Father made the effort to start his online journal about his metastatic liver cancer at a stage of his life where the energy and life was drained out of his body.
With all respect to father, I am going to re-read his complete metastatic liver cancer blog and try to make it in some sort of e-book.
I would love other cancer patients and cancer care givers to join: leave a small comment about what cancer is in your life or what it means for you.
The idea is that all the people that still have to undergo sooner or later cancer within their lives, have some support from similar cancer stories.
Every cancer story is different, yet it all involves cancer.
Every person is different, yet we all are humans.
My 43 yr. old husband was diagnosed with hepatocellular carcinoma early February of this year. The oncologists that we consulted with all concluded that his mass was to large to operate on and it was too dangerous for the other recommended treatments. Our only option was the liver cancer drug – Nexavar which he began on Feb. 12th. Since then his oncologist has also combined the treatment with an infusion of Avastin (which is not approved by Blue Cross Blue Shield). Since the infusion I have watched my husband go downhill with extreme high blood pressure which leaves him weak and fatigued most of the time. He barely leaves his bedroom and when he does it’s only to eat. To me, he is getting more jaundiced which is not a good sign. We have two young children (3 & 12) – I feel saddest when I think of the kids without their father around. This disease has turned our whole world upside down – I am praying for a miracle but from what I’ve read about this disease, it just doesn’t look good. Everyday I feel like he is drifting further and further away from us and I live in a constant state of sadness and loss (even though he is still with us). I’m always on the Internet looking for alternative treatments for his cancer. Has anyone ever tried alternative medicine and have gotten good results from it?
My husband, aged 49, died of liver cancer on the 5 March 2008.
He went for a employment medical in mid February2008 and the doctor noticed some red spots on his upper body. (other doctors had ignored this earlier) These had been around for about 18 months and we had put them down to burst blood capillaries that his dad has too.
The doctor felt his liver and said it was enlarged and referred him for an ultrasound & blood test
The results we recieved on the week preeding the 18th Feb were good news in that the diagnosis was benign growths and he had Hep C. (My husband was an ambulance office early in his career & this may have been the point of infection)
His concern was for me however & I tested negative for Hep C on the 19th and the doctor referred my husband to a clinic to treat his Hep C.
At the referred clinic appointment on the 21 Feb the doctor said my husband needed urgent blood test and cT scan. The bloods were taken that afternoon and the CT scan was performed the next day on the 22nd Feb.
My husband went into the scan appearing and feeling well and the moment he came out he complained of a sore shoulder which he thought was from laying in the machine with his arms above his head.
By that night he was in extreme pain and by the 23 Feb afternoon I took him to the local hospital emergency to get some relief.
The pain did not subside and on the 24 Feb he started to hiccup and did not stop. We again went to the local hospital emergency as the hiccups were interfering with his breathing and he was becoming very exhausted.
More pain relief coupled with valium were prescribed to relax his diaphram. My husband was not to happy to be drugged so much and I was becoming inreasingly concerned about him.
On the 25th March (Monday morning) I rang the clinic and pleaded with them to see my husband as I KNEW there was something really wrong and his face was very sick looking.
We were advised to come through the clinic’s hospital emergency and after waiting a number of hours (while my husband continued to hiccup) a registrar from the clinic came to see him. She said that the hiccup and shoulder pain were part and parcel of the “advanced aggressive liver cancer” that my husband had.
We were flabbergasted/stunned/shcked/crying and said that this was the first we had heard of CANCER . The registrar explained that there was no available treatment and requested that we keep the appointement we were meant to get the ct results at for the following Thursday (28th march) to discuss palliative care.
We returned home and Kim and I decided not to tell anyone in the near future to let ourselves digest the prospects.
That night I googled liver cancer + hiccups and some site referred to this symptom as the ‘final stages’. I shut the computer down and didn’t tell my husband this.
In the meantime the shoulder pain and the hiccups continued into the 27th and by lunchtime the drugs prescibed over the weekend by the emergency doctors at our visits renedered my husband bombed out and he stopped breathing.
I called his GP in a mad panic and shook him to life and called an ambulance.
I called all our kids and my husbands family. we became inundated with visitors.
The doctors asked if my husband wanted to stay in hospital and all we wanted to do was get home which we did.
We went along to the scheduled Thursday appointment at the clinic and the doctor told us my husband had about 2 months to live. We cried all the way home in the car.
Thursday night and the pain increased and I got on the phone to palliative services in desperation on the 29th and with the help of the clinic urging them to come they visited us at home that day.
The nurse took one look at my husband …organised better meds for pain relief and told us she thought he had a week or 2 left at best.
A morphine pump was fitted to Kim on Saturday the 1st March.
He was given steroids which lifted him on the 2nd and 3rd.
On the evening of the 4th after much love amongst us all and the kids we went to bed and he started to die before my eyes.
He died on the 5th at around 10.45 in the morning.
I am shocked and still in disbelief at the rapid decline and death of my beautiful soulmate.
I believe the contrast that my husband drank for the CT scan blew his cancer and symtoms up and hastened his death. Only consolation is that this may have shortened the time he was in pain.
On reflection syptoms of lethargy were around about 18 months beforehand that we put down to his dislike of his job ( which he changed and worked hard at his new job)
He also went thru bout of itching about 18 months prior to his death.
The palliative care nurses came to our home like angels in the night and without them my husband and I would not have been afforded the dignity and our wish for him to remain with us till the end.
God Bless You for what you are trying to do.
I am taking care of my 81-year-old mother who up until last year looked and behaved like a 50-year-old. It is so hard to see her in the state that she is in now. She is so weak and does not want to eat anything. I beg her to eat because of all the meds she is taking but she does not want anything. She does drink a lot of water though. She does not want to go to palliative care and so I am doing the best that I can at home. It is so scary and sad.
How do I know when the end is approaching? I would appreciate any help you can provide.