Hi there, so sorry to hear about your diagnosis but glad to hear the operation went well.

What type of chemo are you having? There are so many, with different side effects (not all of which people get). Chemo is much more tailored to the individual nowadays, it has come on such a long way.

I can only talk about my experience - I am 39 so pushing it in the childbearing window I guess, and going through chemo for breast cancer.

I was told with my chemo there was a risk it would damage my ovaries and I MAY become infertile but it is NOT guaranteed. I have injections of a drug to protect them, to put them to sleep. If I wanted to try to get pregnant post treatment, I would have to stop the hormone treatment I will be put on (which I have to take for a minimum of 2 years), try to conceive, then if I get pregnant go back on the hormone treatment to take me up to 5 years.

However the hormone treatment is there to help stop the cancer coming back, so it is a big risk.

Because I am under 40 I was offered fertility treatment before chemotherapy. They would have done egg retrieval and frozen them. So you should surely be offered the same? I would enquire about that. In my case I refused it, I wasn't 100% sure if I wanted children, I've left it too long anyway, and my treatment was delayed with various issues and my oncologist said we needed to crack on. So I did!

I am angry and upset my choice has been removed but my priority right now is removing this cancer and it never coming back.

As for chemo impacting your day to day life, as I said it depends on the type, and we're all individual. My oncologist recommended I take the full 5 months off work, I'm only 9 days into treatment but I'm taking the first 2 months off minimum and then maybe part time for the rest. You need to see how your body reacts, it is quite predictable after you do the first infusions, apparently, the pattern of sickness will remain the same in most cases, just intensify. But it is accumulative, and the fatigue will steadily increase.

The last few days I have had pretty "normal" days, meeting friends, having dinner at home with them, even had a small glass of wine! I feel much more tired but the days I don't have nausea I feel ok. I don't know each morning how it's going to be so it's hard living day to day but you just have to lower your expectations.

I will say practice self care and compassion. I went back to my team and totally presented the best case scenario in terms of me coming back, because I felt so bad leaving them in the lurch and I wanted to go back to normal.

But the truth is I had (and still have) no idea how my body would react to the chemo and who knows, if I had attempted to work during these 9 days maybe my side effects would be worse? Maybe I would have hindered my recovery?

My only job at the moment is to get better.

I hope this helps, best of luck x 

Hi Georgie,

A very warm welcome to our forum.

I am so sorry to hear of your diagnosis and of your current concerns., but I am so glad to hear that you have had a reply from Clars, telling you about the fertility treatment that she was offered. At your age, I would have expected you to have been given advice about fertility. I understand that your eggs can also be saved for later. 

Please phone your specialist nurse and ask about this. She can arrange another appointment for you to discuss this with your consultant, if she can't answer all of your questions.

Please keep in touch and let us know how you get on. We are always here for you.

Kind regards,

Jolamine xx