Remission With Stage4 Ovarian Cancer?

Is there anyone out there in complete remission with stage 4 ovarian cancer? Please respond. I am very discouraged.

Yes. I have a very good friend who has been in remission for 22 years!!!!!!

And, she knows about another woman with the same results.

 Someone always has to be the exception! So, keep hoping!!!!

G. 

Hi!

Through the ovarian carcinosarcoma yahoo list, I know of at least one member who is a stage 4 and has been NED for the last year.  She has been fighting it for 3 years and her last surgery was to remove a node on one of her lungs.  But since then, she has been OK.  My mom is a stage 3C and she is NED since 10/07. You are not alone.  Hang in there and let's hope that you too can battle this back.

Christiane in OR 

On 2/1/2008 KristaJ wrote:

Is there anyone out there in complete remission with stage 4 ovarian cancer? Please respond. I am very discouraged.

KristaJ, I was not diagnosed with a stage 4 but I was diagnosed with Ovarian Cancer 3-C, which I felt might be just close enough.  I was diagnosed in 1991, and it's not 2008, 17 years of extra time and not too many side effects to deal with.  I took chemo (cytoxin and cisplatin) and also had radiation.  So don't give up, I think your mental attitude has so much to do with all of this.  (Whatever your mind believes, your body receives)  I believe in imagery and meditation along with fighting along with everything that the medical staff offers.  Good luck, fight like heck.

Cindy

On 2/11/2008 OvCaSurvivor91 wrote:

 

On 2/1/2008 KristaJ wrote:

Is there anyone out there in complete remission with stage 4 ovarian cancer? Please respond. I am very discouraged.

KristaJ, I was not diagnosed with a stage 4 but I was diagnosed with Ovarian Cancer 3-C, which I felt might be just close enough.  I was diagnosed in 1991, and it's not 2008, 17 years of extra time and not too many side effects to deal with.  I took chemo (cytoxin and cisplatin) and also had radiation.  So don't give up, I think your mental attitude has so much to do with all of this.  (Whatever your mind believes, your body receives)  I believe in imagery and meditation along with fighting along with everything that the medical staff offers.  Good luck, fight like heck.

Cindy

Hi Cindy, thank you for all the words of encouragement. To make matters worse, I just found out that after responding so well to my second line of treatment(Doxil) for 5 months and set to have my 6th; it decided to quit working. I start on Topotecan next week. I was so looking forward to having a break and whammo! I agree that your mind can do powerful things and I try to stay positive BUT as you well know while you're going through it and faced with only a few more chemo options it's hard to not worry. I do meditate and say affirmations and try to picture myself healthy; sometimes I do the things I do not only because I want to be well, but also I think for everyone elses (family and friends) peace of mind. There are moments that I feel like I'm fighting a  fight that I'm never going to win,almost like I'm trying to change what is supposed to happen .I'm not afraid to die, what I'm afraid of is finding out too late that there could have been something to save my life. Anyway, I won't torture you with anymore philosophical thoughts that I'm sure you've already dealt with. I almost feel selfish even talking about it because I know it brings up old memories that you would prefer to forget. So, on that note I will say Bye for now and hope to hear from you again. Thanks again for responding and allowing me to vent. Take care and my hope for you is a long and happy cancer free life! Love, KristaJ

Krista;

It was wonderful to hear back from you.  Please, Please don't ever feel bad, or guilty, or any negative feelings about ANYTHING you share with me.  Child, if I had only had ONE person to talk with about what I was going through.  At the time in 1991, I was not on the internet and could not find even one person who was alive that had gone through any of my chemo's.  The people I made friends with at my doctors office, all "graduated" to Heaven before me, and it was a very discouraging time.  So I know exactly what you are talking about.  Where do you live?  I live in Alabama and I went to Southern GYN Oncology in Birmingham, with Dr. Larry Kilgore as my physician.  His mother had passed away 6 months before me with OvCa, and I am telling you he is a man on a mission to save everyone he can.  I was given less than a year to survive in 1991, so that Christmas I maxed out every Credit card I had, my family and kids had one heck of a Christmas....so don't do that...lol  'Cause here I am 17 years later, able to fuss about all the interest I had to pay...lol

I don't look back at the time I fought cancer as bad, sad or anything negative, because personally after going through all that I had to go through some very positive changes were made in my life.  I am actually thankful for the experience (I know you think I am crazy) because I am not the same person coming out of it as I was when I went in.  You can write to me, you can vent to me, I am here for you...You know your body like no one else does, you make your own decisions about your treatment.  If I didn't learn anything else, I DID learn this:  PASSIVE PEOPLE DIE, AND AGRESSVE PEOPLE MAKE IT!  So be very agressive with your health care...its a fight for your life, and well worth fighting for.

