Now I'm scared

I'm sorry, I don't have any advice, as I could have written your post myself. I'm set to start chemo October 3 and I'm so scared! I need to get my head in a better place before it starts, but I'm at a loss as to how to do that. Sorry for chiming in, just know that you are not alone! 🥰

I was eager to start chemotherapy because the cancer was growing visibly and I was having chemotherapy first, but I was also scared.

I kept thinking of all of the healthy, happy cells in my body and the darkness that was about to befall them, but I reminded myself that the cancer would do much worse.

I'm now 11 months past my final chemotherapy infusion, had a complete pathologic response, and the only parts of my body with discernable lingering side effects are my finger nails, toe nails, and ovaries.

If I were told I had to go through another infusion, my biggest dreads would be acid reflux, taste changes, and steroid withdrawal.

I remember I started reading the potential side effects (which are a LOT), and stopped midway, thinking "I don't want to know". The side effect I dreaded the most was chemo brain, and I didn't get it. I also was pretty scared of neuropathy, and got just a little bit. I would say don't try to prepare mentally, because you can't. You don't know how it's going to feel, and trying to imagine the worst is not helping. The second day after my first Taxol (infusion Friday, totally fine on Saturday, woke up Sunday and realized I was feeling effects of chemo) was when I understood that nothing could have prepared me for that. It wasn't even particularly bad, but hearing other people describe it wasn't the same as actually feeling it.

I know, it's cliche, but try to take it one day at a time. I'm also a strong person and it was hard giving up independence - I couldn't drive to chemo, because with Taxol they pumped me up full of Benadryl, and I'm as good as dead after Benadyl, so I had hubby drive me. Some friends offered to drive, but I was a lot more comfortable with him. Accept the help if offered. If people say "let me know if you need any help", tell them what exactly you need help with. I loved when friends brought us dinner.

In short, going through chemo was pretty bad, but now I don't even think it was particularly awful. AC was bad, Taxol -> Abraxane was a piece of cake, in retrospect.

My hair came back the same - only less gray. Yes, my hair is BETTER after chemo.

I think you’ll find that when you get your treatment plan in place, your brain will turn to “let’s do this” mode. Time to put your big girl panties and do what you have to. This will be a really sucky time in your life but it is temporary and you will move on.

FWIW, I never got a port, never got a wig, mostly went on with my life through chemo other than *really* pushing the protein, which I highly recommend. My husband mostly took over cooking but other than that my life wasn’t overly impacted.

When you know what you’ll be getting and when you’ll start, read up on the threads for women who started a month or two before you. There will be tons of advice. The thread for the month you start will provide lots of hand-holding. You’ll get through this. You really will.

I, too, thought I would just have a lumpectomy, some radiation and followup meds. So learning I had more cancer than they thought and needed chemo was a shock and something I didn't prepare for. And it for sure was something I didn't want to do. After each AC treatment, I called my onc nurse line, and asked to stop treatment. Each time she told me to give it a few more days. And sure enough, after a few days I felt better. At another point I was battling severe nausea, again I called the nurse, we tweaked the meds and she suggested that perhaps I hadn't gotten to the point of acceptance. That seemed to be the key. Once I accepted that I needed the chemo to give me the best odds, something shifted and everything was ok. However, I don't think you can just skip right from treatment plan to acceptance and grace. It takes time and a lot of emotions along the way.

My last infusion will be this coming Tues. Everyone has different reactions and SE. Just do your best to get thru them as they creep up. You will learn little tips along the way. Allowing myself to nap and be gentle with myself as I was plugging along seemed to be the most helpful things I did.

I wish you a successful course of chemo and minimal side effects. It's been a very interesting year, one of so much personal growth. While I hope never to do it again, I am grateful for my life and the lessons I have learned along the way.

Also, I meant to add, I did cut all refined sugar from my diet. Since your taste will be off, this was not hard for me. I always wanted to try that but never managed before chemo. I always ate very healthy, mostly plant based diet, but I also ate quite a few sweets each day. I cut those out completely (plus my daily bottle of beer), lost some 20 pounds along the way and I must say I feel amazing for it. I am now at the weight I always wanted to be and I think have more energy simply due to the fact I don't eat refined sugar.

I start chemo Tuesday, to help ease my fear, I researched all the possible side effects that could happen, if I need diapers, pads, butt cream, I have it, grocery shopped cabinets and fridge full!! This has helped me so much, my mine set has changed, I’m preparing for a battle!! Genetic testing tomorrow, wig shopping lunch with my sisters, I’m in full battle mode!!

Cancer diagnosis is a mind game, A daily battle

My cancer has messed with the wrong bitch!!

I’m ready!! Ladies we can and will eat this!!

Hugs!!!

