Morning everyone! @gromit12 i hope you enjoy Midsummers Night Dream and that your tummy feels better. Finger crossed your jaw stops hurting x
@belle1 i can imagine it’s frustrating however focus on the weekend at least like you said you hopefully will feel more normal and be able to spend some nice time with your mum.
@isthisreal dont give yourself a hard time about 900 steps we all know how those days are! Big hugs x
Hope you have a wonderful night x
@belle1 please don’t let the delay get you down I know it’s tough as mine was delayed an extra 2 weeks when I had infections. Looking back it was probably for the best, I think lol.
I had my last chemo today and had to ring the bell( I hate anything like this) all the nurses where there and my daughter videoed it 
It was a long day as I was there from 9 to 4 so just to let everyone know they go through everything going forward with you, checkups, points of contact etc, , I felt very reassured after it.
My hormone therapy has been changed to 2 years Tamoxifen and then 5 years of Anastrozole. They said my bloods are showing I’m not through the menopause (52). I start these on the same day as radiotherapy, should be in 3 weeks if bloods are ok.
Spoke with MacMillan breast cancer nurse and she’s arranging 5 sessions of reflexology and also a day group with clinicians on how to manage fatigue after all treatments finished. I’ve also been offered yoga, Pilates or tai chi classes in August.
I hope by writing this Im not offending anyone who still has surgery or a lot of chemo yet. I just want to try and give some positivity to this horrible disease.
I’m already feeling pretty rough tonight and Ribena face has started. I’m just praying I get through the next 3 weeks with no complications 
Thank you for sharing this @pollyanna1 its nice to be reminded that this road will come to an end (or at least a junction!) for all of us soon. Hope the next few weeks go smoothly for you, it’s been a tough time for you so far xx
@pollyanna1 thank you. Glad I went and took immodium to prevent any disasters, and took the gaviscon with me!!! It was a very good production and the weather held out, though a tad chilly for midsummer!!
@pollyanna1 don’t apologise - we all want to know what happens at the next stage! Yes I still have surgery and radiotherapy to go, but this will be a huge thing out the way when chemo through.
Mine is 8mg for breakfast and 8mg for lunch the day before, the day of chemo and the day after chemo. I then am given 4mg for breakfast and 2mg for lunch for Day 3, 2mg for breakfast on Day 4 to taper it and not fall off a cliff. That’s not standard though and is advocated for by my oncology nurse who saw me struggle when it stopped suddenly. You’ve had an awful time. I hope the antibiotics are working and your bloods are okay. It’s so perverse that we fight so hard to let them poison us again. Some might say we’re insane 
xx
A consultant told me the jaw pain is an often complained about Docetaxel issue. I had it too. Jaw and ankles were my most horrific and all consuming pains. They’ve gone during the third week though.
The deal I’ve made with my consultant for tomorrows 2nd Docetaxel is;
The mouth seems to be everything. When it goes wrong, everything goes wrong due to fluids and food. My taste has just come back and week 2 was only spicy food for me or I could taste it. Sugar tastes gross which is amazing! Even crisps taste weird still. Roast chicken with soft baguette and loads of salt and pepper is nice in week two it seemed for lunch. I’ve craved protein like crazy!!!
I hope you feel better soon. I’ve still got diarrhoea going into the next cycle. Consultant said I may be stuck with it until the end as mucosa are unhappy in gut. It’s not urgent, scared to fart diarrhoea now (a little scared) though now. It’s 3 x a day runny and not painful (except when k went for Thai with a friend and stupidly had the hottest Thai Chicken Basil and Chilli dish SND ate every chilli in sight 
. Oops.
@isthisreal just to make you feel better…this has been my 3rd week…my good week…we don’t have stairs at home and the farm is flat. I had to meet a client in her Georgian townhouse on Tuesday and I nearly died walking two flights of stairs. I was a mess.
