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Professional Hiatus
On January 5, 2006 I had surgery to remove a large ovarian cancer tumor from my belly.
I was a definitive stage 3 ovarian cancer patient. 2 weeks later I began chemo therapy, and finished 6 courses in May 2006. It is now August 24, 2008, and I remain in total remission.
My story is told in the 2 following presentations: Ovarian Cancer Canada Breakfast, Edmonton, September 26, 2006, and Chicks Oncology Group, Melbourne, Australia, June 13, 2007.
Ovarian Cancer Canada talk September 26, 2006
Title: Live role models please
Now, where were we?
Yes, it’s vascular
We have cancer
Cushion of love
Open and shut case
A fantastic time
Hands on
Thanks: nurses, doctors, hospitals, friends, family
Introduction:
I am a graduate of the school of ovarian cancer. Bachelor of Ovarian Cancer. This qualifies me to speak today. I worked hard to gain my degree. I am not interested in doing further degrees in this area, but if it becomes necessary and opens further life opportunities, and my team of supervisors deems it necessary, then I will pursue a masters and perhaps even a doctorate in this most challenging of courses. I plan to survive.
I qualified for entry after a relatively short time, and very little work. In fact, it fell on me. sabbatical leave London Paris. Pure energy, music excitement, professional development, concerts, old friends, joining the dots of my life. Began to feel less than well early December. Big menopausal bleed, bloat. Yes that time of life!
Diagnosis
Back to Edmonton and bleeding stopped and was congratulating my belly for calming down with a gentle rub and lo and behold, I felt a large solid mass. Mediclinic, emergency at u of a, ultrasound, ct scan, mri, all rather contradictory and indeterminate. Fibroid, lymphoma, ovarian cyst, ovarian cancer. Then CA125 came back at 2000. high marks! qualified for entry to CCI, cancer id.
We were on a raft in a huge tropical storm, buffeted from all sides with no solid ground under us.
We have cancer. Yes, the whole family, like having a new baby it changes our lives. Said the word cancer and death. Lots, to family, friends, doctors. Know the facts, data, chances of survival. It opened doors of communication. I hate mincing around, but it is hard for many to approach. My cancer. Yes mine, not yours, mine. My doctor brother in Australia knew ovarian cancer’s reputation for malice and sneaky death and warned my siblings that they had better be prepared for this to be “an open and shut case”. Ie. That the cancer would be far too advanced for anything to be done, that I would die before long. I was lucky that my body reached a degree of discomfort before that stage was reached. In too many cases the body remains silent and the cancer invades stealthily and thoroughly until it is too late to have any chance of a cure, or even a decent period of remission.
Treatment Laparotomy
Dr. Faught and Dr. Hoskins. Large cancerous tumor on left ovary, plus smaller one on right ovary and a grape on peritoneum. Ati Sam and Helenka waiting and hearing the bad news. Pathology showed more microscopic tumors so I was a stage 3. Pain, nurses, walking.
ChemotherapyBegan 2 weeks after surgery, and had 6 sessions, one every 3 weeks. Taxol, carboplatin. Barrage of preventive drugs: anti nausea, anthistamine, muscle relaxant, then the big anti cancer drugs. I sailed through the first, and each subsequent one, and learned to enjoy the mix of ativan and benadryl.. better than a whisky. Ati, Helenka. Nurses, blood tests and exam previous day.
Chemo persona, the stranger that I became physically and mentally.
Side effects: blunt bullets, necessary evil, illness in itself, coping strategies, not so bad for me. drugs controlled nausea which passed after about 6 days. Neuropathy was the tough thing to deal with. Nerve storms like erratic light show in my body, mainly legs and arms. No relief except for movement. But 2-3 days max, and only really bad after 4th chemo. Heat pad. Light massage, yoga thinking and dissociation. Fingers and toes. Cello. Bare feet. No body hair, yes even there! Going bare headed initially like exposing my breasts. Get used to anything. No I kept my shirt on.
Attitude to chemo: I was not my chemo. it came through me for a while. It visited different places, stomped bluntly around killing some healthy pretty flowers as well as the weeds. The weeds stay dead, the flowers regrow. Went with it. Uncomfortable at times. Good to watch it, observe, listen without fear. It passed through, did its job. I was lucky that I didn’t have to go back to work. It would not have been possible. The univ granted full paid medical leave.
Infections: avoid! No crowds, friends know not to come if have cold, kids stayed away and wore masks when tail end of cold. No concerts, plays.
Road to health. Essentials: Cushion of love Immediate family: Important for family, we have cancer. So true in my case. Family love care nurturing, all directions. All families work differently. We have to know everything, down to smallest detail. Exiting of small intestine to feel the back of the peritoneum, do we really want to know? Yes. my journey is our journey. Extended family: lib, emails, phone calls
Friends close to home, and far away
Ati’s reports and responses from far and wide.
