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Living with lung cancer - Introduce yourself & come say hi
Lung Cancer | Last Active: Jan 22 8:18am | Replies (1013)Comment receiving replies
Hi Alamogal,
As you can read here, I'm a bit ahead of you. I was diagnosed last June with a larger cyst than you (turned out to be 3 cm) in my upper right lobe. I can't help you with VATS as I was lucky enough that my surgeon was one of only 3 in my county that is proficient in the use of the da Vinci robotic system. It's similar to VATS only the surgeon manipulates 4 robotic arms to perform the surgery.
I don't know what you mean by "senior", but I'm 58 and was pretty happy when the doctors kept referring to how young I am! I'm a pretty positive person by nature and never needed any medication to keep up my spirits. I'm also lucky enough to have a great wife. She probably could have used some meds, as I think she worried more than I did!
My doctor was not a fan of staying in the hospital "People get pneumonia in hospitals!", so I had surgery Monday morning and was discharged Wednesday evening. The surgery went fine and I really had minimal discomfort. However, I will tell you that when the hospital nurse asks, "Would you like Percocet or morphine?", the answer is morphine! Part of the reason is that you will initially be in ICU and it seems like they are waking you up every couple of minutes to take your blood pressure again. I don't remember if it was every half hour or every hour, but it seemed like I just got to sleep and then they were waking me up again. I asked for morphine just because I wanted to get back to sleep as quickly as possible.
One other thing: I have a bad knee. In late June I had an X-ray taken and when my primary care physician saw the result, she referred me to an orthopedic surgeon for an MRI and probable surgery. 2 days later I was diagnosed with lung cancer. My PCP and I agreed: 1 medical condition at a time! My wife did rent me one of those chairs that lifts you up to a standing position. We rented it for one month. It was a great help when I first came home. (Quick update on the knee. Still haven't had surgery. 2 1,000 mg tablets of Curcumin or Tumeric have greatly helped reduce the pain.)
I was also told the initial plan was surgery - no chemo or radiation. Didn't work out that way. The cyst turned out to be closer to the cutline than the CT scan indicated. So close, that after surgery the cutline tested positive for the presence of cancer cells. That got me 33 rounds of radiation. Radiation made me tired and that was the major side effect. It irritated my scar tissue a bit, but doubling down on the deep breathing exercises I've been doing since after surgery solved that problem. No damage to the skin whatsoever. I had IMRT, Intensity Modulated Radiation Therapy, which is why I had so few side effects.
Pathology after the surgery also showed the cancer had spread to a lymph node. That got me 4 rounds of chemo. Compared to the people around me, and my friend who is currently finishing up chemo for her breast surgery, I feel that I got chemo-lite. I got Carboplatin and Alimta. I took steroid tablets the day before and after and received steroids the day of each round and never felt any nausea at all. Never lost my hair. I'm a food judge on the side and never noticed any change in my taste buds.
Just had my 3-month follow up PET/CT scan yesterday. No follow up doctor's appointment, so I guess I hope I don't hear from them! Personally, I think the PET scan is a walk in the park. I just sleep during the 1-hour wait and lightly nap during the procedure itself.
Emotionally, I personally find the long-term side effects of chemo and radiation to be the most depressing. If my doctor feels she told me that it would be a year or more before I recovered my stamina, I forgot that. I'm still sleeping 8 to 8 1/2 hours a night which is a lot more than the 7 hours max that I used to. I'm currently training to climb 1,400 stairs as an annual fundraiser for the American Lung Association. The training involves climbing stairs 5 days a week. Those days I sleep 9 hours. I keep telling myself that as side effects go, sleepy is not so bad.
I don't know if this helps you get an idea of what you're in for, but I hope so. The overall message is that the medical community is getting sooo much better at all this stuff all the time. Your experience will be better than even people who had the same procedure as little as 10 years ago.
Replies to "Hi Alamogal, As you can read here, I'm a bit ahead of you. I was diagnosed..."
@flusshund- Good morning. I know that the after effects of chemo can be depressing. I kept think that I'd wake up and be as new as a new born puppy. I didn't! It takes a very long time to recover from lung surgery. It took me upwards of a year to feel like myself again, physically anyway. May I ask what part of the country are you from? Most lung cancer patients have CT scans every 3 months for at least the first year. How can it be that you wont have anymore?
As for pain medications I was given some sort of a block in my back. Where in your back depends on the site of the tumor. I had this up until a day before I was to leave the hospital. I was also given anti-nausea meds to offset any stomach uneasiness. This is separate from the IV line and chest tubes.
Have you had your leg surgery?
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@flusshund Thank you for your kind note. Yes, you have really helped in knowing what to expect and what pain meds to insist upon. In other swhos till plays for my own pleasure. I have had a couple of prior surguries--an-ankle fusion and hysterectomy for which morphine always worked well for me and will insist upon it this time as well. I am 68 years old, a retired psychotherapist, but basically a classically trained pianist ill plays for her own enjoyment. T o hear a doctor call me "young" for surgery at this age was delightful! It is indeed helpful to learn about what all you went through and endured--the follow up chemo and radiation and the merciful lack of awful side effects for you. I am so glad your PET/CT scan was clear. No followup appointments for you.! Hooray!
. My surgeon does the Robotic assisted surgery as well as VATS, and for whatever reason chose VATS for me. I will leave his decision of what surgery to do up to him as he knows far more about this than I. Anyway, it is a blessing that it won't be the old fashioned kind of operation here the ribs are spread apart and recovery is so much more complicated. I heard yesterday, at the seminar on surgery, that we lung patients would be in ICU overnight, encouraged to walk once we are out of anesthesia , vitals are good, etc Then we will be moved to a private room to move on in recovery. I figure from that all was said , I'll be in the hospital for about as long as you and am determined do all I can do to help the recovery process. I want to go HOME ASAP! Also the nurses said not to be the strong silent type during recovery, and if we were in pain or needed anything to let them know. They are there to help us have a minimal amount of pain and stress while we all recover from the surgery. I promised todo the breathing exercises, walk, eat the hospital food and follow their dictates to the utmost to speed there recovery process
Can see where the effects of chemo and radiation could be so emotionally draining! However, I'm glad that it went as well for you (side effects and all) so well. I guess such things have truly come a long ay from what used to be. Don't know about you, but From he two surgeries Had before, I found myself more tired than usual. It will probably be so withe his one as well. I normally sleep around severn hours and expect to sleep more than normally once at home. I recall the previous times when it seemed like there was NOT REST during the hospital stays.
The surgical team will know if they got everything and if somehow the cancer spread to any lymph nodes, or surrounding tissue.If such is the case, then we will move on to the chemo and/or radiation. I hope to avoid that as do my doctors. By this time next week, I may well be in a private room and awaiting removal of the chest tube. Having gone through the morning pre-op tests and the seminar on what to expect was truly helpful. More hospitals ought to have this sort of meeting for patients who will be having surgeries and recovery from surgery for cancer. Also being around other cancer patients kind of gave us a feeing of beingl f a band of brothers and sisters untied in a fight against this disease. I was in total denial about realization that I do indeed have cancer--lung cancer.--called it anything but what it is/was until yesterday.
I thank you again for taking the time to share your experiences with me and appreciate all that you had to say. I feel much better thanks to you and your information. Am so glad that things are going well for you now I hope we can keep in touch and know I will be thinking of and praying for your continued recover. So glad to have found this group!