Life on anti-depressants

Anti-depressants have become a part of the my life, I never expected that I would have to take medication for depression although looking back I've always been more depressive than upbeat. After being dx I thought I was doing fine, in fact with lack of oestrogen I wasn't as moody as before, leading me to believe that my mood swings were a result of out of balance hormones. Initially I was put on anti-d's for the menopausal symptoms to alleviate the hot flushes caused by an early chemical menopause (which by the way are still as horrendous as they always were) this worked for a while but eventually they stopped working and I am now back in the hot and sweaty position I was before. Trouble is I can't seem to get off them. I want to come off them as they aren't working for what I they were prescribed for. Of course I realise I probably wouldn't of been able to cope with what life has chucked at me over the past 7 years if it wasn't for the tablets.

The best way of describing being on anti-d's is that :

Normal life is full of a rainbow of colours, dazzling,vibrant, bright and alive, once your on anti-d's this rainbow doesn't stop but its muted, toned down, nothing is as bright as before, everything feels safe, everything feels beige....... 

The thing is life isn't beige, things happen, life throws curve balls in all shapes and forms, sometimes its amazingly wonderful and at other times its hard to fathom how to cope. I feel dumbed down, on the one hand I don't get stressed out about ANYTHING and I mean anything, everyone tells me how well I cope with my dx but really I don't give a shit because I'm living in the safety of a beige world where nothing touches me, apart from my dad having 2 strokes and is now in nursing home that really upset me and I actually found myself crying but not for long as the ant-d's take the edge off of everything.

Im going to try and ween myself off of them in an attempt to feel like me again. I need the colour back in my life, I need to be me again in all my kaleidoscope of colours.

Ovaries v Zoladex

On Friday I had an appointment at the hospital in a new department the Gynaecology dept. it was my first consultation on the possible removal of my ovaries and apparently tubes. I've been on Zoladex which is a 3 monthly injection with the largest needle possible of an implant through the stomach to shut down my ovaries, this works very well and apart from the very unpleasant brace yourself injection, nothing else bothered me (or so I thought), every time I go for the injection I become anxious and experience a panic attack, so afterwards I feel extremely fraught and fragile.

The consultant I saw was a very pleasant man although have too say why are gynaecologist's always men? I would of rather of seen a female. Back to the story..... he explained to me that Zoladex shuts my ovaries down and that taking my ovaries and tubes out would basically remove the need for this unpleasant injection, also he mentioned that some women experience very depressed feelings and this explains that whilst I am on anti-depressants for the hot flushes I still experience extremely depressed moods and thought I was going crackers but clearly I'm not! I realise it's the Zoladex. We discussed the possible repercussions of having both ovaries out to which he seemed to think I would feel no different than what I do presently as the Zoladex had officially closed my ovaries down. So I am now waiting for another appointment in 3 months time, in the meantime I need to decide if I definitely want to have the operation, get a smear test yuk, and a Braca's gene test, I don't think I've had this test done so far and apparently if confirmed positive would increase the possibility of developing a womb cancer and of course increasing the possibility of breast cancer returning.

So what to do....... I thought I was sure about this but now feel a bit weirded out by it, will keep you all informed of my decision in the meantime if anybody reading this can advise I would be most appreciative, just leave a comment thanks xxxx

The month where if anybody says the P word to me I'll scream

Yes its that time of year again the air is cooler (thank god my hot flushes are off the scale!), the nights are drawing in, the leaves are falling all of these things I love but what I don't like is the bloody way people now call October Pinktober or words to that effect.... it makes my blood boil! Good natured well meaning people are duped into buying a product because it has the breast cancer logo splashed all over it and coloured it pink, what these good people don't realise is only a tiny amount of the money taken for the product actually goes to the breast cancer charity, hardly anything at all, certainly not enough to make a massive difference it just means that every October these companies get extra exposure under the cover of charity. Its a massive marketing campaign and yet again is clouded by money.

Back to the reality of living with secondary breast cancer, last week I had my flu jab (as I am immune compromised) which made me feel terrible I spent the whole week in bed, feeling very sick, achey (more than the usual) and plagued by migraines......the bain of my life. Today I awoke to the sinking feeling where I feel sick to the pit of my stomach and then the head throbs back on the sumatriptan and knock out drops....... just woke up and the whole flipping day has gone again.

Saw my GP last week and am to have another blood test for the thyroid so onwards and upwards, will keep you all informed if it does work out to be the thyroid gland.

Still feeling hot hot hot! but my lovely GP has upped the anti-depressants to 20mg a day so that should start taking effect shortly on the flushes that are the second bain of my life.

Best get on with whatever I have left of today.

Tricky Times

Its been ages since I last wrote a post so I thought I'd better bring you all up to date. My father had a stroke earlier on this year and after nearly 8 weeks in hospital he was released, unfortunately they released him way to early, he wasn't ready to come home and the house wasn't ready for a severely disabled person. So after a lot of phone calls and a couple of weeks spent at my mum and dads house we finally have managed to get nursing care for 4 weeks after which they will review and see if he needs any further care. I don't want to go into it on here but its been a nightmare! not just watching my dad struggle around the house with the stairs but also with all the red tape to go through just to get some help. It was made all the worse when my mum went down with flu which she then passed on to dad who already had pneumonia earlier on in the year all this put his recovery back to being bed ridden and so I was asked to come up and care for a fortnight, this I did, but I'm physically not able to lift him etc so was relieved when the nursing care finally was sorted. Worryingly my father was referred to the lung cancer department and was supposed to go for a CT scan earlier on in the year after his bout of pneumonia, due to the stroke this got left by the wayside and forgotten about, however today he faces a CT scan to check out that earlier niggle. Stressed out or what.......

