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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
@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?
Replies to "@flusshund- Good morning. I know that the after effects of chemo can be depressing. I kept..."
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Good morning. I'm in southern California, Huntington Beach. When I said no follow up doctor's visit, I meant after this particular PET/CT scan. I was expecting an appointment to discuss whatever they saw. But I guess it will be "no news is good news!"
I already have standing orders for 2 more at the end of May and August. After that I'm guessing they'll go to every 6 months. This doctor did the same thing after my blood clots and PEs. Blood test every 3 months x3, then 6 months. It was after the first 6 month break that my D-dimer level spiked. Then they did an Ultrasound of my legs, a CT scan of my chest, saw a change in the 2 CT scans that were a year apart and it was all downhill from there.
It's my impression that will be the order of things this time as well. Every 3 months, then 6, then once a year. I have a friend who survived colon cancer and he had once a year scans up to 10 years. He just had his last scan in the middle of last year so now he is officially "cancer free"!
Haven't had the knee surgery. My wife has developed an even worse problem with her knee, so she is going to go first. She is getting her MRI next week. After changing physical therapists I found that part of my knee problem was a hip problem. I've learned hip alignment/relaxation methods that have mostly taken care of that problem. And the 2 1000 mg tablets of Curcumin that I'm taking daily have really lowered my knee pain, so that it's now manageable at least.
For this American Lung Association fundraiser, I'm training to climb 1,393 steps in a skyscraper in downtown Los Angeles. I have a 9-week training program I used to prepare. As part of that training I climbed the equivalent of 51 stories yesterday on a StairMaster. Each week gets harder, but I'm hanging in there so far! But I am WAY slower than I used to be. The only reason I think I might be able to do this climb is there is no time limit. In past years I've done the climb in 22 minutes. This year I'll be lucky to finish in an hour! I've been doing this fundraiser for 5 years now. 3 years ago, I was the 6th highest individual fundraiser in the event. I've already agreed to speak at this year's event, whether I'm able to climb or not. We'll see.
Since you're a mentor, is there a group for the spouses of cancer survivors? As I've been telling my wife about this group, she has offered to communicate with anyone that might want to know what it's like to be the spouse of someone diagnosed with cancer. I think her emotional roller coaster ride was even scarier than mine!