My wife has pancreatic cancer. She was diagnosed 2 years ago. She had her operation (8 hour op whereby the surgeon took out 30% of her pancreas, 15 % of stomach, gallbladder, bile duct, parts of her large intestine and then pulled the small intestine to connect everything back together) and 6 mths of chemo. She was so skinny she was 36 kgs and her face was all sunken in.
It was 6 months prior to being diagnosed was when she started having pains. The GPs and system were useless. The time to see a GP then get a scan and then get the results and then see the GP again to review the results takes 3 weeks turn around. They first thought it was stress, then a viral infection, ...., she went through this GP, test, wait results, see GP cycle for 6 months until they said there was a 3.7 cm diameter tumour on her pancreas.
3 months after chemo, she started getting ill again and a MRI and Pet Scan showed that another tumour was growing surrounding her portal vein. THis is the main vein taking blood from her liver, stomach, pancreas, etc and the surgeon said that they could not operate as any mistake meant that she would die on the operating table.
We were ok the 1st time she was told she had cancer but since it was operable, we just said, just do it and get it out.
However, the 2nd time hit us hard. She fell into depression and did not want treatment as chemo basically wiped her out and she did not want to go through it again. The 1st time she wanted to stop the chemo altogether 3/4 of the way through but I forced her to complete it.
As for the 2nd time, I had to speak to the oncologist to find another way to convince her and luckily he said we could try an oral tablet chemo. It wasnt the right chemo treatment but it was better than nothing and medicare didnt cover this so we had to fork out the cost of the treatment. So she went through 6 weeks of daily chemo and radiotherapy.
This combined treatment reduced the tumour to being non-detectable in the MRI.
It has been 6 months since then and although she has the occasional stomach pains, her tumour markers in her blood work are within normal parameters.
She is also having a chinese mushroom tablet (something like 30 tablets a day) which boosts her immune system and costs $500 a bottle. This has helped a few friends get through cancer in conjunction with western medicine. It could be a placebo effect but if her blood works stays good, well I wouldn't change anything.
The day that we accepted that this will kill her was the day our lives changed for the better. Rather than worrying and stressing about whether any treatment works, was actually negatively affecting ourselves and our relationship. Therefore, when we accepted it and decided to live and appreciate each day left is far more important than anything else.
I still dread waiting for the results of each blood test (every 3 months). And I admire anyone who goes through this.
