What Does Chemo Do To You?
Ok, this one might be a little too much information for you. But if there’s somebody out there that will be going through all this, you should read this. Or maybe you shouldn’t. People ask me on the bad days what chemotherapy is like, and although I consider myself articulate, I have a really difficult time explaining it. Its difficult to describe the forest from the trees, right? But I figure I’ll try to describe it a bit here. Careful reading this.
Chemotherapy side effects are worse than cancer, that’s for sure. With cancer, most of the time you’d hardly know it if some doctor didn’t tell you. I mean, I was pretty hard up by the time they found it in me, but sometimes cancer can go all the way to stage IV and you’d never know it.
Chemo, on the other hand, you can never forget that. Not for a second. There’s no ignoring chemotherapy. It invades every cell by the end of it. You spend months marinating in a stew of toxic wastes that are out to kill you. And I don’t think that’s overly-dramatic. You try it sometime and see if I’m not right.
Well, I’ll tell you what I can about chemo. I’ll go day-by-day.
I’ll start on Sunday, the day before chemo. Remember when you were a kid and you dreaded Sunday night because it meant that you had to go to school early the next morning? And maybe you hadn’t done your homework yet, and basically, your fun was just over? Or maybe its still like that for you, where you get to Sunday night and you start to dread the coming work week, and what hassles are going to happen this time, etc., etc. Well, its a little like that, but I think I can, without hesitation, claim that my Mondays are worse than yours.
The dread of chemotherapy now starts much earlier than Sunday. At first it did start on Sunday, but then I realized how bad it was, so I moved the freaking out back a few days to Friday. Then Wednesday. I knew it was bad when the dreading would start on Friday, 9 days before my chemo treatment – before I’d even recovered from the last one. But now I dread it all the time. I get no rest from the dread of chemo now, because I know it gets worse every time and, save a few surprises, I know just what’s going to happen to me.
And I suppose I should feel good that I only have 2 more treatments. That’s what people keep saying, at least, “Hey – only 2 more, right? That’s gotta feel good.” It doesn’t. And people hate that answer. If I’ve learned anything from the progressive side-effects of chemotherapy treatments, its that the last treatments will be the worst. I don’t look forward to them, and knowing that they are coming doesn’t make me feel any better, even if completing them means its all over.
I try to distract myself on Sundays, and thankfully, I think everyone around me tries to do the same. The only thing you can do is try not to think about it. The doctor gave me anti-anxiety pills to calm down, but I don’t like taking them. So I just try not to let my mind rest on it.
I sleep as late as I can on Mondays. I don’t want to get up any earlier than I have to, because I know if I have time to think, I will. I take a shower and put together a bag of stuff. I usually bring my computer, my iPod, my headphones, maybe a book. I usually never use any of the stuff because the Benedryl knocks me out, but I bring it anyway. It makes me feel better holding onto something.
Chemotherapy is about a 4 hour process. They take your blood and start your IV right away. They fill you with steroids, saline and Benedryl to get your body ready, and they wait for the chemo drugs to be brought up from the pharmacy in the bright green zip-lock bag they come in.
I have a mental reaction to the smell of the alcohol swabs and taste of saline now. They use a lot of alcohol swabs during the whole process. They wipe down your port with alcohol, they swab the ends of the IV before they insert the vial for your blood, or the syringes full of chemicals. I can’t smell or taste the chemo itself, so I guess my mind has just decided that the bad stuff must smell like alcohol and taste like saline. The reality, of course, is that the saline and alcohol are the only things that are good for me in the whole process, but that doesn’t stop me from wincing whenever I smell or taste them. I know what’s coming when they are around. Sometimes when I’m not at chemo I’ll remember the smell of the swabs or the taste of the saline and I’ll jerk my head to the side and try not to puke. I really freak out sometimes.
You don’t really start to feel anything until an hour after you’ve been given the drugs. First you go to the bathroom and pee red. Maybe that’s too personal to tell everybody, but I’m telling you anyway. It freaks me out every time. I always forget its going to happen. It’s from the Andreomyacin, which is a red chemical, and the first drug in the chemo. Some people pee red for days.
