starting rad/chemo, upset, won't know if am cured for years

I start radiation & chemo (6 weeks) on Thursday. I'm not so much scared of the treatments really -- just upset about the whole thing...feeling let down by my body.

The worst part of this for me is that there will be no test to see if the radiation/chemo has worked. Only time. My gyn/onc said that they will do tests that will trigger them to see if something is wrong but no test that will identify me as being cancer free.

How do people cope with not knowing if the cancer is still there? When will I be able to stop looking over my shoulder?

We just have to assume that the treatment worked. There is no one alive who can be certain that there are no cancer cells in their bodies.

Having had cancer, we are all prone to Cancerhead. It seems that it gets better, for most people, the further out we are from treatment. I have a cousin who had breast cancer 28 years ago. She still has bouts of cancerhead. My aunt had cancer return after 40 years but she didn't spend 40 years worrying about it returning.

A month after my treatment ended my gyn/onc pronounced me 'cured' as there is no evidence of the disease. He's hopeful, I'm hopeful, but we both know that it can come back, or a stray cell may still be there. There's nothing we can do about that, so I'm trying to enjoy my life, whether it lasts for another 40 days or 40 years.

Janie

Hi - I sent you a PM also.

I have the cancer head - sometimes it is worse than others.
You will have ups and downs for the next year. If you did not you wouldn't be normal. How can we not worry.

When you are going for treatment is when I stopped treatment I felt the worst. I still call my doctors for the every ache and pain.
My nurses are nice and help alot.

While you are going through treatment. Do other things at night.
Stay around as many people as you can. Try to have some fun time. I told myself that it wasn't going to come back during treatment so why worry now. Now I tell myself it is ok to worry but do obsess. You may want to take a break from the internet because you need to remove yourself sometimes.

Also I am starting to seperate my life from my medical life.

So - it does get better slowly.

Katherine