Chemo Treatments

I have breast cancer, have received 3 chemo treatments....and have been very sick. I do not want to continue with the treatments. I had all of the scans after my surgery in Oct/04 and everything was clear..Ive read that chemo can also cause a recurrence ??? My oncologists says I'm setting myself up for failure. My lymph nodes were involved. I believe that quality & not just quantity of LIFE counts. I could not be around my 3 grandchildren when my blood counts was down that was very difficult for me....Is there anyone that has refused chemo & dealt with nutrition & prayer. Please advise. May God bless us everyone who has this awful disease.

Hi Paulette, I just had to answer your letter, as I do believe I know what you are going through. I was diagnosed with colon cancer 6 years back this past September. In November of 2004, my cancer came back a second time, this time to my bones. I took chemo twice in 6 years and it keeps coming back. So this time I said “no more chemo”. The oncologist was not pleased and gave me months to live. I am still alive 15 months later. I am doing well. I don’t know how much longer I have, but no one does. I attended a funeral this past Saturday for a friend 57 years old (my age) who was diagnosed in December of this year. She took chemo and after the first treatment, she developed blood clots and died this past week. One of the clots traveled to her heart. This would not have happened had she taken no chemo. Another friend of mine passed away last year. He was diagnosed with the same type of colon cancer as I was. They wanted to give both him and myself Cisplatin (a type of very aggressive chemo). I refused. He took the chemo and passed away. I have done as lot of research on chemo on the Internet and nowhere did I find any good that chemo does. Chemo does not cure cancer. For every patient that takes chemo, the cancer clinic gets paid about $5,000. Chemo is all the cancer clinic knows. Why don’t they start teaching their sick patients how to boost their immune systems rather than take chemo that lowers the immune system? You should get busy first thing tomorrow morning and start doing research on ways to boost your immune system. For starters, I am on a near vegetarian diet and take modified citrus pectin tablets. They can be found at your health food store. I take 4 a day. They kill newly formed cancer cells. I also do not smoke or drink and try to stay positive 24 hours a day. I have to keep telling myself that no one on the face of this earth (including the Pope) knows when their time is up. So start building your immune system and start living and enjoying your grandkids. Chemo will never give you a good quality of life and I think that’s all we want. Good luck to you and let me know how things work out.

I have to say I agree. I was diagnosed in Mar 04 with multiple metastatic melanoma. I was give a prognosis of 0-2% chance of surviving 5 years with treatements. However, I decided to go ahead and take Chemo. I'm only 36, and didn't feel ready to give up just yet (not that you are giving up). My first 3 months were a very tough combination of Cisplatin and several other drugs. My blood counts were low, I suffered every side effect of each one of the medicines given. At the end of 3 months there was no change in my condition aside from the fact that I finally just wanted to die and get it overwith. Then my oncologist recommended changing the style of chemotherapy I was undergoing. We went to a high dose Interleukin-2 program. Since then (and I'm going to my third round next week) the inoperable growths in my lymph nodes have shown respectively a 30-50% decrease in size. It is actually working this time. Best part is the only side effects I've shown so far is flu-like symptoms during the week I'm in the hospital. Not much help on your question about refusing chemotherapy and working with nutrition to give you a better quality of life. That is a choice you have to make, and no one can stop you from doing what you feel is best for you. Just when I was about to give up and refuse treatment, we found another course to take it and it has been working wonders. So I guess my answer would be yes, quality is infinitely better than quantity. But if a different form of treatment would give you both, why refuse it?

Dear Paulette: I have read your message, and can sympathize with your situation all too well. I myself was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in 2000. After undergoing the Whipple procedure followed by a long hospital stay and chemo and radiation treatments, and getting fairly ill, I decided to stop. In 2002, there was a new treatment of chemo called gemcitabine. (Gemzar). I had no ill affects because of this chemo. I do not advise the radiation that all doctors seem to want to give. I had to stop taking the gemzar treatments in Sept. of 2004 because my bone marrow was saturated with the chemo. My tumor marker was well over 1000 in 2002 before I started and at the time that I had to stop, my tumor marker was near normal (33). Don't get me wrong, I have said my share of prayers continuously, but I feel that before you give up on the treatments, you should look into this type of chemo. I have grandchildren myself that I couldn't be around when my blood counts were low. If you are going to the right doctors, there is something out there to help raise your white blood count, and there is Aranesp(?) for your red blood count to prevent the anemia. I never lost my hair with this treatment, and even though for the first day or two I was tired, I was still able to have a quality of life. My pancreatic cancer (primary cancer) unfortunately has spread to 3 secondary cancers: lung, liver and bone. I am glad to state that I among the few who have survived this long with pancreatic cancer, however, now there is not much that can be done. My only advice would be not to give up hope. You have 3 grandchildren that you need to live for. I myself am 55 and can understand the "hopelessness" you are feeling. Please remember that God is with you, continue your prayers, watch your diet and please ask your doctor about the possibility of having the gemzar treatments. My doctor states that because I was on the gemzar for so long, that these new cancer cells have found a way to bypass the chemo. I am heading to Fox Chase for another opinion. I will add you to my prayers, and God willing, you will get the right treatment and get well. By the way, just as a side note, my cancer has come back in the areas that were treated with radiation! Good luck and may God bless and hold you close! Yours in prayers, Marsha.

