What do you mean I look like a wreck?

This post isn’t new. I wrote it in mid-September for the Macmillan cancer support charity on the importance of exercise during my breast cancer treatment and ongoing recovery. I read back through it the other day and realised – to my astonishment, really – that nearly 11 months on I’m still seeing improvements from the surgery I had last December. Details will follow but in the meantime I decided I wanted this on my own blog for the record. I really like it; it’s nice and upbeat and it makes me smile. 

Here it is…

When the consultant breast surgeon greeted me at my most recent appointment with the words, “You look like a wreck”, I was more than a little confused. It seemed completely out of character and was, I thought, downright rude. More importantly, though, I was feeling really well physically and just couldn’t fathom why he’d say such a thing.

I’m fitter and healthier than I’ve been in years. Since finishing pretty gruelling treatment for breast cancer nearly seven months ago, I’ve been eating healthily, I’ve cut down on my alcohol consumption, and I’m exercising loads. As 53-year-old women go – never mind one who’s relatively recently been through cancer treatment – I think I’m doing pretty well.

“A wreck?” I said, trying not to sound put out. “But I feel great.”

“Not a wreck,” the consultant said, amused that I could think he’d say such a thing. “A rake! You’re fading away.”

I laughed at the misunderstanding and reassured the doctor that I was not in fact fading away. Since my diagnosis in July 2015, I have, however, lost the six, seven or eight kilos that I’d put on gradually over the previous decade. The consultant’s comment illustrates just how much I’ve taken on board the recommendations for healthy living that you’re advised to follow when you finish cancer treatment. Doing certain things, you’re told, reduces the risk of your cancer coming back. I’m at high risk of recurrence, so it’s perhaps not surprising that I’m trying to do everything I can to lessen that risk.

Initially I was ambivalent about the lifestyle changes I was making. I felt they were driven by fear of recurrence rather than by a genuine desire for change. But now I’m positively enjoying being fitter and healthier than I was pre-diagnosis.

I’m loving the extra exercise. I’ve always been sporty – tennis and cycling have been part of my life for years – but for the first time in my life I’m enjoying running. I’ve even joined a local running club.

I invariably feel better after exercise. During treatment itself, on more than one occasion, I felt it was my saviour. There were days when I’d be feeling tired and low and I’d force myself to cycle to the hospital or clinic appointment rather than drive. During radiotherapy I challenged myself to cycle to more sessions than I drove to. It wasn’t always easy, but I won – just! No matter how I felt when I left the house, I always felt better by the time I got to my destination.

When I did my first local 5K Parkrun in mid-April six weeks after finishing radiotherapy, I was both relieved and elated. Around 300 people did the same run that morning. I was amongst the slowest. Running the same route at the same time as all these other people, however – and knowing thousands of others were doing exactly the same thing in Parkruns up and down the country – in some way made me feel I was back in the real world after having been in some sort of parallel universe since I was diagnosed in July 2015.

I had Stage 3a breast cancer and went through six-and-a-half months of treatment that comprised eight sessions of chemotherapy, a right-side mastectomy with immediate own-tissue reconstruction, lymph node clearance and 16 sessions of radiotherapy. It takes a long time to recover from that kind of treatment. The chemotherapy-induced peripheral neuropathy that I had in my feet is pretty much gone, but I still get the odd niggle, especially when I run (ironically). My upper arm on the operated side is still numb and there’s a feeling of discomfort in my chest and armpit that never quite seems to go away. There’s a little swelling in and around the operated area that’s been diagnosed as lymphoedema. Some days even now, I can feel really fatigued and have to take things easy. I’m on letrozole anti-hormone therapy and if I stay sitting for too long I feel my joints stiffening up. Hot flushes appear out of nowhere. In my right hand I’ve developed trigger thumb, a painful and annoying condition that can be caused by low oestrogen levels, which is precisely what letrozole is designed to achieve.

There’s no doubt that exercise helped and is helping me deal with both the physical and emotional effects of having had breast cancer. Everyone has their own way of coping, and exercise, it seems, is mine. There’s no downside as far as I can tell. I’m aware that what is a huge challenge for some is a breeze for others and vice versa. It’s about knowing what’s right for you and about setting achievable goals and not being overambitious. Exercising with friends or in a group can help.

For me, exercising is empowering. I’m fitter, I’m healthier, and over the past few months I’ve met some great new people. On the recurrence front, I know there’s no guarantee my cancer won’t come back. Exercising is a massive help in keeping in check my fear that it might.

 

 

 

Should I play tennis? “Yes, just don’t play Federer.”

As soon as I’ve recovered from my radiotherapy treatment and assuming I’ve regained sufficient mobility and strength in my right arm and shoulder, I plan to get back on the tennis courts. I was concerned that the movements involved in playing might increase my risk of developing lymphoedema but the consultant oncologist in charge of my radiotherapy reckons otherwise.

I’ve made no secret of my fear of developing this condition (Fear of lymphoedema) in my operated arm and I hadn’t been able to find a clear answer on whether tennis would increase the risk of getting it or not. I came across a biography of the consultant online and read that she played tennis so I asked her at our first meeting last week (Post-op progress report No 3: one month on and things are going well) whether, if she’d had the same surgery as me, she’d go back to playing.

The consultant’s answer? A definite yes, with a caveat, though: “Just don’t play Federer.” I wasn’t planning to, so I guess that’s fine. She reckoned the different kinds of movements you make with your arm and shoulder playing tennis don’t constitute the vigorous, repeated arm and shoulder activities that women at risk of lymphoedema are advised to avoid. This consultant says I have a 10-15% risk of developing lymphoedema; I’d been told before it was around 25%, so that was good to hear too.

The plan is for me to have radiotherapy every day excluding weekends* for much of February, starting on the 4th and finishing on the 25th. It should take me a while to recover from that and more in general from the overall battering my body’s taken over the past six months or so. And I guess this hardening of the lymph vessels, or “cording” (A busy week with welcome news – “no further surgery necessary”), in my right armpit and more recently also down my right arm will need to be resolved. Once that’s done, though, I should be able to start hitting tennis balls again. I’ll have to build things up slowly and take it easy at least to start with. I’ll still worry about lymphoedema, but with that encouragement from the oncologist perhaps not quite so much.

*Radiation affects the healthy tissue in the area being treated and the two-day pause in treatment each week is it allow your body to repair this damage.

Tennis, Part I

So, do I challenge my 16-year-old son to a game of tennis before I start my chemotherapy treatment next Wednesday? If I do, I’ll be giving him an opportunity to beat me and he hasn’t managed to do that in the few years we’ve been playing each other.

I was determined not to lose to him while I was still in my 40s. Once I reached 50, I thought, I’d relax and be happy for him to walk off court victorious at the end of the match. But here I am at 52, still holding on. To be fair to my son, we don’t play each other often and the last time we did play he was in lead when rain stopped play. I said a silent thank you to the rain gods that day. That was a good few months ago. Now I’m in two minds. Do I challenge him to a match or do I leave well alone?

The same goes for my other son, who’s almost 15. On the one hand, I’d love both of them to beat me. They’re both taller than me now, and much stronger and fitter… and it’d be proof that all that money spent on tennis lessons over the years was worth it! On the other hand, once they do, that’s it, isn’t it? There’ll be no going back, breast cancer or not.

Any thoughts?