Cancer Discussions, Cancer Support and Community Connection Forum - December 24th, 2009 - 10 Comments
Why does cancer seem less painful than chemo?
I was diagnosed with cancer two days ago, and I’ve clearly been living with it for a while. I feel just fine, even after the news.
Then I’m going to get chemo and lose all my hair and become just horribly sick. It doesn’t really make sense to me.
Help?
You can’t feel cancer. It’ll kill you without raising the red flag. Chemo is nasty. It may or may not make you sick. Depends on the person. What do you do when you have a fire and no water? How do you put it out?
Light a bigger one next to it. That’ll suck out all the oxygen and kill the fire.
That’s essentially what chemo does. It takes away the cancer’s ability to multiply therefore sunffing the fire. It’ll kill all you cells. Spare nothing. You’ll have no immune system and you’ll be extremely vulnrable. You need to eat and excercise to maximize your chances. If you pray, eat, and keep fighting you’ll be fine.
The chemo will destroy the silent killer lurking inside of you. Unfortunately, because the medicines are powerful they also destroy some healthy cells like your hair. Your hair will grow back stronger and thicker than before and you’ll be rid of the stealth enemy that’s waiting to ambush. You’re lucky that you’re living in times that medicine is able to give you a little short term sickness to save your life. Feeling sick from chemo is a small price to pay for so many extra years with your loved ones.
I’m sorry to hear that you’ve been diagnosed with such a horrible disease. You don’t really feel the cancer in your body, you just feel the chemo. The chemo helps get rid of the cancer cells, but also the healthy cells that help your hair, skin, and nails grow. That’s why the chemo is so painful, because it’s also destroying your healthy cells, with side effects like nausea and vommiting.
Good luck <3
It is weird that you can feel perfectly fine and have cancer.
By the way, don’t let them get away with telling you you will be horribly sick. There are great drugs out there that prevent you from getting sick. Tell the doctor you want a prescription for Emend or Zofran. They should also infuse Aloxi as you are getting the chemo to prevent nausea/vomiting.
My oncologist said to me, "We don’t allow our patients to get sick from chemo." It’s barbaric not to prescribe these drugs when they are available. This is not 1960.
I know, it sucks. But I would rather go through a bit of misery and live than feel no pain and die.
While it is true that they do have much better meds now, I also have to say that you shouldnt let people sugar coat how you will feel either. Now, I am a bit biased there. I was told the same thing the post above me says, but there was not a single drug combo that my doctors could find that kept me from vomiting and feeling like a mac truck had run over me.
But, there are a list of meds they will give you and they should help.
Because cancer is deceptive. It is part of your body and can co-inhabit with all the other organs in your body for quite a while . . but the problem with cancer is that it will grow indefinitely unless treated. Cancer is a mutation of a cell that has lost the ability to stop growing and without treatment the disease will grow until at some point . . it will shed hundreds and hundreds of microscopic cells into the blood or lymphatic system in a process called metastasis. This is stage IV or advanced disease. It is metastatis that is deadly . . the microscopic cells flood the body and can set up new cancer colonies anywhere in the body . .usually the liver, lungs, or brain but it can be anywhere. Those new cells will grow indefinitely and shed hundreds and hundreds of more cancer cells . . eventually if left untreated a patient will begin to ‘feel’ the effects of all these tumors . . the tumors will invade tissue, puncture holes in the intestine, grow to enormous sizes, poke through the skin and create large holes in the body, disrupt normal bodily functions, disrupt breathing, cause the body to fill with fluid, begin to press on nerves . . eventually spreading to the liver or kidney or brain and causing massive disruption and finally death. Cancer is nasty beyond comprehension for those uneducated about the disease.
Undergoing chemotherapy will seem like a cake walk compared to the effects of untreated advanced cancer. Chemo and cancer treatments, you can handle .. because it may be the only chance left you will ever get to live.
Chemo is poison, naturally the body will react violently to an assault upon it by toxins. People used to be given mercury to "treat" disease; the result was the same devastating effects on the body as found with chemo. Cancer is a disease that will not necessarily spread without conventional "care", thus pain will vary. And, contrary to the scaremongering claims employed by one or two regulars here, there is no inevitable progressing of the disease. Research performed by Dr.Hardin Jones produced a different conclusion to that usually parroted by supporters of the drug industry. See these links.
http://www.naturalnews.com/026578_chemotherapy_cancer_MSN.html
http://cancertutor.com/ChemoSpill/deathbydoctoring4.htm
I know how you feel because i was diagnosed with cancer earlier this year & have since undergone radiotherapy for 7 weeks with 3 courses of chemotherapy given intermittently throughout which definitely wasn’t any fun but an absolute necessity.
As for the chemotherapy……..things have changed drastically to what they were like & the anti nausea drugs they gave me before the chemo & to take for the 1st few days after were fantastic at controlling my nausea.
I was then prescribed Maxolon Tablets, which unfortunately didn’t help my nausea so i was then given Zophran (in a wafer form) which you just put in your mouth & it dissolves in a few seconds & believe me they work brilliantly!
The Drs & nurses told me there is no need for us to suffer while going through treatment because the medical advances have been really beneficial.
The best of luck!!!
I’m very sorry that you must endure this treatment. I suspect that you will be one of the many cancer survivors in the world. My sister also endures chemo treatments, although for her, it’s merely palliative. Her condition is fatal, but she is able to reduce her overall pain by shrinking the largest tumor with chemo. It sounds like your situation may be quite different.
The experts seem to know a lot about their own treatment specialties, but not much about other specialties and nutrition. They all humor any suggestion that diet or supplements have any effect at all. Her physicians dismiss the importance of nutrition, but other physicians, including my Uncle recommends a 100% vegetarian diet. This was substantiated by well-researched study by T. Colin Campbell.
If I had any form of cancer, I would ask a lot of questions and move to a rigorous diet that was completely plant based. (oh yeah, I’m already vegan) Sadly, our health system is composed of specialists who fail to see the whole picture and refuse to acknowledge the science that may be a reality.
http://books.google.com/books?id=FIRLLcLjyC8C&printsec=frontcover&dq=T.+colin+campbell&cd=1#v=onepage&q=&f=false
I honestly believe this researcher has discovered something very significant. You need to be informed of your treatment options and take control of your life. See also:
http://www.tcolincampbell.org
hi I am from Pakistan and recently my sister aged 31 has been diagnosed the cancer ,,,as SACROMA ,+ she has the prob of SLE in which her hemogloben downs at 8,.
. i just wana know about the possibility of its cureness when the tumour has already been removed by operation and dr says that its in the very earlies stage. will any body will respond on my email.irfanrehmani1@gmail.com.
I will be really gratefull.