Long term effects of chemo

[nikki9]

Can anyone tell me if they have had long term side effects from chemo. I have had two lines of chemo, 6 carbo/taxol then 6 months later carbo/gem due to reoccur of OC. Many thanks in advance xx.

[TinaWright]

Hi Nikki,

Its difficult to answer in respects to the fact that most of us have probably only finished chemo a short while ago. By long term side effects? are you asking months or years later?

I think most people usually find the side effects have began to subside before the next 3 weekly chemotherapy treatment however, those who suffered long term from things like joint and muscle pain or neuropothy, this does seem to stay with us for a while. My doctor told me it could be up to 5 years before all the side effects have gone. It is 18 months since my last line of chemo and the side effects are gradually improving, slowly but they are getting better. These also include the surgical menopause symptoms as well.

Severe neouropothy damage may be long lasting or permanent in some cases but usually the chemo dose is either lowered or stoped if this becomes a troublesome side effect durring the chemotherapy treatment.

Remember your body has had a batterring!

a) First of all we go through the ajusting stage, to the fact we have/had cancer.

Its traumatic and the fears will never subside which is only natural. We go through an awful lot of tough emotions and we learn how to deal with them in our own way. This alone has a huge knock on effect and there are side effects from this alone.

b)Then there is recovary from the surgary and before we are really over that, we start the treatment along side a load of other drugs in which all take their tole.

Emotionally, I`m not sure if we ever fully repair. I do think we need to fight the demons before we can start to rebuild our life, our health.

I now understand why people often say they never felt ill until the cancer diagnosis.

This is the case for many of us with early cancers. Then after the treatments etc we are never the same and many of us seem to spiral downwards.

I`m not sure if this is a `Shock` responce or drug related or both.

I do know that emotional trauma often has a bigger hold on us as far as side effects go than many of the drugs that we need to stay Cancer free or simply alive.

There are many self help techniques we can do to help ourselves - the first one to learn is, the pacing. At first this comes natural but after a while when we start to recover, it is only natural to do more. Often we make the mistake of getting back to normal before our body and/or inner self has healed well enough. Allow yourself to take things real slow, take one step at a time and treat each symptom or side effect as an individual one. Don`t suffer in silence, talk to your doctor about any side effect or discomfort because often there is help out there. One thing most of us fail to do is talk about inner worry`s and anxieties, remember this is so important too.

I know I haven`t really answered your question but I don`t think there will ever be a clear cut answer.

Lots of love from Tina xxxx

[Archiebanana]

Hi Nikki

All I can say is during my carbo/taxol chemo (Dec 2011-May 2012) I felt pretty unwell the whole time and had various infections. I felt that I recovered really quickly after though, I had neuropathy in my fingers and toes which has virtually gone. I have had a wonderful summer and felt back to my old self, apart from not having the same amount of stamina. At the beginning of September I had a reocurrence, I have an appointment at end of Nov with Oncologist to see what second line will be.

It's the old thing that it really does seem to affect everybody differently.

Good luck.

Love Linda xx

[thehusband]

Between Jan 11 and June 12 my wife had 6 x tax/carbo....then 5 months later 4 x weekly taxol, and then 1 month later 8 x gem/carbo.....now going to start Caelyx as 4th line treatment. She, we, have noticed that fatigue is increasing quite a bit, not enough to stop her going out every day, but certainly enough to make her think about it and have the need to rest much more.

That aside, obviously apart from the hair loss with tax/carbo, she has tolerated everything very very well.....its just the tiredness really that limits her activity. It does of course have an emotional effect at times, the surprise would be if it didnt.

Good luck.