5 weeks post chemo and still feeling bad

Hi Gubbyann, sorry you are not feeling well. I remember that five weeks out, I was still feeling pretty rough. I had a lot of the same side effects - black nails (my onc thought I would lose a bunch of them, but they stayed on and grew out over time), my taste buds were still messed up, had bone aches... not fun.That's the result of the cumulative side effects of multiple doses of chemo. Fortunately, I think you will start to see improvement soon. The bone achiness hung around for a LONG TIME... I finished chemo a year and a half ago and I think the bone achiness turned into more like stiffness over time, and only really went away in the last few months!

The best advice I can give (for what my opinion is worth) is to make sure your oncologist and maybe a dietician have looked at your labs, and counseled you on what you can do to help yourself feel better, and see if there is anything going on that could be contributing to the dizziness (you may even want to see your primary care physician about this, just for a second opinion and a fresh set of eyes on the problem). If you need protein then the protein drinks are great! For me, I tended to run low on potassium so I needed to take a potassium supplement. Absolutely make sure you are staying hydrated. Towards the end of chemo I absolutely could not stand the taste of water; fortunately tangy drinks were more agreeable so I stayed relatively hydrated with them. Keep moving... try to keep active, that is good for your health and will help your system do what it needs to do to clean itself out, so to speak. The watery eyes are a common side effect too.

There is light at the end of the tunnel... just based on my experience and what I have read here, I think you will start to see improvement over the next few weeks. Just do your best to take care of yourself right now. Oh and how are you sleeping? Chemo kind of goofed with my sleep cycle and it's hard to feel well if you are tired. So if you are not sleeping well, you might need to think about what will help with that as well.

Best of luck to you!

God Bless you too, Gubbyanne and many ((hugs)). 

Hi

I am 5 months post chemo and although I still don't feel 100% , every month gets better!  Not sure how old you are but for me being forced into menopause at 42, still having kids that I need to be 'normal' for and working full time at a job that requires me to drive all day has not helped. I plan to do more for myself this year. More massages, more yoga to relax and to take more time to rest. I hope you can do the same as it will get better. 

Hugs. 

I'm 4 weeks post chemo and wondering when I'll feel better myself. After suffering with blurry vision for months I was diagnosed with an eye infection. You can have more than one reason for symptoms. I also had vertigo that was cured by a maneuver that we all thought was caused by a virus. Now I'm concerned about the edema in my feet, legs and hands. I had a little during chemo but now it's painful to walk. Lasix is not helping at all. I guess I'll just have to wait it out but gaining 15 pounds in a week puts a hurt on the body. I just wish chemo SEs had an expiration date. I've lost half of my nails and the others will follow soon. Getting ready for my SMX on Wed. and wonder if I'm ready for it. We have a new massage therapist in town and hope to visit her soon. She's almost done with her training for lymphatic massage. Sounds good to me. My taste buds have started coming back but still no appetite. My husband thinks I'm anorexic. Just can't eat more than a little bit.