So. Tired. Very. Tired.

whisperingwolf

Hi!

OK. I finished chemo in April 2010 - I had my double mastectomy + axillary lymph node dissection May 20, 2010. I finished being inflated for reconstruction in September. I took two rounds of Herceptin before my heart couldn't tolerate it anymore. I'm being seen currently by a cardiologist to try to get my heart pumping normally again. Once that is better, I can have my exchange surgery

What I'm wondering is - all this ( except reconstruction ) is done, other than the heart stuff. So why am I still so tired?! I still feel like I did when I was at the end of radiation - exhausted nearly all the time! It's very hard to even get up out of bed! Some days, I don't. Of course, I'm also being treated for bipolar depression, a pre-existing condition to my cancer ( years before ). 

My oncologist said I should only have stayed so tired about two weeks beyond radiation. Ha! Three months now, Doctor! Some of it is likely due to my heart, my cardiologist says, if not all of it. But I talked to a breast cancer counselor who believes it's normal for women to experience fatigue related to breast cancer treatment for even a year after the treatment ceases.

I just want to feel like a "normal" person - there's no evidence of cancer anywhere in my body anymore, and I wish my energy level reflected that. I'm 31 - I'd like to be out doing things, even just running errands again, instead of feeling so tired all the time.

I feel like my mind has moved on, but my body isn't cooperating!

Does anyone have any suggestions / ideas / similar situations that occurred? Am I the only one?

Thank you! *smile*

Lou10

whisperingwolf:

You are not alone!! I am totally exhausted and quite depressed. Had surgery, chemo (FEC-D), 28 rads, and now tamoxifen. Finished rads in late October and started tamoxifen in early November. I'm attributing most of my fatigue and mood issues to the tamoxifen, as both are side effects. But I haven't had any follow up yet and may have a fight on my hands to get appropriate imaging done, which is really weighing on me. So my mind hasn't even been able to move on. I also have a lot of body pain and am seeing a rehab medicine specialist about that tomorrow.

I can't imagine having a cardiac problem right now. And facing more surgery. I'm getting more tired just thinking of your situation! Maybe you're so close to it you don't realize how much you're dealing with?

Wish I had some suggestions ... I'm trying to focus on baby steps. Trying to doing a bit more each day, but not beating myself up if I can't. Hope you wake up with more energy tomorrow. 

pamdo

Get your thyroid checked!  I had the same experience last year 2 months after finished rads was getting more tired by the day....thought it was heart issues too...turns out I was severely hypothyroid due to hashimotos....once I got on meds felt sooo much better!

Good luck...

Lou10

Good idea from pamdo. If you're having bloodwork done, you may also want to have your ferritin checked (re: iron deficiency).

Anonymous

whispering- I don't think it's really fair of your oncologist to give you a timeline of fatigue for 2 weeks.  He's, of course, assuming the fatigue is from the rads when it could be from any number of things.  One is just surgery in general.  My doctor told me that for every hour you are under anesthesia it takes your body a month to recover.  Just MX is an incredibly long surgery and recon can be, too.  But a lot of women, and cancer patients in general, also experience fatigue which is caused by depression that usually begins after treatment ends.  This is the end when we catch our breath and really start processing emotionally all that we have been through.  It can be a really difficult time.  After I was all done I really hit a wall and it took awhile to work through it.  I think what you're feeling is very normal but it may make you feel better to have some blood work done just to make sure nothing else is going on.

I found this article, written by a journalist who had just completed treatment for prostate cancer.  I found it really helped me to know that what I was experiencing was normal for what I'd been through.  Hope it helps you too.

 

 

After Cancer, Ambushed by Depression

By Dana Jennings

I’m depressed.

 

I’m recovering well from an aggressive case of prostate cancer.  I haven’t had any treatment in months, and all of my physical signposts of health are pointing in the right direction.

 

Still, I’m depressed.

 

And I’ve been ambushed by it.  After more than one year of diagnosis, treatment and waiting.  It’s almost as if, finally and unexpectedly, my psyche heaved a sigh and gave itself permission to implode.

