I’ve decided to dedicate this blog to all the wonderful side effects I’ve been having throughout chemo! I feel like most people (myself included, prior to this year) when they think of cancer patients and their side effects, really only see hair loss, weight loss and nausea/vomiting. I started making a list the other day of all my side effects and let me tell you, there’s a lot more than those 3 I just listed. So here you go starting head to toe!

Hair Loss & Dry Scalp – I started losing my hair in February but was lucky it just ended up thinning out. I had it cut to help me feel better about losing it – so it didn’t look like I was losing THAT much! During this time I haven’t washed my hair a lot, to try and stop it from falling out, but then I got the adult version of cradle cap. So now I have to massage oil on my head about an hour before washing my hair so that it lifts off my scalp. This side effect has possibly the most impact on me, as I don’t feel like I look like myself anymore 😕

Memory Loss – Chemo Brain. It’s a real thing! If I’m in a conversation and someone interrupts to ask something else, I’ll answer and then completely forget what I was previously saying. Also just in general my memory can fail me a little bit, so apologies to anyone I’ve asked the same question to multiple times 🤯

Watery Eyes & Flakiness around my eyebrows and eyelashes – These are relatively new side effects. When I asked my oncologist about watery eyes, I wasn’t even sure it was a cancer related thing! But apparently it is! The flakiness around my brows & lashes is related to hair loss as my scalp started getting flaky when it started to fall out too. Luckily, I’ve still managed to keep majority of my lashes and brows though.

Dry Nose – Every morning I wake up with an extremely dry nose. Almost painful. But after about 10 minutes of being awake it then turns into a runny nose. I didn’t realise how much nose hairs help stop your nose from running! (I better go catch it 😉) So then obviously I blow my nose as it’s runny and then that turns into a blood nose most of the time. I was warned from the start to not blow my nose too hard as it can cause blood noses, but now I’m barely blowing my nose without it turning into a blood nose. I think I also have a heightened sense of smell too 👃

Mouth – There’s a few issues here… I’ve been lucky to have only had a couple of mouth ulcers and they seem to clear up really quickly with mouthwash (Biotene works well for sensitive mouths). I also have a really dehydrated mouth and tongue nearly all the time. That’s mostly due to the THC I’m taking, as it dehydrates you. But it’s also difficult to drink a lot of water on some days, so other days I try to drink at least 2 litres of water to try and make up for the days where I barely have any. Another issue is sensitive gums. I can’t use my electric toothbrush anymore as I need a super soft bristle. I feel like I can’t brush my teeth properly because it can make my gums bleed which isn’t nice. Dry and cracked lips are starting to become an issue but the yuk taste in my mouth and change of tastes is the worst. If there’s something that has one flavour I don’t like, I can’t eat it without feeling nauseous. My body also no longer tells me when I’m hungry so some days I forget to eat! Who would have ever thought those words would come from me?? It’s one of the hardest side effects to deal with as I know I need to eat, but when your body doesn’t tell you to, it feels like I’m being forced to do it anyway. Which is extremely frustrating.

Hands & Feet – I have neuropathy. This means that majority of the time I can’t feel my fingertips or toes. Neuropathy definitely impacts me most on a day to day basis than any other side effect. I’ve previously mentioned that I can’t do up buttons very well or open containers anymore but getting shoes on and doing up or undoing shoelaces is starting to prove more and more difficult. Hopefully I’ve reached the worst of it and it starts to improve soon. It can take 6-12 months for it to go away, if it does go away, as it’s not a guarantee. My hands and feet are peeling and sensitive and my nails are brittle and discoloured.

Scars – I still have a scar from my liver biopsy back in January! I had 3 samples taken at the time but only 1 left a scar. But the major scar I’ve got now is from my port. So that one is definitely permanent. My port is much easier than having a PICC line though (I also have a tiny scar on each arm from the PICC lines). It means I can shower without having to cover it up, less appointments with the hospital as I don’t need to change the dressings every week and less complications when accessing it. It can sting a little when accessed and during flushes and it took a while to be able to sleep on that side but apart from that it’s pretty handy!

Weight – I get weighed every time I go in for chemo. At the start it felt like I was constantly going to a weight watchers meeting! But it is actually very helpful to make sure I’m not losing weight from my lack of appetite. Which unfortunately has started to happen. The first few months of the year I ate a LOT – just to have a bit of leeway if I didn’t want to eat much on chemo days. And it worked, I gained about 8 kilos, but have since lost a couple due to lack of appetite.

On top of the above side effects, here are some more… Random bowel movements, rashes all over my body, lack of energy which equals tiredness and napping (I was never a napper!). Because I’m tired I don’t exercise as much so my muscles are weaker. Hot and cold flushes, getting my period while on zoladex injections (which are supposed to put me into menopause), hormone replacement patches, blood tests every fortnight, steroids – which keep me awake at night, physical ‘poking’ feeling in my upper abdomen. If I go for a massage now I have to fill in a separate form because I have cancer.

And these are just the physical side effects. Maybe next time I’ll enlighten you with all the fun mental and emotional side effects that come with cancer, like feeling dependent on everyone and feeling like I’m staring at a stranger in the mirror…

Sorry if this post is a bit of a downer but I really don’t want to sugar coat all the things we are dealing with on a daily basis. It’s tough. But we have wonderful support from our family and friends – like the ones below 💕