Thank you so much for your reply GOD BLESS YOU. You are so young I am so glad that you found something that is better for you....Wishing you health and remission from this yukky thing ...

I know by now you've read more than your share of information on different types of cancers, treatements and therapies and nutrition etc. One of the BIGGEST factors in my decision to undergo treatment was two books that I discovered early on after I was diagnosed. I wish I could remember the authors names, the titles alone should be able to be located by any book store. I was fortunate enough to find both of them at the local public library. The main thing I gained from reading both of them is that NO ONE can tell you what to do. If your chemotherapy is making it that much worse, it's your right to say NO. Of course under my old treatment, no one would let me say no, but I'm glad they didn't. I go back in for my next round of the Interlukin-2 on Monday. I have about 15 people with different prayer lasts that you've been added to. I'm spiritual if not religous. But you do whats right for you. There's No Place Like HOPE From This Moment On Both books were highly inspirational, ever easy to read since they are only one or two paragraphs at a time. daily meditations and such. Rather expensive books so I recommend the library first.

Paulette, Please as hard as it may seem, continue your treatments. I was dx w/breast cancer and went through 8 rounds of chemo. 4 adramyacin/cytoxin and 4 taxotere. The adramyacin did zap my counts and I had to get nupagen injections along with procrit injections to keep up my strenth and get through it. My lymph nodes were also involved. It is like an extra step in making sure that if one of those tiny little cancer cells spread it will get it and destroy it. It is tough no doubt about it, but you can and will get through it.

Hi: I am a 75 yrs old; healthy. Suggested by Sloan Kettering OM to have dose density and NYU OM to have AC or CMF. I am leaning toward DD. I read your info with interest. Can you clarify how you got through the 4 month program. Would appreciate your response --- Message edited by CancerCompass staff: for personal protection, email address removed. Please review CancerCompass Member Guidelines at http://www.cancercompass.com/common/guidelines.html --- thank you and continued good health. Shirley

I was diagnosed with two forms of cancer, uteran and fallopian in Sept 08, and I had just lost my brother-in-law to suicide a few months earlier. I have so many people in my life who had cancer and died from the treatments much earlier than the first estimate of life expectancy. My father -in-law hemmoraged from vomiting 6 weeks into treatment, my friend lost her vision and wouldnt heal ... leaving her wheel chair bound at age 50 in an old folks home until she died last week (14 years of hellish treatments). My mother in law took radiation and she is now 5 years cancer free.

 Farrah might have been saved through alternative treatments if she hadn't had chemo that destroyed her ability to heal.

I don't know what works. I only knew that for me, destroyng healthy cells sounded like a really poor plan for treatment. I want quality of life too. Maybe the loss of my brother in law just reinforced a sense of inevitable loss...but the need to be fully present in the now. I refused treatments.

I may be crazy, it may kill me! I am trying alternative healthy lifestyle treatments. I felt it should be the first avenue of attack.

I have had two cancer free results, and this week go for my next test. I always worry, and I can't even talk to family about my fears since they were livid about my choices.

I told them that refusing treatment is an act of bravery too, but they think it's suicide too, my husband burned candles for 3 months straight and has an undercurrent of anger most of the time. 30 years of marriage and he thinks the choice should be his.lol I know if this goes bad only death will let me hear the end to it....

What ever we do, right or wrong, we have to advocate for ourselves and not be bullied into something. Do your research. Support each other!

 

I have just had a double mastectomy for a second breast cancer (first was 2005, did lumpectomy, radiation, and three rounds of taxotere, carboplatin (could not start herceptin if I did Adriamician) and a year of herceptin - was her2nu positive, ER&PR positive, node negative). It is not a true recurrence, but sort of a "clone" of the first one. Barely ER positive this time, but it is her2nu again. Node negative again. I am really on the fence about chemo. The treatment did not work last time, so why should I think it will this time? I did stop the chemo early, however, they wanted me to do six rounds (body aches were horrible and I had just been divorced and unemployed and felt that I needed to get back in the game). But, the recommended protocol now is 4 rounds (so me doing 3 probably was not so far-fetched). My onc says I have a 28% chance of mets in the next ten years without doing anything further (I think these are the general stats for just doing the mastectomy) and it depends on how much risk I am willing to take....but he says I am young (50) and he wants me to do chemo again. With a total of 14 negative nodes it does not seem likely that it has spread. I think I may just really work on my immune system, nutrition, reducing stress, etc. and take my chances. But, I have an 11 yr old son, so it is a tough decision. Any thoughts would be appreciated!