 

I’m not alone in this cancer-caused depression.  As many as 25 percent of cancer patients develop depression, according to the American Cancer Society.  That’s contrasted with about 7 percent of the general population.

 

This isn’t about sadness or melancholy.  It’s more profound than that.  Broadly, I have a keen sense of being oppressed, as if I were trapped, wrapped up in some thick fog coming off the North Atlantic.

 

To be more specific, I’m exhausted, unfocused and tap my left foot a lot in agitation.  I don’t much want to go anywhere- especially anyplace that’s crowded- and some days I can’t even bear the thought of picking up the phone or changing a light bulb.  All of this is often topped off by an aspirin-proof headache.

 

The fatigue frustrates me the most.  When I envision myself it’s as a body of motion, walking or running, not floundering in bed.  On one recent day, I slept till 10 in the morning- getting 11 hours of sleep- then took a nap from noon to 2.  And I was still tired.

 

I’ve had occasional depression over the years, but nothing as dogged as this.  When I first learned that I had prostate cancer, I wondered about depression.  But after the shock of the diagnosis wore off, I was sharp and clear-headed.  I wasn’t depressed as I went through treatment- surgery, radiation and hormone therapy.  I was buoyed by a kind of illness-induced adrenaline.

 

The bone-smoldering fatigue arrived in late spring/early summer, and intensified as summer deepened.  I thought that I might be depressed, but resisted the diagnosis, didn’t want to countenance the idea that I could be depressed after all of my treatment.

 

I stubbornly chalked up the fatigue to the lingering aftereffects of radiation and my fluctuating levels of testosterone.  But I was wrong.

 

I am seeing a psychiatrist who specialized in cancer patients, and have started a course in medication.  My doctor assures me that depression isn’t unusual among those who are on the far side of treatment.

 

Partly, I think, I’m grieving for the person I was before I learned I had cancer.  Mortality is no longer abstract, and a certain innocence has been lost.

 

And while the physical trauma is past, the stress lingers and brings with it days washed in fine shades of gray.  In the same way that radiation has a half-life, stress does to.  We all ache to be the heroes of our own tales, right?  Well, I’m not feeling too heroic these days.

 

Cancer pushes a lot of difficult buttons.  It lays bare our basic vulnerability and underlines the uncertainty of this life.  And prostate cancer attacks our culture’s ideal of manhood.  The steely eyed Marlboro Man isn’t expected to worry about incontinence and erectile dysfunction.

 

Cancer feels bleaker than other diseases.  Even though my health keeps improving, and there’s a good chance that I’m cancer free, I still feel stalked, as if the cancer were perched on my shoulder like some unrepentant imp.

 

It’s harder to write about the weight of depression than it is to write about prostate cancer and its physical indignities.  Cancer is clear biological bad luck.  But depression, no matter how much we know about it, makes part of me feel as if it’s somehow my fault, and that I’m guilty of something I can’t quite articulate.

 

This has been a difficult post to write because during my dark waltz with cancer I’ve depended on my natural optimism and my sense of humor to help see me through.  But depression blunts those traits.

 

In the end, though, I believe and trust in the healing power of the stories that we tell each other.  And I wouldn’t be truthful to you or myself if I ignored the fact that I’m depressed- even as I wait for a brisk wind out of the North to blow this fog of mine away. 

Ang7

I am also very tired.

I am over 2 years out from treatment.

I do have 4 kids, but I find myself needing a nap.

Thank goodness they are at school when this happens.

mightymon

Hi Wisperingwolf - I'm too feeling very tired about 3 weeks ago. I'm 32 dx last year in July, chemo, radiation and now on Tamoxifen. I let's my oncology know and he did some blood test and turn out that my iron level are very low, so he prescribed some iron tablet for me to take, and that had fix my tired problem.

Naniam

I had been on estrogen for years and stopping that and then having chemo and radiation, I was exhausted.  Mine was just the loss of estrogen. 

I was given a medication by a neurologist (saw him for an MRI scan post chemo) and he told me there was no reason people had to suffer with the fatigue of cancer treatment.  He said this drug had been proven to help with that.  It is called Provigil.  It worked wonders for me until I could taper off the drug.

