SRT started - Bummed out

You know ---
yeah, it does kind of suck to have to go through this. You're doctors and techs understand that, we understand that. It's okay to not be happy about it.

but ...

try to do something nice for yourself that helps distract your brain from all this - at least for a hour or two. Read a book, watch a movie, take walk, visit friends. Something, anything.

Hang in there, it's a marathon and not fun.

We're here anytime you need to vent.
Andrew

Your treatment and everything associated with is hard--taking in the suffering of everyone around you as you go to your treatments. It shows your humanity. The advice you're getting of treating yourself well during this time is the best thing you can do to care for yourself. My husband got lots of good medical advice from the staff about prepping for his nine weeks of IMRT but nothing about prepping his mind for it.

Here's what he wound up doing:

--He took a longer, more scenic route to and from the hospital to de-stress and get his mind in gear. (He rode his motorcycle to the sessions as often as possible because he finds that relaxing. I have two friends who rode their bicycles to radiation for the same reason. It made them feel they were still normal.)

--He always had a good book going on his Kindle at home and in the waiting room instead of just flipping through his phone, reading magazines, doing the waiting room crossword puzzle, etc.

--He asked for music to be turned off during the sessions! I know, many people find that music helps them lie still. Decide how you want to deal with whether or not music helps the sessions pass. There's lots of meditative music online that you may be able to listen to during the sessions or some of your own good music. (On the subject of music, when we visited Dana Farber for a consult, the huge waiting area was filled with the sickest people imaginable, including children and young people--heartbreaking and depressing. DF had a very good pianist in the lobby loudly playing a gamut of music. Guess what? The music seemed, to us anyway, so intrusive and inappropriate somehow as if we were in a Nordstrom department store. Whenever the pianist stopped playing, it was a relief honestly to just sit there quietly reading. (We love music, but not always other people's music in a setting where silence is its own kind of music.)

--Because my husband had been going to acupuncture to help cope with hot flashes from Lupron, he also learned to get into a kind of Zen mode (while having to tell the acupuncturist to turn off their music!!!) and he's not a Zen kinda guy! There's an app called https://www.headspace.com that teaches people how to use meditative techniques to deal with sleep problems, anxiety, or get through difficult times. Maybe trying out some of the strategies in a small way at home at might carry over to your SRT sessions as well.

It's pretty sobering to take in the suffering of this world and to know you're part of it. Take it in, don't avoid it, but find some good ways to relieve your own suffering as well. Peace.

Lots of good advice here. For me, working my way alphabetically through composers (or performers or time periods) created conversations with the techs.
It never got easier but did get routine after the first week.

Whenever my wife asks me how I feel about an impending medical treatment, my standard line iis borrowed from WC Fields epitaph: “On the whole, I would rather be going to Philadelphia.” Best wishes with your remaining 34.

Jay - I'm betting that part of this is how the lupron is affecting you. I believe that part of your depression is driven by your body's reaction to rapidly dropping T levels. I haven't had to endure lupron, but I have been on TRT for quite a few years now, and that is exactly how I feel if my T levels drop due to any change in dosage, product used, or any of a number of other causes. I start to feel the "Low-T Blues."

I'm lucky - mine typically only lasts a day or a few, until my levels rise again. In your case, you may "get used to it" or you may not. I would suggest that you talk to the folks at your treatment center and ask if they have a counselor on staff, with whom you could meet. They would be able to help you with some tools to cope with the changes that your body is experiencing.

I've been an on-line "counselor" on another medical condition-related board for about 15 years now, and we often tell new folks there that "There is no shame in seeking help for depression or similar moods/feelings. The only shame is not using the help that is available, and not being able to live your life to its fullest."

JayMot said...
I started my SRT yesterday, so 2 sessions of 34 down... I look at the ceiling and start feeling sorry for myself. I'm not supposed to be here! Maybe it's the Lupron (1 month in) working its magic, but I gotta figure some way outta this funk. I think they sense my angst. So, this post is just an effort to express the way I feel right now.

