Recovery Time After Chemo

I'm a year out of dx tomorrow.  You're in the worse place right now...the beginning, chemo was hard but doable.  My first round of AC was the worst but each round afterwards got better and better.  I used a motion sickness patch behind my ear with AC.  It gave me really bad vertigo, I couldn't even watch TV so the patch helped a lot, be sure to take the meds they give you they help.  Day 3 was my worse too, I was so tired.  Eating becomes a problem, I could taste salty some days and sweets others so I ate a lot of ramen noodles and soups.  About the time you get to feeling better it will be time for your next round it seems so, take it one day at a time and pace your self.  I hope all goes well and let us know how it goes.  Come here often, this website got me through.

Ellasmom: I worked full-time through chemo and have 2 young kids at home. The A/C was hard on me mentally, lots of chemo brain, so try to schedule mindless tasks (if you can) in the days right after treatment.  I had chemo on Thursdays, so I would work from home Friday, and by Monday, I was off steroids/antinausea and able to go in for work. I wasn't one of those who needed to sleep for two days; I would nap Friday and Saturday but then I was fine.  I think I only took one day off during the whole thing (other than infusion days), and that was more a "mental health" day.

Once I switched to taxol, it was WAY easier for me.  Rest on weekends and don't push yourself too hard. This is so doable!

Hi EllasMom,

   Just wanted to send you good thoughts for this week as you begin treatments. I really do think all of us are so different in the way we feel during treatment. I hope you will find them very doable also. There were just a couple of things I wish I had known. One of them- Popsicles are great to have on hand as you go through treatment. The cold is great for your mouth. Also, I don't know if the other girls feel this way...but I wish someone had told me about not taking your favorite food with you on treatment day. I never ever got sick,but on my first treatment day I took peanut butter and jelly which is my favorite for lunch and for many months I did not care for the smell of peanut butter, again I didn't get sick though. Some of the girls I knew did not experience this. Also you may want to take ice water with you. Again ..I think the cold may help your mouth. The steroids may keep you awake. I always had a few days of feeling like I was wound to tight. I think the most important of all is it really is not as bad as you may think. Not at all like I think we used to hear. Please feel free to PM me anytime if you should have questions . You will get through it.

Take care and I will be thinking of you,

Kim

I didn't need any anti nausea meds BTW.  I did drink some ginger tea, but mostly drank water whenever I felt queasy.  It always worked just fine.

So just the steroids, and I cut those back to two as opposed to three days.  I felt a lot better afterwards.  (Asked my medical team if OK, and they said yes.)

I made sure I got stuff done on Day 2 (including a 3 mile walk) prior to giving myself the Neulasta shot.  Fortunately, my brain worked just fine as I do data analysis for a living.

Taxol was a once every two weeks thing too.  Was much livelier as my red cell counts came back up. - Claire

The first one was scariest as didn't know what to expect.  But was much easier than I had imagined.

I had similar treatments except my Taxol was every other week X 4.  The AC was harder because of the nausea but my onc doc worked to give me things to keep that under control.  Fatigue seemed worse than with the Taxol.  Fluids are so important but I had such trouble with water tasting like dirt or chemicals!  Slices of lemon or lime in the water helped.  I also drank decaf iced tea with lemonade mixed in.  Popsicles were a lifesaver for the days when I had a bad taste in my mouth.  Also used sugarfree gum A LOT.  Sucking on hard candy was recommended but never really did much for me.

I worked fulltime.  My infusions were on Thursdays.  Neulasta shot on Fridays (which gave me a lot of upper body achiness).  I worked from home on Fridays because Fri, Sat and Sun were my "bad" days.  Usually by Mon and definitely by Tues I was doing much better.  Was pretty tired in the evenings and had trouble staying up past 9:30!

I suffered leg pain at night from the Taxol, requiring Percocet to get me through the night.  That usually hit Sat night and was gone by Wed.  Didn't keep me from working, though.

Take things one day at a time.  Come to this board often but get out if you come across a discussion that is too far ahead of where you are or gives you anxiety.  And remember - everyone is different both in their diagnosis and their reaction to the drugs.  As one tech who is a survivor told me - you CAN do this and a year from now you'll be smiling and not thinking of cancer every day.

Good luck.