Feeling SO unsexy

Albertan - sorry no one responded - bad to feel bad on Christmas Eve. 

I understand how you feel - I felt horrible during chemo - I gained 20 chemo pounds, so I was fat, bald and boobless with a road map of scars.  Amazingly enough my wonderful husband still thought I was sexy and pretty - gotta love these men that stand by us.

Chemo was the worst time emotionally for me - the chemo drugs and the steroids affect us physically and emotionally, so what you are feeling seems perfectly normal.  Two things helped me the most - working through chemo and exercise. There were some days when it was all I could do to drag myself to work and back, but despite that, working was a great help to me emotionally - it was a lifeline out of "cancer world" where I could have ordinary conversations about ordinary non-cancer stuff like people's kids, someone's new haircut, or that silly memo from management.  It kept me from focusing too much on me.  If you can't work at your job, is there something else you could do to get yourself out and among people?  A book club or similar group?  It really helps sometimes to have ordinary conversations about something other than cancer. 

My other lifeline was exercise.  Some days I could only manage to walk to the corner and back, but by weeks 2 and 3 after tx, I could manage a longer walk or even a short stint on the elliptical.  I felt like everything else was so physically out of my control, but exercise was one time when I could take control of my body and do something for it.  It helped my body image taking control like that and I didn't feel quite so helpless and yucky.

Bottom line - cancer robs us of a lot, especially during active treatment.  Hang in there and enjoy your husband's love and support, and do what you can to get through chemo.  Chemo will be done eventually, your scars will fade a bit, your hair will grow back, you'll feel stronger, and you can get back into exercise.  All those things will help.  In the meantime, this is a great place to vent because we all get it. 

If you feel that you're really feeling helpless, absolutely talk to your onc or PCP about some anti-depressants or therapy to help get you through this.  Meanwhile, good chocolate is always a drug of choice! 

Hang in there!

albertan - I was not good at imagining I was an Egyptian princess either...  I was just a bald, puffy, sick-feeling person with one flat side and a tissue expander.  You are correct - NOT sexy.  However, I looked at my treatment period as a time-out from sexy.  I did not need to feel sexy at that point, I needed to try to do everything I could to stay alive, and my DH agreed and made me feeling nothing but very loved.  Now that I am on the other side of treatment and after many surgeries, chemo and Herceptin, I do feel much more like my old self.  I found that realizing that this was a temporary state of affairs, and trying to maintain a sense of humor carried the day.  I am sorry you are feeling down, but it is very normal, I hope the time passes and you get past this. 

I can totally relate. I feel so fake. BMX, fake boobs, chemo, bald and fake hair, eyelashes pretty much out fake eyelashes. Separated and feel like there is no one out there who would want to hang out with this scenario. .... Ugh