The heat starts about then. The heat comes from inside me, from my chest I guess, and radiates into my face. By Tuesday I’m flush red all over, and my face is puffy and hot. My skin starts to feel softer than usual, I don’t know why.
A heated, sharp indigestion starts about the same time that the hiccups start. My nurse thinks the two are related. I think its all the same thing. The hiccups last for two days. They are double hiccups, where your diaphragm pulses twice most times and really shakes your body.
The nausea sets in immediately, despite all the drugs they give me. It’s a sharp nausea, like someone is stabbing you in the stomach, and trying to pull your throat out by reaching in through your mouth.
But, despite the nausea, and despite the fact that eating just makes it worse, you are ravishingly hungry. You would eat rice cakes willingly, you are so hungry. You eat until the nausea takes you over in a big wave, and you lay down and cry and wait for it to pass, and then you eat again, until the wave of nausea comes again, etc., etc. Its awful.
But the effects of chemo aren’t just in your stomach, chest, or throat, they are all over. Your eyelids droop and the muscles in your thighs twitch, and your abdomen expands with all the food your body won’t digest (go get some ex-lax and fiber bro, its going to be a long week…).
By Wednesday my legs are usually dog meat, but the hiccups are gone. The heat is still around, but its second to the sheer exhaustion. I mean, absolute EXHAUSTION. Not like “I’ve had a long week and I haven’t slept much,” or “I just lifted weights” kind of exhausted. Its much more powerful than that.
Last time, I woke up with three fingers numb on Thursday. The doc says that’s nerve damage from the Vinblastin. I say that’s some really nasty stuff for pianist. He’ll cut out the Vinblastin if it happens again this time.
I don’t really know when it happens. Not right away. But sometime between Wednesday and Friday my mind starts to fall apart. It lasts for 4 or 5 days. I can’t remember people, or conversations, or I’ll stop sentences halfway because I can’t think of the word. It goes away, though. I think.
By Saturday and Sunday I’m recovering, and I’m usually ok by Monday. Then I have one good week to run around like a mostly normal person, but with more dread, until I get hit again. The exhaustion never totally leaves me, and I can’t stand very long, but its not as bad during what I facetiously refer to as my “good” week.
Wow, my heart goes out to your friend. I’m sorry to hear that she’s having such a rough time of it. I’ve heard it said, though, that taking your life is a permanent solution to a temporary problem. I hope she starts to feel better. Feel free to download the PDF of my story (click on eBook) above and bring it to her. Maybe it would give her some consolation to hear of someone else that went through the hell of chemotherapy.
Thanks for sharing this, David. My mom starts chemo tomorrow for ovarian cancer. I cried reading your posts. Cancer sucks. We got side-cocked by it as well. At least now I have a better idea of what she’ll be experiencing.
My best to you and your continued health.
My mom is going through this right now….
I wish there was something better out there for you. I appreciate everything you have to say. It could be any of us.
Thanks for the information – my daughter just had chemo on Thursday for ovarian cancer – stage 3C and it is good to know how other people experience chemo the good the bad and the ugly. Constipation is one of side effects is that why she is feeling the pain in her stomach?
its amazing to find someone who can describe the way i feel im one week after my fifth treatment and feel like it would be better off if i were dead. i hate cancer and i hate the chemo even worse.
thank you for explaining your expierience. my gfs mom is going to go through chemo for the first time tomorrow and im scared for her and want to know what shes going to go through. i was really hoping to find something good to tell her but i dont think chemo is neseserilly anything good (besides the faact its tring to cure you.) good luck i hope your last to treatments go by very quickly and your cancer goes away.
Thank you for sharing. I feel the same way. I have stage 3 breast cancer. Just had my first aggressive chemo treatment. I thought I was crazy til I saw your post and your symptoms. God bless you.
aww that sucks thank you for sharing this my best friend has cancer and i really wanted to understand what she is experiencing. i wish you luck as well
I couldn’t read through this. Having had the “pleasure” of experiencing this first-hand, I did not have courage to revisit this experience. Chemo is the worst thing I have ever experienced in my life. I prayed more than once to die. Just because of chemo. BUT I BEAT THAT SHIT. and I quit chemo.
