I had to have a Zoladex injection after Tamoxifen didn’t work for me. i was told it would stop my periods and put me into menopause. this is what I was told with the Tamoxifen and it didn’t work and I still had periods the whole time I was on it. Well, after two weeks I started a period again and now I am worried and annoyed this won’t work either. The doctor never said I would bleed on it but when I rang the breat care nurses they said it was perfectly normal for the first injection and possibly the second. Why wasn’t I warned about this, talk about panic and I have rotten period pains to contend with now along with everything else. I think I should think about having my ovaries removed, what do you all feel about this?
hi,
i hope you don’t mind me asking, but who told you your periods would stop on tamoxifen? My understanding is that some people will continue with periods and for others they may stop, depending where you are regarding your menopause. How do you know tam didnt work for you?
I did visit a gyn doctor and asked for mine to be removed, and they told me that not all oestrogen is bad for you and at my age 42 I need it, my bc was er and pr positive, so tamoxifen hopefully should be working. Really confuses me when we are all to.d different things.
hope you get things sorted, good luck xx
Hi, Ive been on zoladex from day 1, (stopped during chemo), my periods stopped back in Aug 2012, it takes a while for the body to adjust. I was on tamoxifen which didnt work for me. I am currently on letrozole…my cancer is strongly oestrogen receptive and a combination of these two drugs is necessary to remove as much of the oestrogen as possible. It is hard to cope without oestrogen as the side effects are tough to deal with, hot sweats,achy joints, tiredness and dry mouth to name a few.
I suspect things will settle down for you luckygal.
Mel xx
My periods returned to normal on Tamoxifen, despite 2 lots of chemo.
Monitor the zoladex closely. It does stop most women’s periods but there are a certain proportion of women that it does not work for. Seemingly surgery is the most viable option.
Julie
I am 45 now. After chemo (6x FAC) I was for two years on zoladex and tamoxifen (5 years) I had both togeather, but my periods never stoped. My doctors always told the best for cancer is to remove ovaries. How I will cope with side effects after - this is an other things.
I had my ovaries out at 35 when Tamoxifen failed and I had to switch to an AI. I was given the option of Zoladex, but as Tamoxifen didn’t work for me, I wasn’t about to risk it with Zoladex. There are already too many uncertainties for those in our situation, so I wanted to be sure of this at least; if the ovaries aren’t there, they can’t cause any more problems.
Thanks for all your helpful responses ladies. I guess some things work well for some people and not so well for others.
It’s one thing I will have a good chat with my Oncologist about.
In reply to Gordok 1
My Radiotherapy consultant and Oncologist BOTH told me my periods would stop and were surprised when mine didn’t and then said that sometimes they don’t stop but the Tamoxifen would still work.
After I was told the cancer had returned, the first thing I asked was why didn’t the Tamoxifen work? The Oncologist said that sometimes, it doesn’t work and it was sadly just one of those things in my particular case.
In reply to Angelfalls
I agree with you and I am going to ask about that as soon as possible.
Good luck, Lucky! I forgot to say that my periods continued the whole time I was on Tamoxifen, too…