Oh and I officially look like this every morning before make up. Fun times. It’s nearly 2am and wide awake with steroids and the kitten is being spayed in the morning while I’m at chemo and I can barely remember the word for ‘hand’ half the time and shouldn’t be trusted with anything more than watching TV and drinking water right now.
Predict - anyone who did their score early in the year, it’s worth going on again as they’ve updated it with more modern stats (which account for longer hormone treatments and more use of Taxanes - hooray for evil Docetaxel and Paclitaxel!).
My 10 year survival rate has increased by 2% and my 15 year survival rate has gone up by 4%. Hoorah! I’m almost nudging 90% 10 year and 85% 15 year which I’ll take. Happily! Love that they point out that 5% of people would die anyway from other causes and not cancer so as long as that wasn’t my plan, my rate is only really 85/95*100 = 89.5% for 15 years. And mine was two tumours in breast, 7/10 lymph nodes, ER 8/8 and HER2 -ve and not the mountain lion with three legs and a limp unfortunately.
New Predict was exactly what my steroid addled brain needed tonight!
Good morning ladies, just wanted to let you know @swk1981 im thinking of you today, hope it goes well and it looks like you’ve got everything covered so keeping my fingers crossed for the week ahead 
🩷
@pollyanna1 thank you for sharing your positive news it really helps to know what’s happening going forwards and there are brighter days ahead for us all 🩷
@gromit12 hope you managed some sleep last night and you feel bit better today ? Xxx
Our Oct17 gang stayed together on the chemo thread through surgery and rads too as gave a lot of the other threads 
you can do same if you want too 
Shi xx
Morning @swk1981, I’ve just done mine, it’s strange how we are all so different. I was er+ no lymph node involvement stage 2 grade 3. I’m 52 so think age plays a factor lol.
My 5 year is 93%, 10year 83, 15 years 73%.
I was also told yesterday I’ll be on hormone therapy for 7 years instead of 5 as new research this last few weeks suggests. I’ll be on one 2 years another 5 years. I’m getting extra 4 radiotherapy to target the tumour site as it had been very aggressive ( grade 3) and most people would have had node involvement at this stage. I’m taking all the positives lol.
@elle16 thank you, got some sleep which is always a plus post steroids! Jaw pain has eased a tad, but still popped the ibuprofen and codeine on waking! And who knows what last night’s immodium has done to the guts, but have just downed my kefir and !!!
I’ve just looked at the predict tool. My cancer sounds similar to yours @swk1981 however I’m older I’m 50. So my results came out as 5 yr 96%, 10 yr 89% and 15yr 82%
I didn’t actually use the old tool so not sure what the difference would have been!
I’m also having immunotherapy as well as hormone therapy and radio so maybe that will bump it up a bit too!
Morning @pollyanna1 i hope you managed to get some sleep despite all the crazy steroids. The end is in sight! Hope you feel ok today x
@swk1981 thanks - I’m 8mg too and it’s Dexamethasone (if that’s how you spell it). A couple of you seem to take it in afternoon at lunch so I’m defo going to query it again as someone else in my team told me to take it at night rather than lunchtime (after 2 other people told me other times😂) but thinking I won’t get any sleep if I do that and if it’s still effective taking it earlier in the day then that would be better
@hc1973,hope all is good with you I managed more sleep this time than any other surprisingly. Although other side effects kicked in within a few hours of treatment. Normally day one I’m hungry very nauseated from I left hospital. My final weigh in yesterday and I’ve managed to put on 8lb in total:see_no_evil: I’m overweight as it is . I think it’s the diet of chip butties and ice cream. Didn’t get that silver lining of weight loss from chemo lol. On a positive note, once this is over, I’m going to try healthy eating and increase exercise. (Slowly) my body’s got me this far, maybe time to repay it.
@belle1 when I was taking it for my 1st Docetaxal I had the same drug and dose and was told 8am and then 1pm otherwise no chance of sleep! I’d definitely query it. X
Exactly the same here. Even on breakfast and lunch, I only managed 3 hours sleep last night. If I took it at dinner, I’d be wide awake all night!