Blessings to you and your friends and family.  Do you have children?  At the time I had a 13 year old, and a 19 year old, and I am presently raising a 14 year old granddaughter.  Yikes!  Wish me luck there, she is special needs, and is a joy to my old heart.

Hope to hear from you...

Cindy

On 2/12/2008 OvCaSurvivor91 wrote:

Krista;

It was wonderful to hear back from you.  Please, Please don't ever feel bad, or guilty, or any negative feelings about ANYTHING you share with me.  Child, if I had only had ONE person to talk with about what I was going through.  At the time in 1991, I was not on the internet and could not find even one person who was alive that had gone through any of my chemo's.  The people I made friends with at my doctors office, all "graduated" to Heaven before me, and it was a very discouraging time.  So I know exactly what you are talking about.  Where do you live?  I live in Alabama and I went to Southern GYN Oncology in Birmingham, with Dr. Larry Kilgore as my physician.  His mother had passed away 6 months before me with OvCa, and I am telling you he is a man on a mission to save everyone he can.  I was given less than a year to survive in 1991, so that Christmas I maxed out every Credit card I had, my family and kids had one heck of a Christmas....so don't do that...lol  'Cause here I am 17 years later, able to fuss about all the interest I had to pay...lol

I don't look back at the time I fought cancer as bad, sad or anything negative, because personally after going through all that I had to go through some very positive changes were made in my life.  I am actually thankful for the experience (I know you think I am crazy) because I am not the same person coming out of it as I was when I went in.  You can write to me, you can vent to me, I am here for you...You know your body like no one else does, you make your own decisions about your treatment.  If I didn't learn anything else, I DID learn this:  PASSIVE PEOPLE DIE, AND AGRESSVE PEOPLE MAKE IT!  So be very agressive with your health care...its a fight for your life, and well worth fighting for.

Blessings to you and your friends and family.  Do you have children?  At the time I had a 13 year old, and a 19 year old, and I am presently raising a 14 year old granddaughter.  Yikes!  Wish me luck there, she is special s needs, and is a joy to my old heart.

Hope to hear from you...

Cindy

Hi Cindy, I have 3 wonderful stepchildren that I love like no other. They are great kids and having a hard time with my illness. I don't know how much to tell them. Some people say to be completely honest and some say to not bring it up. I will say as a person who lost their mother when I was 4, no one really ever made it a point to talk about her when I was growing up, and that made me very angry. Now, as an adult, I want to know everything about her and can't get enough information. This is such a hard thing for a child to go through, I just wish there was a way to prevent it from affecting them for the rest of their lives. I too have had wonderful things happen to me through this horrible experience. Most of all, I know myself better than ever and am at complete peace in who I am as an individual. I truly am proud of the person that I have become which has taken a long time to figure out. I also finally realize that I am deserving of all that life has to offer. I've spent my whole life a pretty sad person and always trying to take care of everyone else, not realizing that I deserve the same happiness that I have tried to give everyone else(the 3 husbands I've had). More importantly, I am on a journey to self discovery and I now say that if you want to go on that journey with me, fine, otherwise have a nice life! My current husband#3, does not get anything that I'm going through, thus making it very hard to stay married. It's all about him and frankly I can't worry about that. That's been my problem all these years, is that I've put everyone else first and wasted so much time on people that have no intention of giving me the same. NOT ANYMORE!!!! Through all of this, even though my marriage is in trouble (he doesn't think so) I'm very happy in who I am as a person. I've also realized that I can't make anyone happy;I can contribute to their happiness but it has to be there to begin with. You've been very nice in listening to all of this and the days are counting down to my first Topotecan treatment, I'm a little nervous. The hardest part about cancer is that no one can tell you what is exactly going to happen and how long you have to live. That is my biggest frustration. Oh, by the way, I live in Indianapolis,In. Well, we just moved to a small town right outside INDY to be closer to my stepkids. Not somewhere I would have chosen to live but there I go again, making everybody else happy first. It's only about 20 minutes from Indianapolis and much easier to see the kids with all their activities. Much further from, it seems, everwhere I have to go on a daily basis but I agreed to it(like an idiot). Is your grandaughter living with you? Wow, that must be tiring. So, you have alot on your plate like me.Are you married? I'm sorry if you mentioned that already. I have horrible chemo brain and my short term memory is GONE. But I hope that your life is extremely fulfilling and you are doing what YOU want to do . Take care and write soon. Love, KristaJ

