Prayer and a positive attitude make a huge difference. My first week of chemo a lady came in to say hello to the nurses. She'd never smoked but had lung cancer. Said she was told that she'd have to stay on chemo just to survive. At one point she was breathing with half a lung (one collapsed, the other partially collapsed). After 3 years of chemo she had a PET scan that showed no cancer. She stopped chemo. When she came in was a few months later, after a second PET scan that showed she was still clear.
This inspired me, at the time I had two fair sized tumors (4 cm in the colon, 6cm on the other side) plus a lot of little stuff spread across my intestines. Plus abdominal pain. The pain had dimminished right near the start and was gone after about 6 cycles of chemo. After 12 rounds of Avastin + FOLFOX, I had a scan that didn't find any cancer. My CEA dropped from 307 to 9.0. Since it was still high I stayed on chemo, but cut out the olaxiplatin (the neuropathy was driving me crazy). My CEA dropped to 6.8 and stayed there. I cut back to Avastin only (no side effects for me) and felt fantastic (like I was totally cured) for about 3 months.
My CEA started rising and I had another PET scan that showed a lot of little stuff in the same area as before. So I went back on full chemo, this time FOLFIRI. I'm positive things will get better again - the CEA has leveled off & dropped slightly.
Someone said you're not considered cured until you go 10 years with no evidence of disease. But that doesn't mean you can't get a whole lot better than you are now and enjoy each day. Stay positive.