you look over your shoulder a lot. Sailor The wonder is always new that any sane man can be a sailor. Ralph Waldo Emerson ... View more

Hi there teachers all. The things that we do and the commitment that we show. I remember sitting up being prepped for rectal ultrasounds (No - I've checked my spelling!), CT scans and bones scans, being surrounded by student essays and marking them! How mad was I? I guess the students appreciated the effort but I'm not sure. Twelve years down the track I still get twitchy in the weeks leading up to my next test, and yes any odd ache or unusual feeling brings back to your mind the possibility of it returning. I have mentioned before that it has been referred to as 'the shadow'. A colleague once referred to it as the shadow residing in a smaller room in the house of his mind, not the main rooms. Sometimes, however, it can become a black monster trying to break out of the room and invade the rest of your mind. All you seem to be doing is hammering planks across the straining doorway to keep it contained. If it get to that stage, then get some professional help. Otherwise it does reduce over time, but it will never go away. Another person I spoke with once, told me about his Christmas present to himself. He was well past treatment and his specialist had told him long ago that he no longer needed to go for regular test. Every December, he went and had a blood test, got the result showing that all was well, just before Christmas - his present to himself. So hope the test go OK , that if remains a shadow in a small room of your mind and never becomes the black monster. Regards Sailor An incorrectly identified mark is a hazard, not an aid, to navigation. Alton B. Moody ... View more