 Krista,

I am sorry to hear your marriage is in trouble.   I really hate to tell you this, but tact I have never been famous for, and truth seems to work much better for me, as I still have "chemo brain" and can't keep up with fibs anymore.     BUT so many marriages don't make it through Ovarian Cancer and its treatment.  My cancer doc even apologized to me about it and said it never ceases to amaze him at the behavior of the many men who are "others" to his patients, he said it embarasses him.  I ended up divorcing the man I was with when I went through my cancer treatment, he could not "handle" having a sick wife, and was so afraid that having "sexual relations" with someone undergoing chemo and radiation "there", and it was going to affect his "you know what" and make it glow in the dark or fall off or something he was just stupid about it.   I have seen it happen over and over as I have watched so many wonderful women fight this awful disease over the last 17 years.  So I encourage you to focus on you, this is a time to be unabashedly selfish about you and your care and health.  Go Girl!!   Yes I do have a husband, I was married 22 years to my present husband, and we got really "pissed off" one year and decided to go our separate ways, I then married "Mr. Glow in the dark" and that lasted 3 years, til I got well enough to get rid of him, and then my first husband was there to help me through the rest, and we remarried and now we have been married 40 years in total.  I am 61, you sound much younger than me, but I am a very young 61, and yes my 14 year old granddaughter lives with us, we have custody of her.  As I said she is special needs, emotionally and is doing so good right now.

 Don't get too scared, do verbal affirmations daily, and believe in your medical team.  I will be praying hard for you, and will put you on my Church's prayer list if you don't mind.

I am very proud of you for your fight and good attitude.  But, remember somedays you will be planning your funeral, and some days you will be planning next years vacation, those ups and downs are normal, so don't beat yourself up over it.  If anyone of the rest of us are surviving with this, you can too.

Cindy

Hi Cindy!

I was reading your current conversation and you are an inspiration!  I have Ovarian Cancer IIIC - reccurrence - after a 3 year  mission.  My onocologist now tells me it will just keep coming back.  I mentioned to her that I'm NOW  trying many alternative methods to  get rid of what is left (I'm not "chemo break" right now as she puts it) but she rather scoffed at that.  But I have done so much research and truly feel that many combinations perhaps along with western medicine can help us alianate this disease!!  I'm juicing,  taking juice plus,  eating ginger, and ginger vitamins (ginger is now being known to make ovarian cancer cells commit suicide),  exercising, meditating and I feel most importantly thinking positive!   The power of positive thinking and reducing stress (as I'm researching) is a huge part of healing and staying well.  My husband is a wonderful man and has stuck beside me through both times of enduring this illness,  and I love him deeply,  but he does have a habit of constantly griping  (he says kiddingly) and belittling me and says I can't take a joke when I get upset,  but he loves me enough to try and change that,  although it's slow,  I'm letting him know it bothers me,  instead of stuffing it inside. If he weren't willing to change then I would probably leave him. You have to confront and/or change what stresses you!   My last CA125 was a 10 ! And I strongly feel a lot of the reason I am getting better is because I'm learning out to eat/think/and live differently !  I'm trying to do what makes me happy instead of ALWAYS what will make other people happy.  I'm telling you all out there to READ!  Research! Learn how to manage your life.   Imagine those tumors and cancer cells being destroyed ! Since I am religious, I imagine ANGELS gobbling up that cancer - my angels come from my immune system.  You have to TRULY believe that your cancer will be healed and it will be!  You have to WANT to be well,  really want it.  Believe it or not,  many people do not want to be well,  especially if it means changing their lives.   Imagine your body as being perfect !  Forgive those people who have hurt you,  and never hate.  Tell yourself,  that if people have hurt you,  you have become a better person because of it and have learned from it,  instead of harboring the pain.  Let go of bad memories and replace them with good thoughts. 

Please be well and live well and happy!  Your life depends on it!

Love,

 Deb