As for me, I'm sort of ok obviously feeling frazzled by all the stuff going on with my dad but also other things are upsetting me involving so called friends and loyalty. Again I don't want to go into it but am feeling very low, initially I was disappointed but now I'm just plain angry, this will pass, I am used to these feelings but a trust has been lost and I don't think I can forgive and forget this time, I feel this is the end for one significant friendship as I just cant see a way around the problem other than conceding defeat and carrying on as if nothing has happened, the later of which is totally out of the question and is something I have done ie: bury head in the sand over and over again. Enough is enough...... I am sad but also glad to of been shown the lies that have been told allowing truth to prevail.

Health wise I am doing alright although I've had a few heart palpitations and feel my stomach swells up at certain times of the month, not sure what is going on there but my skin around my abdomen becomes very tight and I feel about 9 months pregnant even though I know I've put on weight its not anything to do with weight it feels like water retention the sort you get before a period so I suppose I will have to go back to the Dr's to find out what the hell is going on. Have too say I am so sick and tired of all this shit..... Dr's, hospitals, appointments, ailments and symptoms urghhhhh.............. Wish it would just all fuck off. At times I have considered just stopping everything, no more Zoladex no more Herceptin, just see what happens, at some point in the future I am going to come off these drugs, people have been on them for 10 or 15 years but I did read somewhere that in America some life time patients have been weaned off Herceptin and found no repercussion from it. When someone tells you that you've got to be on it for life its so hard to know how your going to feel about that only time will tell. Its been 5 years 6 months since this all started thats a long time dealing with something on a daily basis, living in fear of the dreaded 3 monthly CT scan results and going to the hospital every 3 weeks to have a potentially life saving drug. Apologies this isn't very positive is it but its how I feel at the moment and thats on Citrolapram anti-depressant maybe they need to up the dosage as the hot flushes are off the scale (not kidding sweat pouring down my face) and my moods are at an all time low!!!

Anti-depressant UPDATE

Ok its been a week since I started taking the anti-depressant Citrolapam and so far so good, the hot flushes are more severe when they do occur BUT they aren't as frequent as they were before and are seemingly becoming less so YAY to that, people seem to think that a hot flush is an innocent problem that can be tolerated I beg to differ on that hot flushes when extreme are embarrassing making you red in the face, the heat in your face and head makes you feel physically sick to the point on occasion where I have actually thrown up! So innocent is not a word I would use to describe them, it actually feels like your burning in the depths of hell, its quite simply put horrendous I wouldn't wish them on my worst enemy. Of course most woman who go through the normal menopause wont suffer this extreme kind which were brought on by chemo and perpetuated by the massive drugs I am on to block estrogen. I hope that with time they will completely disappear and leave me the fuck alone! I've also noticed that my appetite is diminishing another YAY to that lets hope that I get to lose some of this god awful weight gain and start to look like me again. The only downside to this drug I've encountered so far is that I'm not sleeping as well as I did I am hoping this will go away as time goes on. Knackered is an understatement.

Oh and joy of joys I'm due another Zoladex implant my my how time flies 3 months have just flicked by!

PJ's and sofa day

Today not feeling so good been camped out on the sofa all day, woke up really early with massive hot flush that persisted throughout the day in fact the whole day was one massive fucking hot flush, the only thing that gives me any respite from it is to stick my head in the freezer/fridge or out of the window, anyone who thinks that hot flushes are doable have got to be kidding me, I mean seriously it really is the final straw,  I'm sat here with sweat pouring off of me whilst I type this, I was supposed to see my oncologist this week as part of the rads appointments but he was off ill and is now off on holiday so can't ask him about taking sage tea and fig leaf tea for the hot flushes, everything I take has to be ok'd by him for fear of it interfering with the tamoxifen or adding to my estrogen (my cancer is estrogen rich meaning it feeds off my estrogen), so stuck with not being able to take anything for the dam hot flushes until I speak to him, I did go on the forum and ask the ladies on there about sage and fig leaf tea but did'nt get many responses and the ones I did get seem to conflict nobody seems to know whether or not it is safe for me to take sage/fig leaf tea with the medication I am on, I was prescribed anti-depressants for the hot flushes but after taking only one I was near suicidal and decided to refrain from taking them and try natural alternatives instead, hence my day on the sofa in my pj's on and off sleeping with a sort of headache that has not materialized into anything yet but my head still feels fuzzy, I have taken 2 paracetamol/codeine tablets and an anti-sickness tablet just in case I had a repeat of sickness day I experienced a couple of weeks ago. I really really hope that this is just a side effect of the rads or rads fatigue that I am experiencing and not another hormonal migrane problem. God when will this shit ever end!!! Only three more radio sessions left next week then thats over and done with stroll on wednesday!

Retail Therapy

I am much better than I was at the weekend and I am sorry for my last post or if it upset anyone I just had to vent my rage and anger.

So went late night shopping last night in Totnes it's something me and my best-friend do every year and we love it.  I think its important to carry on as much as normal it helps me feel normal and not a cancer patient. It is amazing what a little bit of retail therapy can do for a girl, we both were supposed to be shopping for xmas presents and ended up buying for ourselves but hey we deserve it and we got some bargains, the sales start early this year probably because of the economic climate. All in all it made me feel better and improved my moods. I have spoken to my GP on the phone and asked him to write the prescription I thought I would never ask and thats for anti-depressants they help with your moods but also with the hot flushes indued by early menopause, these are just terrible, don't get me wrong I am grateful forever for the tamoxifen and the chemo BUT the hot flushes make you into a terrible screaming mad woman!! and I just get so depressed with it, probably still coming to terms with my dx I think this is all part of going through the mill with this cancer trip.

More xmas shopping is in for this afternoon thats if my other half comes home and picks me up. We still got loads to do, but we have been waiting on money and its only just arrived so all at once typical.