I have a friend with exactly this -metastasized BD bust a vertebrae which had to be removed. She fights like all fury and is determined to live as long and as fully as possible, but occasionally finds the pain so extreme that it can be hard for her to justify continuing treatment. but she does. Beest has metastatic colon cancer. Stage 4. No real pain, this one is a silent killer. So we're doing the chemo. But it's different from most chemo. no hair loss, but extreme sensitivity to cold to a point of extreme pain. Even tap water needs to be heated to be drunk sometimes. I'm not looking forward to winter, I can't really imagine he is either, we live in the fucking arctic. But I digress, unfortunately for your friend, there just aren't any great choices, rock and a hard place. But I'm sure she isn't making obviously bad choices without care for those around her. Pain has a great knack for invading logical thought processes and diverting the stream of thought. When you hurt really badly, it can make sense to reject everything that you're doing now and go off at a tangent just to try and make it stop -like jumping off a tall cliff when you're being attacked by a swarm of bees in the hope that they won't be able to keep up with you during you descent.....

I'm sorry for everyone's suffering. Fuck cancer.

Just what, again, has been the reason for her avoidance of western medicine protocols until now? Was she raised in another culture, have a terrible experience with medical treatment here, born psychologically impaired, fried her brain on drugs, punishing everyone (maybe just her husband) because she got cancer and they didn't, attention whore extraordinaire; or, just too lazy to fight the good fight? There's more and more people gravitating to that last category who would rather die than have to work at living.

Is your friend selfless enough to talk hospice with her.

She may have been evaluating her husband's (and other's) receptiveness to a hospice conversation with that dead end scenario ... that is unless you can tell us the woman is just plain stupid or nuts.

Sorry about the predicament it puts you in.

Bottled water kept at room temperature goes down easy when I feel the need to hydrate quickly.

One of the down sides of the information age is the ability of quacks and scams to distract people with promised miracles, when looking for help. Those bastards are the lowest of the low, they don't just steal your money like a Nigerian Prince.

We hear Aunt Ruth, or Joe at work, has cancer then their gone, it's common to think cancer=death, sometimes slow and ugly, sometimes quick. I remember 40 years ago, a girl who was known as a drama queen said she had cancer, then a year later it was in remission. We all thought she had made it up for sympathy/attention. Remission, what the hell is that?
It's taken a long time for it to sink in that it's not automatic, there is treatment to put it into remission if it's detected early. Yes, maybe your GP isn't the best person to map a strategy, but he/she certainly knows a specialist who is. My mother had skin cancer at 65, and lived to be 95.

You could say it was because she went through a shit ton of regular medicine and still found herself in her predicament. 3? miscarrages, 2 cancers and one open-heart surgery before the last breast cancer diagnosis. Maybe she got tired of all that, and wanted to believe something else.

You could say she was wooed by the woo and still is - she was interested in some sort of woo convention around here where they are pitching healing crystals and whatnot

I can't say for sure. When her husband originally tried to talk sense into her, she quit speaking to him altogether. What are ya gonna do.

Sounds like a case of for better or for worse: he couldn't do any better and she couldn't do any worse.

It used to more often be the other way around; but, gender equality and all that jazz dontcha know.

I just realized today is the eighth anniversary of my best friend John's death. It almost got by me.

We still miss you, John.

:sniff:

:blackr:

Hugs Grav. It's always hard when it sneaks up and hits you unawares. X

Sent by thought transference

Auntie Joyce has died.
And it's unlikely I'll be able to get to her funeral.

She was a proper East End woman - stood by her man (Dad's brother Ted) through thick and thin. Laughed like a drain. Could drink for England.

I remember a night when she, Mum and I stayed up until the early hours, fuelled by Barcardi? vodka? (before I knew my drinking was a real problem) well after the "boys" gave up and went to bed. None of us could eat the next day, but she was impressed with my chops when I ordered a hair-of-the-dog.

She had a Tax Office job at a time few women of her class/ accent did. She got a good pension too, which helped see them through. She refused until the end to go into care (mentioned in this thread I think) but sadly ended up being shuttled from one home to hospital to another, to hospital and back, because she wouldn't sign consent.
Anyway, she lost the fight, as we all will in the end.

But I loved her.

It sounds like she was her own woman Sundae, a solid person to have known.

Sorry about your friend's situation Tony. Maybe we should all be considering our end of life issues.

Sorry for your loss, Sundae.

I'm sorry for your loss Sundae.

Auntie Joyce sounds like a badass, neither intimidating nor intimidated, the reason England will carry on. :thumbsup: RIP Joyce.

Like all great nieces I think you take after your Auntie, Sundae my dear x


Sent by thought transference

I've just been catching up on this thread. Hugs to all. Also, I concur with Limey's above assessment.