Hi @kirstine. Chemotherapy works by interfering with rapidly dividing cells, such as cancer cells. How quickly this works to slow or shrink the tumor that’s blocking your brother’s bowel will depend on how well the cancer responds to the chemo. Sometimes, tumors shrink quickly in the first few cycles. But more often tumors shrink slowly over several cycles. This is pretty typical for many cancers.

I guess what I’m trying to say is progress isn’t going to happen overnight. But now, with his chemotherapy having begun, there is forward movement. I don’t have personal experience with cancerous tumors. Mine was a blood cancer that was very aggressive. Within 2 days of beginning the equally aggressive chemotherapy, the fever I’d had for 2 weeks finally broke and I actually started feeling better the first week. I knew the chemo was working! However, the 2nd week after chemo is generally when some of the side effects start making themselves known with nausea and fatigue. So encourage your brother to hang in there. This period passes! Will he be in the hosptial for the remaining round of chemo?