Numb and wiped out.....

Cherylmarie

Hi girls.....well, after finishing with radiation last November, I feel more lost than ever.  I'm tired of hearing the same old song and dance...."this wasn't cancer, but your odds of it becoming invasive increase because it was grade 3".  So, I have exhausted myself researching for months on end, trying to make sense of all that I've been through and making a final decision about taking Tamoxifen.  I feel like no matter what I chose, I will more than likely end up being diagnosed with invasive cancer down the road. Do any of you feel like this? I guess, I should clarify that at the time of my diagnosis, I felt very confidant of my choice of treatment. The "non-cancer" was so played down, I felt like it was nothing more than just a few months of inconvenience driving 60 miles for daily radiation.  Now, I'm simply numb inside....second guessing my choice....and have real doubts about taking Tamoxifen.  I can't afford anymore office visits to discuss this with the oncologist....my husband is a GM retiree and our benefits have been jerked around so much that it makes my head spin...office visits aren't covered and I owe too much to each doctor I've seen since this all began.

Is there anyone else out there that feels like throwing their arms up and saying "screw all this!"? I don't think I have a functioning brain cell left to try and sort all this out. I don't want to sound like I'm feeling sorry for myself...I guess I just want to know someone out there is feeling what I feel right now.  There isn't a day that goes by that I'm not thinking about this and I know for a fact it has changed me.  I don't talk to anyone anymore about it....everyone says it wasn't cancer, so be happy and get one with it. And let's face it....people will think I'm just feeling sorry for myself when they hear me rant. Blah blah blah....that's what I say!  

jancie

I think most of us have been in the same dark place you are in right now.  It is not a good place, the second guessing of "did I do enough, will it come back?"  Unfortunately there are no guarantees.

And you will read the ups and downs of tamoxifen.  My side effects have been hot flashes but really not too much worse than it was 6 months prior to taking tamoxifen when I went into menopause from the chemo.  For ME personally, I am going to take it for the 5 years as my tumor was hormone receptor positive.  I don't ever want to look back and for one second think "if only I had done this or that, the cancer would not have come back"  I am treating mine as aggressively as possible so that I will never have guilt or blame myself if my cancer comes back.  

The chemo was the hardest on me.  I have lingering side effects that won't go away for years.  However, my personality is one that I want to live and if I had to again - I would do chemo knowing more than I did the first time around.  Sure there are times I feel like I would be better off dead because I get so stressed out over stupid things and life was not fun at all during 2009 while I was enduring treatments.

There is a thread here under hormonal therapy that is extremely long and is all about tamoxifen.  You might want to go and read that thread.  Since I am technically challenged, I am not able to get you a link to it but I am sure someone will come along and do that for you.

Hang in there.  It is a tough journey and we are here to help you.

If you want to get away and have a blast - look at the forum "get togethers" and join us in Vegas in October for a weekend of pure fun!  I went last year not knowing a single person and had the time of my life!

3monstmama

Cherylmarie,  I hear you completely.  As I posted to my blog one day, what I want to do is crawl under my bed and wiat until it was over or until I wake up.  I have had those second guessing myself sorts of days.  I actually found that I can read too much about DCIS, that by reading too many threads and too many articles I can make myself much more uncertain than certain about my decisions.  It may make me more informed, whatever that means, but it also makes me paralyzed and unable to live my life.  I have found nightly news and local news has the same impact---news reports focus on bad things in the world and make me focus on bad things in the world.  When I don't watch the news each night, while I still know that Chile had a terrible earthquake, that people are suffering in Haiti, that the war continues in Afghanistan, I don't obsess over it.  I can still appreciate what is good in my life like my children and husband and the view from my office window.  So for my news, I rely on a quick perusal of the internet or a newspaper and for what to do about my cancer, I am relying on my doctors.  I just can't educate myself as well about treatment options and still live my life.  What I can do is find good doctors with solid reputations that I trust.

I can't tell you what to do but as I have a diagnois much like yours, I can tell you what I'm doing.  I also have DCIS, grade 3 and I was positive for all the wrong things.  I had a lumpectomy, had a reexcission, start radiation in less than two weeks.  After that I will be doing the tamoxifen.  Neither the radiation nor the tamoxifen is something I wanted to do.  I really hoped that I would be told I had excellent margins and could skip additional treatment.  But it didn't work out that way.

Instead my oncologist has told me that with grade 3 DCIS, it is not a question of "if it will become invasive" but rather "when will it become invasive."  As far as tamoxifen goes, while taking that won't eliminate my chances of invasive cancer, it will improve them.  It will also improve the odds for the good breast.    And I don't have the same risk on side effects because I had a hysterectomy 5 years ago.  So the recommendation is that I try tamoxifen and see how it goes.  Per the oncologist, many of her patients do not have any issues with side effects.  If I did not have grade 3 DCIS, she would have said I could skip the tamoxifen.  Same thing with the radiation.  So I am doing radiation. 

I have three young children.  I feel I need to take every step possible to make sure that when my now 10 year daughter gets her medical degree [this week's goal!] or my sons' walk down the aisle, I am there with them.  And if dumb old tamoxifen makes that more likely than not, then thats what I have to do.

good luck.  just remember:  you are certainly NOT alone......  (((hugs!)))

RegulJ

You can always go back to the dr.

Call the billing department and explain your financial situation to them.

See if you can start a payment plan.

Most dr.s are sympathetic.