I am now Stage IV and I am going to ask for another prescription - it just gives you enough of an energy lift that you feel more normal.  I had no side effects. 

If it isn't your thyroid or iron, you might ask about this. 

kmccraw423

I, too, am tired.  I have a number of other health issues and suffered from depression before I was diagnosed with bc so maybe that's why I'm so easily exhausted.  I am looking at a carotid rotor rooter, stent placements in my legs and a hip replacement.  I am on iron supplements since I am anemic and low on protein - whatever that means.  I am desparately trying to get my blood sugar under control so I can try reconstruction again (failed the first time),  And I recently had another stroke.

In my head I feel like I always did - its just when I try to execute anything that I find I am too exhausted to do anything.  I know I have a number of health issues but I am taking much better care of myself and it doesn't seem to make any difference.

kmccraw423

After reading the above I really sound pathetic!

Ang7

kmccraw423~

You don't sound pathetic to me!

After reading your post, I am feeling like I should not be feeling tired anymore...

Hugs to you.

jennifer1

A subject I can get a grasp on.  I finished rads in Feb last year and they told me to give it a year however closing in on that.  I am depressed (taking meds), cant seem to get an interest in anything.  Let all my friends go and most of them I have had for 30 or so years.  Dont care how I look and cant seem look in a mirror because I am scared of what I see.  I think I have cancer in other places but doctor seems to think I am fine.  I have to wonder if tamoxifen is doing this or the other drugs I took before I switched.  I think we need harmones to be balanced.  If this is my new normal, I am screwed.

PattyKell

You are right. Tamoxifen causes depression (as if a breast cancer diagnosis wasn't enough). I Recently stopped the tamoxifen after 5 months because of the side effects. Am starting to feel a little better after 4 weeks being off. I can't look in the mirror and don't even wear makeup anymore..which prior to thie diagnosis I would not have left the house without...am hoping this will pass...but also have thoughts wondering if it's spreading elsewhere. Decided if I keep thinking this way it will. Tell. Myself every day out loud that I am well and I feel good. Hopefully my subconcious will hear me! Life has definitely changed..am feeling time is much more precious now. Try to live for the day instead if making plans for down the road. It sucks to have cancer in the back of your mind all the time, but am now realizing how much of an epidemic this really is. I want to stop the he reception infusions as well...because I just don't feel right on it, and I want the port out too...I just want control of my body without thinking I am signing my own death warrant by taking myself off stuff that I don't believe in...maybe I am, but I want to live it out on my terms...

cfdr

I'm also dealing with a lot of fatigue. I'm 3 months out from chemo (I had rads before chemo) and there are days now that are as bad as when I was still doing chemo. I slept 10 hours last night and had a 2 hour nap today. Can't focus on work or even hobbies. I don't feel depressed, just frustrated...like I keep puting my foot on the gas pedal and not getting a response.

For all that exercise is supposed to help, I find that it just exhausts me further. I couldn't nap today until after I went for a walk, then I fell right back asleep.

I started letrozole right after chemo, don't know if this is a side effect or not since I didn't have any down time between the end of chemo and the start of letrozole.

mlm445

Hi Everyone.. I'm new to this thread... I just finished Rads March 30 and have now completed treatment. I'm doing well but have terrible insomnia. Has anyone else had this symptom. Even Ambien didn't knock me out last night. Thanks for your feedback! 

kmccraw423

Welcome Mlm ... sorry you have to be here but you are at least in good company.  Yes, I can sleep.  I wake several times in the night to go to the bathroom and then get up when it seems okay (like 5 a.m. - at least its morning and not in the middle of the night!).  I took Ambien once, when living with my sister and thank goodness she was home.  I must have gotten up to go to the bathroom, fell into the toilet hard enough to cause a large gash in the toilet tank.  Water was gushing everywhere!  I have absolutely no memory of this.  I could have tried to go downstairs and fallen and broken my neck!  No more Ambien for me!  I just deal with the chronic lack of sleep as best I can by taking short naps.  My bed has become my enemy ... all I do is toss and turn.  I don't know what the answer is.