Cancer 251

I have just started my third cancer treatment, after the failures of the first – which worked well for over two years – and the second – which didn’t work well at all and just seemed to make me more ill. I am now starting the third with significantly increased numbers of tumours and tumour sizes. My abdomen is rather full.

I am the being treated with a combination of Lonsurf (trifluridine and tipiracil) with bevacizumab, not the easiest word to pronounce. Bevacizumab is given via my central line in hospital on day one of the new 28 day cycle. I then take Lonsurf in tablet form for the next five days, then a two day break, then Lonsurf again for five days, then back to hospital for Bevacizumab, then a thirteen day period of no treatment. Yahoo! The focus is on stopping the tumours from growing further rather than getting rid of them, and then for as long as possible. I did ask the consultant that only question terminal cancer patients are interested in, knowing full well there isn’t an accurate answer. How long? Reply. Typically 12-18 months. OK, here’s another challenge. My combined heart failure and cancer intitial predictions suggested i would die in the first half of last year. Now I should die in the middle of next year. Can I beat that? We will see. At the moment I am wondering whether I will last to the morning.

I made the mistake of reading the leafet that comes with the Lonsurf tables. Top tip, don’t bother reading this sort of thing. It is just too depressing. The list of potential (and common) side effects includes virtually everything that can go wrong with the human body, along with a few made up ones. Other people are not meant to touch the tablets, and I am meant to wash my hands after taking them. And I am putting these into my body? What are they doing there? Finally, the document suggests that the side effects can lead to death. That is a bit extreme. You don’t get that on the side of a packet of paracetamol. So taking the tablets that are meant to make you a little better might kill you? And I consented to this treatment before reading all this? Oh well, it is not going to make much difference one way or the other.

I fell asleep in hospital today, waking up to the nurses looking at me and asking if I was all right. They are not used to seeing me ill.