This
is about Janice, my wife. My
name is Robert. We live south of London, UK.
Janice had endometrial cancer in
1987, from which she was not expected to survive. Chemotherapy, which
was
ineffective, was followed rapidly by intensive radiotherapy over many
months.
This was intended to be palliative, and to try to control the intense
pain. It
was some considerable time before the therapy ameliorated the
pain. Also, a very effective
breakthrough came with
a skilfully administered pain block. Ultimately, the radiotherapy was
more
effective than anyone dared to hope, as all these years later she is
still
alive, but still experiences problems.
Although all this treatment has
dealt with the cancer, it has left a legacy of severe damage to the
small
bowel. This manifested itself several months after the end of
treatment, by a
bout of intense pain and vomiting over very many hours. This was, as we
knew
later, a bowel blockage. In the earlier years following treatment,
there were
many repetitions of these attacks, perhaps every 4-6 months, but as
time has
progressed the frequency also increased to about every 3 weeks.
We are unable to plan anything, go
on holiday for example, as we never know when an attack will kick in,
which is
now very soon after the initial indication.
With attacks this frequent,
including vomiting and pain which could last up to 16
hours, with many days to
recover,
Janice was not rehabilitating enough to withstand the onslaught of the
next
attack.
In August 2000 she had a series of
attacks lasting in total 7 days. Each time it appeared to be
on the
wane, it would kick in again. She needed a further week to recover from
this.
The effect over this many years is gradual
debilitation. She was working as full time as possible between these
attacks.
Thankfully, her employers were very accommodating but she made an
arrangement with them whereby
she did not get paid for time taken off work for these attacks or the
recovery
time needed. From June 07 she retired. |