Thank you for sharing your experiences. My Mom is right now recovering from having a port put in. Chemo starts next week. You’ve helped me to be able to try and understand what she may go through.God Bless and my Best to you.
Thank you so much for sharing this. I’m so sorry you’ve had to endure this horrible trauma. My best friend just began chemo a few days ago and I want to understand what she’s going through. Your clear description of your pain has really helped me.
My dad’s going through chemo at the moment for a mesothelioma. What you’ve written has really helped us understand what he’s suffering. It’s fairly difficult as he’s always been a stroppy git anyway and is trying to carry on as if nothing is wrong.
I am writing a book and one of my characters has cancer, I have been scouring the internet for peoples experiences and found yours, although I have known many people that have gone through Chemo they have never had words to describe it or haven’t wanted to. Reading your account of it has touched me, left me reeling a bit. I wish you well. x
Thank you for sharing this. My mother starts Chemo soon for Pancreatic Cancer. I want to be there for her, but the truth is I’ve never had to deal with anything like this. It worries me that I won’t be able to help her like I want to. This helped a lot with knowing what exactly she will be going through.
Thanks for sharing that exactly how I feel. I started chemo on February and I have to go until October. I work 45 hours a week at a public job and Im on my feet all day. I take two days off work for each treatment, then back to work. Most of the time I have I cant focus on what I should be doing, but I cant afford to take off work. I will be glade when its over.
Well, I just had my second of six rounds of Taxotre, Carboplatin and Herceptin. I had a stage 1 breast tumor just over 1 cm and only 1 of 9 lymph node that was positive but it was a grade 3 which made it agressive. From the start I was iffy about the chemo but my surgeon explained that this would be a cure not a treatment. Like you I slept through the treatment and was fine the next day. By the second day, everything I drank or ate tasted like plastic. So unfortunately, I didn’t drink enough and became really dehydrated. That Monday night, I ask God to take me before I would ever do chemo again. With the help of my sister who is a nurse practitioner, we planned to get better again of it on the next round. I also talked with the oncologist and lowered the levels. Well round 2 came and I did try drinking fruit juice and V-8 fusion and lots of tea. So I did stay better hydrated this time. Unfortunately, both times come day 8, my white cell count hits bottom and the fever kicks in. I actually went to the ER yesterday and of course by the time I got there my fever broke. I am hoping that next week is a good one. I wish you good luck with future treatments.
Thank u so much for sharing. Ill be starting chemo either the end of this week or next week its so hard dealing with this. I’m a mother of 2 and was told I have hodgkins lymphoma. I’m so scared to go thru chemo I don’t know what to expect. Well now I have an idea thanks to u. I hope u beat ur cancer and that u never have to go thru this again.
I can empathize. I am going through chemo now and I HATE it. They say that it is effective though and I am too young to just give up. I think that even if I was older I would probably go through it.
I really loved the analogy about Sunday nights and dreading Monday. I feel this way, too. It must be the way we all feel right before the next cycle.
Thanks for the post, it helps to know that we are not alone in our journey.
Thank you for sharing. My 2 year old just started chemo 3 weeks ago and since he can’t explain to me how he’s feeling, this gives me a good idea. I’ve definitely seen the hunger/nausea in him. It’s a terrible inner battle in him and it’s painful to watch.
I am also in the process of getting chemo treatments. I was diagnosed with stage 4 colon cancer that spread to my lungs. Fortunately, they were able to remove the cancer with surgeries. However, I am on treatment number 7 out of 12. I go in for chemo every other Wednesday. I am in ther for about 4 hours and then I have to bring it home with me for two days and then get disconnected on Friday. I always feel like people just don’t understand how awful chemo is. It was so great reading your blog. You said exactly word for word how I feel. From the freaking out before treatments to the smells of alcohol. It was so refreshing being able to read exactly how I was feeling. Thank you for posting this. I will keep you in my thoughts.
Thank you for posting this. You are brave
Thanks for this. My friend is starting chemo today and wanted to learn a little more so I could try to understand what he is going through. I’ll find out how it went tomorrow :\