Thanks for posting!

Good for you Mel of course you will and being positive will help you get through this. I'm finished chemo a year and herceptin since August and I think it's my duty, so to speak, to stay on here and try and help those who are daunted and scared of what lies ahead. I sit here with a full mop of curly hair, with much more energy than I had, and enjoying life to the full as it's now more precious to me than it ever was. I have met some of the women on here and they are legends, an inspiration . Best website ever for us cancer chickkies. Best of luck to you and we will be chatting on here I'm sure quite a bit over the next year.

Thank you so much Wicklowlady and no doubt I will need lots of advice in the weeks and months ahead! I've recovered very well from mastectomy surgery so now to next phase of treatment. I'm glad to hear you are feeling so well one year on and I'm sure I too will view life so much differently afterwards. Even now I feel so grateful for my early diagnosis and I feel lucky in a way to be getting treatment to prevent cancer ever coming back. Some people have said to me "you'll be glad to see the back of 2013" but in a weird way it has saved my life. Instead I think - God what if I didn't find the cancer and maybe it would have spread etc. Of course I would have preferred it if never happened but so glad to have a chance to fight it.

Hi Mel,
I absolutely agree with you. I too was very grateful of the generosity of posters here to contribute their own experience and advice, and kind and sympathetic support.
I wish you the very best in your treatment. They are aggressive, for sure, and some women get a bad doing with the side effects. But many women here and in my breast care centre (and my niece, diagnosed at the same time as me, and whom I saw in tremendous form at Christmas!!) are proof that there is a very good quality of live at the other end of the tunnel.
Good luck, stay strong!
And I take this opportunity to wish all on this forum the very, very best for this New Year!

Catherine

Hi Mel,

Thank you for posting and welcome to the site!

My awful year was 2011 so I am two years out and doing well. All clear in my last mammogram in November, and great hair again .

I was very glad to put 2011 behind me but you are quite right in what you say, though the thought had never occurred to me. If I hadn't been diagnosed in 2011, my story would indeed have been very different. 2011 was an opportunity to get my health back on track, not a disaster.

Thank you for your insight and perspective. Truly, we learn so much from each other here.

Best wishes and good health to all for 2014!

Kath

Hi everyone,

Thank you all for your kind words of encouragement. I had my first chemo yesterday and so far I'm feeling ok. I felt a bit weepy when I took to the chair for the first time but it was a bit of fear of the unknown. I came home yesterday and even though I was tired I didn't sleep too well when I went it bed last night. The events of the day were replayed in my head as there so just so much information to take on board. I keep waiting too so see what was going to happen as my tummy felt a little woozy at times.

Hopefully the next few days will be okay and the anti-nausea meds will do their job!

Hi Mel, sorry you had to join us but we are a mine of info so please post anything even if it feels silly...,

On the anti nausea stuff - piece of advice that i got as i started chemo is to stay ahead of the nausea so try not to be the martyr and avoid taking tabs, rather take when you need them, ESP for the next three days. Also drink plenty of water.

On the off chance that you feel really, really, really crap or if you are vomiting, get onto the onco day ward, they can fax another script to your pharmacy (just have the fax no to hand). There is LOADS of anti nausea stuff out there, trick is to find one or a combo that suits you best.

Best of luck,

Lindylu

Totally agree with lindylu post anything someone here will be able to answer. I felt really sick one Sunday and I rang the hospital and they faxed to my local chemist who kindly opened up on a Sunday for me. They can make you constipated but you can sort that with sachets!!! Best of luck you've plenty of friends here.

HI Everyone, Iam not great with this techy stuff at times and seem to have left my first message in the middle of someone elses blog apologies for that.As i said in my first message I am newly diagnosed 13/12/2013/
Had wide local excision and sentinel guard clearance.got good news on friday with consultant , they got it all ..Yipee! Now have to wait to meet doctors re chemo and radiotherapy so still waiting for the treatment plan.Get sick of talking about this cancer crap at times, anyone else feel like this.Thanks.

Great news happy mum delighted for you. Yes I found it all consuming and no matter how you try it's foremost in your mind all the time and that doesn't go until you're out the other end. I'm finished chemo over a year ago and herceptin since August but I am getting back to normal now and don't think of it much except when on this site or helping a friend who is going through it at the moment. I'm starting training with the ICS on Tuesday for volunteer work in Vincent's looking forward to that

thanks wicklow lady, I have no doubt that I will beat this "blip" in my life, but it's the journey isn't it.

Well you got it in one. Of course you'll beat it but you may have a bumpy ride along that road with a few potholes but you'll emerge back out on that motorway , like I did, I've no doubt.

Hello Happymum
Sorry to hear that you too got that horrible shock of being told what you didn't want to hear... I was diagnosed in April last year & couldn't believe it at the time, but amazingly I am 10 months on and almost back to normal (whatever that is) I was very very lucky to have had a low score on my onco dx test and so did not need chemo.. Are you having this test? I found radiation easy to get through, skin got a bit sore towards the end, but still nothing I couldn't handle. You too will get through it & come out the other end a stronger person. This forum helped me no end, there are so many wonderful people only too delighted to answer all questions, so keep positive and look after yourself

Resolute x