It's probably the ADT plus all of your accumulated stress. It happens. Lupron takes about a month to kick in and makes us guys tend to cry a lot. I'm trying to review your history from this thread: https://www.healingwell.com/community/default.aspx?f=35&m=4140786&g=4140786#m4140786 but TBH too many personal triggers. When I was put on Lupron I'd been depressed for a couple of years already (from the early biopsies and such). Plus my wife and I have been dealing with others cancers, very rare, not much online support.

By the time she's finished chemo I had started an antidepressant, venlafaxine. I had to fight to get it. And I had seen a lot of bald heads by then. The ven really helped, but by the time I started RT I'd been on Lupron for eight months already, so I was sort of accustomed to it. And I struck up a friendship with another guy in the RO's waiting room who was about a week behind me and we talked a lot throughout. Then hurricane Irma swept thru and a lot of us lost power for a week or so. Florida with NO AC!!

For much of my treatment (and my wife's) I spent a lot of time online reading other people's stories. I believed that we were both very fortunate that our cancers were caught before they had gone any further. We had hope, and I was constantly reminding myself that finally I was able to fight this cancer. I imagined the little cancer cells dying a horrible death. Okay, maybe not so uplifting.

Remember that you've already been thru a tremendous war, and this is the final battle. You WILL BE victorious.

You will become more uplifted and encouraged as you start working your way through the treatments and start seeing "the light at the end of the tunnel" ...

I had to race to treatments, at day's end, after a full day of work, to get the "last treatment of the day" --- I'm a teacher and didn't want to miss school.

I found out that if I changed into track pants and a t-shirt before the treatment ( metal zippers not allowed, by the way), then I didn't have to change into those dreaded hospital gowns.

Here's what "lifted me up" --- the technicians began playing my favorite music requests --- ask them if they offer this --- two songs, and I was done.

Also, as soon as I left the hospital, I drove to a nearby recreational lake and took a walk. You'd be surprised how that walk encouraged me, gave me something to think about during the treatment, and allowed me to "clean the slate" after every treatment ---

Also --- on days when I needed a pick-me-up, I would stop at a favorite deli, bakery, or coffee shop and get myself a treat.

Every weekend, after a week's worth of treatments were over, then I picked a different restaurant --- some old favorites, and some new ones I wanted to try --- and that was encouraging, also --- anything that provides a goal or feeling of "getting away" will help --- and some time to rest, because radiation treatments can leave you with residual fatigue.

Take care of yourself --- start counting down the treatments --- I started at 45 treatments, and I eventually worked it down to zero --- it's a marathon, not a spring, but patience, day by day, will get you there.

Handshake, support, comradeship ~ from "one brother to another brother" ~
CYCLONE ~ Iowa State University

If you are male, your age divided by 100 is the chance you have PCa. It is not a personal failure of some kind that causes it, just the 'luck of the draw'.

The feeling of lack of control is central to the onset of depression. Merely going in for treatment should give you a start on dealing with that as you are indeed doing something. Being as healthy as you possibly can (or attempting to do that) will give you a measure of actual control.

I run 2 - 3 hours every day and work out hard doing load bearing activities so I am pretty much always sore and tired. I use (clean organic) cannabis flower buds in a vaporizer for pain and nausea. That also lowers my anxiety and depression.

I routinely meditate during scans as that is the most profitable thing for me to do while lying still and breathing regularly. The calm that comes from this practice stays with me for a very long time.

JAYMOT, hang in there it will get really boring as time goes on. Boring is good though, in this case.

It is a slog. I worked throughout treatment so that kept my mind off the PCa for the most part. At the radiation clinic many people visibly had it worse than me. I found myself trying to help them with small things like getting them a water or striking up a conversation about family.

For the treatment itself I did two things. First, I brought my own music and had them play it loud. Second, was advice from my wife who was going through her second full blown bout of breast cancer. She said during the radiation you must somehow visualize the x-rays destroying the cancer cells. So every time the LINAC did its humming to indicate I was getting radiated I would chant “Snap...Crackle...Pop...kill those ******s!” Of course the technicians could hear me and they always cracked up. I must have said the chant 50 time each session for 25 sessions. I think it worked.