I knew after the biopsy pathology that I would have to do chemo since I had a larger tumor and was Her2+, so my advantage was that I didn't have to wait for OncotypeDx or surgical pathology to inform that decision. I am also an order and control person, and very independent. Both of my children were in college at the time, one local and one out of state, and I wanted to disrupt their lives as little as possible. My husband works long days, with a long commute, on a military base - so I was basically on my own a lot to deal with things. I had five surgeries in the 14 weeks prior to chemo (long story) so started behind the 8-ball a bit, but I still did the grocery shopping, all the cooking, paid the bills, and cleaned my house. I did not have any infrastructure of help locally, no family nearby, as we had just moved to this city for my husband's last active duty assignment - but I did not require help with meals or rides during chemo. My husband did go with me on the day of chemo, but he took no other days off. I do have a few good friends who checked on me periodically, but I really didn't need help with much, and honestly, didn't want it. I tried to keep my life outside of immediate treatment as normal as possible, so I just did fun regular things with them. I did have leave from work, mostly due to the string of surgeries, but also because I worked in a bio-hazardous area of the hospital and my oncologist didn't want me to be there during active treatment. I did return to work after chemo was done. I was tired in the few days after each of the six infusions - which were on Thursday, but didn't really have issues with nausea. I found my oncologist and the nursing staff were on top of medicating side effects quite well, and attentive to anything new that popped up as I went along. I did lose my taste for some things, but still ate as much protein as I could between infusions to keep my red blood cell count as high as possible. I don't think you have to change doing Keto as the protein component will help you. You may struggle with the fat a bit if you have any reflux (some chemotherapeutic agents can cause irritation) so you may have to adjust that. Due to the targeted therapy for Her2+ I received with chemo I had some GI distress, but not enough to be a real problem. By the end of the first week I went out to lunch, shopped, went to social events, etc. I attended a wedding two days after treatment #4, and a surprise 80th birthday party for my mother-in-law out of town a few days after my last chemo. I put together a recipe book of all her recipes, typed it and had it bound, and had no problem getting that done between treatment #5 and #6. I did have some minor lingering side effects, but for the most part they resolved by the six week point after the last infusion, and I was feeling pretty good. Some of the things I did to help maintain normalcy were to cook and freeze meals in case I wasn't feeling up to cooking from scratch, I also stocked my pantry just before treatment so I would have all I needed, and I leaned on crock pot meals at that point also. I received steroids before, during, and shortly after each infusion so I embraced the steroid induced energy and made sure all laundry was done, clean sheets were on the bed, bills paid, house cleaned. That helped me feel ok about taking things easy in the few days after treatment, I had no tasks weighing on me that needed to be done. I tried to be proactive by taking some supplements, approved by my oncologist, to help with side effects - L-Glutamine to help ward off neuropathy, vitamin B6 and Acetyl L Carnitine. I iced my hands and feet so I wouldn't lose, or have damage to, my fingernails and toenails. Some also feel that this can help reduce neuropathy as well. When I went out of the house I wore a wig and I also had a hairpiece made from my long hair that I cut before chemo that I wore some of the time, wore make-up and dressed like I always would. I am all for doing whatever makes you comfortable, but it was important to me that when I was out and about that nobody knew I was receiving chemo - it made me feel like my regular self. For me, that time period was just something to get through with as little disruption as possible, I put my head down and went one step at a time. This was my approach, which isn't for everyone, but it worked for me. You can do this, just align your thinking with the necessity of doing it and the benefit it is providing, and you'll get through it. It may help you to regard the drugs, not as your enemy, but the cancer's enemy.

DMHGF, there are many different chemo protocols and your next step should be meeting with an oncologist to determine the best for your situation. Be sure you can talk to your oncologist and that you trust her/him. This will be your doctor for the long haul. Other than hair loss and some cracked skin on my fingertips toward the end, I barely remember my side effects. Radiation was much harder for me than chemo.

I did have a port as we knew I was going to have chemo when my surgeon did my mastectomy. My wig was great- got more compliments on my hair during those 6 months than any time before or after.

As to telling your family, honestly your treatment plan is designed to remove cancer from your body. I would expect everyone who loves you wants that too.

After my biopsy results came back with cancer, and that it was high grade, I didn't truly understand the ramifications. I met with the breast surgeon a few days later. I was expecting surgery, reconstruction, maybe radiation, hopefully not chemotherapy. That was not the path laid out by the surgeon. I was shocked when she said I needed chemo first, and had trouble wrapping my mind around it. This was not the plan! It finally started to get through my head when she said, "Surgery is not going to save your life." If I wanted to live, I needed chemo. I met with my oncologist and got a plan of action, got my port in, pet scan, echocardiogram...all of it done in five days. Chemo started eight days from my meeting with the surgeon. It was a whirlwind, but it felt good to be taking needed steps.

Cancer took my plans and tossed them up in the air. I am a planner, and I like to know and control what's happening next. Cancer took all of that out of my hands, and it's been a hard adjustment. But I went to each and every chemo, and am dealing with each and every side effect, with the mindset that this is necessary, and I want to live. This is helping me to live.

I had four treatments of AC--Andriamycin, and Cytoxan. I never threw up, and nausea was pretty well managed by my meds. I needed the Neupogen shots also with this. Treatments on Thursday, Thursday night was a little rough with flu aches. Friday the shot, and aches. I didn't eat much those days thru Sunday--Sunday I started feeling better, and was able to be back to work on Monday. Lighter duty--I was moving very slow and was weak, but I could do it. My employer was amazing and accommodating.

I started 12 weekly Taxol treatments after that. My symptom severity has varied--some weeks I have a lot of muscle pain and neuropathy, other weeks it was minor. I have been able to work four out of five days most of the time.

None of it was unbearable! We do what we have to do so that we can pick up the pieces and carry on with our lives. Changed, but living!

People would ask what they could do--one of the things that truly helped our family was the mealtrain website. Someone set that up, and we opened up the dates for a meal on the days when symptoms were normally the worst and I just wasn't up to cooking. Having a homemade meal delivered to our house was such an incredible help. Accept the help when it's offered!

Best wishes, and I'm glad you found this site. It has been an enormous source of information and support for me, and I hope it is for you as well.

homemadesalsa - I love your big smile in that pic - says much about you and your strength!