Does cancer or chemotherapy change you?

As a person who knows without a doubt I am going to die from this and have no idea when let me share some observations.


It is hard on both the person who has cancer and is going through treatments or even not going through treatments and it is hard on other people around that person whether caregiver, family member, husband/wife, girlfriend/boyfriend or friends.

I am changed, It changed me from the day they told me my surgeon told me he felt a mass in my colon while checking to make sure no surgical implements or towels or pads had been left behind from a total hysterectomy. (No "medical" need for the hysterectomy, I had simply had enough of the "monthly" thing, had, had my tubes tied since the birth of my second son in 1978 and was nearing menopause). It changed me again when I was told it was Stage IV metastasized to my lungs and liver. It changed me again when I started chemotherapy and found out I had the KRAS mutation which means my chemotherapy options were limited, it changed me when the chemotherapy had me so I could not think of a word I wanted to say or think how to spell T H E, it changed me in July after I spent two weeks in hell dealing with side effects from chemotherapy and decided to stop chemotherapy. It changed me this week when I finally got my results of my last CEA level from 08/16/10 and it had jumped 120 points in two weeks, it changed me again when I did some calculations and figured out how much my CEA level might be now (I figure 400-500) I don't know for sure as even though I had decided to stop chemotherapy anyways, my oncologist really has had nothing to do with me as I go in for hernia surgery this friday and there's nothing for him to do until after the surgery and I recover. It changed the way I looked at the world; sometimes if I am on an upswing all is  beautiful and bright and I can almost feel hope, sometimes when on a downswing as now it's a cold lonely world. It changed me this morning when my boyfriend was trying to figure out where to put the new television he bought and I was trying to explain to him I would trip over the cords if he put it on one side of the room and trailed the cords across the door front and got me frustrated to the point I said "I don't care, put it where you want to put it I won't be here that long anyway" and he absentmindly said "I know"

It changed me, both the chemotherapy and the cancer itself and I wish to God they had never told me I had cancer, just let me go until I didn't go anymore.