Colleagues
Steve's 3 types of people: Those who can hear your distress, sit with it not becoming distressed by it themselves, and in consequence be empathetic and supportive (the best kind to meet). Those who can hear your distress but who can't sit with it and so withdraw (second best). Those who can hear your distress, who can't sit with it but who become distressed themselves and then look to you to shoulder their own distress.
Everyone has a cancer story. I have got to the stage now when I am saying to these people, some who are real friends as well, when I sense a cancer story coming on, that I am not interested in the dead role models… only the live ones!
Doctors: Faught, Young, Hoskins, Levin, Shepansky Diet: juices broccoli, celery, carrots, beetroot, apples, ensure, proteins tofu, bland, no peppers, smells! White fish, lamb chops, chicken noodle soup, no raw veggies, steamed, no bread, some rice, no spaghetti, Quarantine: no infections, masks, no concerts, crowded restaurants or shops. Safeway at odd times. Lots of fresh air. Laughter: email jokes, serious jokes, bad hair days, sitting round the table with my family and friends, Emails and phone calls from friends and family far and wide. News of continuing lives. Old friends popped up out of cyber space. Arthur’s updates Drugs: zofran, gravol, Tylenol 3, minimum supplements, vitamins BC, nothing to interfere with the workings of chemo. sleep Information: internet, papers, sam ati, intraperitoneal, ginger, nitroglycerine, dialogue, Music: Brahms Beethoven Bach Mozart. Great classics. No energy for more obtuse complexity and complicated emotional challenge. Then moved gradually to Mahler, Bruckner, Wagner, Puccini when I began to feel stronger Movies: one a day! All sorts. Plug for alternative video spot on whyte! The more miserable the movie, the better I felt. Nothing like gloom and doom to cheer you up. Books: I gobbled up cancer story books: Lance Armstrong, Patient from Hell... Action: walking, bike, skiing, jogging, swimming with helenka Canadian citizen Positive action: possible tasks. My cello room represented my cancer. Mess of life needed to be cleaned. All photos catalogued, old files, papers thrown, library organized, it was to lead me to health and allow a clean new beginning, and if in the worst case of my death, then be a clear death, and enable my affairs to be uncomplicated for my family to organize. Bookshelves! Knitting. Eventually cello playing once I felt that I cope with not being good any more! Self indulgent therapies: massage, sauna, Jacuzzi once scar had healed and vag felt solid. Some chi gong, and yoga, all gentle. Emotional lifePersona: you are not your cancer. I emailed a student wanting to talk about his present decisions. He emailed back. Didn’t know how to talk to me. no experience of serious illness. I phoned him. I told him I am Tanya, same old, just with a changed job to do. I am not my cancer, and never want to be.
Loss of professional identity. Watching world go on without you. Initially felt very professionally lonely. But then good to realize we are all dispensable. Humbling and encouraging. Could not teach as had nothing to give away. Needed all for myself.
Twin sister and hysterectomy Celebrations: birthday party with Lib. Stephane visit. Remission party after the final chemo and the CA125 was way down to 13. Grand Canyon trip with ati, sam and andy. Kootenay lake, London, Paris.Now:
My sabbatical has been renewed and am off to Australia to take up where I left off. Study conducting, play concerts, see mum, realize my scuba diving dream off the barrier reef. meet my new niece born in April. On Ovarex drug trial. Eating loads of ginger. Playing lots of cello, beginning to teach, studying orchestral scores. Back in saddle Jan 1. plans for concerts and festivals already coming in for the next couple of seasons. 5 year plan to learn and perform all of Beethoven’s string quartets and conduct all of his symphonies.
Conclusion:
Many women could be granted many more years of life after ovarian cancer had they been diagnosed at earlier stages of the disease. Universal screening of women will save many lives. Chemotherapy is successful, amazingly so, but still a blunt weapon which can lose its usefulness once cancer cells become resistant to its poison. Sneaky devil.
Looking through the correspondence of the past months gives a clear picture of the steps we took and the intense nature of the work to find all possible means to battle this cancer.
CA125! CT scans, examinations, normal life, cancer life, separate them
Am I changed? Yes, but life itself is a life changing experience. Still me, mere mortal
Resources & Links
CA125 influences the sensibility of NIH:OVCAR-3 ovarian cancer cells to genotoxic anticancer drugs.
Marianne Boivin, Denis Lane, Julie Beaudin, Claudine Rancourt Oncothyreon CancerConsultants.com Ray Sahelian, M.D.
Check out what they say about Ginger:
"In multiple ovarian cancer cell lines, ginger induced cell death at a similar or better rate than the platinum-based chemotherapy drugs typically used to treat ovarian cancer." Ginger (Zingiber officinale)Ginger can be helpful in alleviating nausea and vomiting caused by chemotherapy.53 54 Ginger, as tablets, capsules, or liquid herbal extracts, can be taken in 500 mg amounts every two or three hours, for a total of 1 gram per day. Whole Foods Market I also did a search for interactions between pacitaxel/ginger and carboplatin/ginger. No interaction was shown by the following:
Checking drug interactions on DrugDigest.org Also no interactions listed at:
Drugs.com