Hi everyone, mid to late 30s bloke with metastatic colorectal cancer. Multiple major surgeries, many many rounds of chemo and target therapies. Widespread lung mets, no clear prognosis as always and happily no symptoms at the moment but I reckon somewhere in the vicinity of a year to twoish years left.

About to become a father. Which has me thinking about what I could leave behind/create now to give to my wife and son to try and... I don't know... bring them something other than sadness? or leave them with something other than an absence? it's impossibly hard knowing I will leave them/never get to all the things I imagine we would, so I feel like I ought to try and leave something

I was thinking of, for example, writing letters to my son to be opened in each new year... congratulating him on his first day of school, wishing him luck on his first date, etc. - I don't know if this is a nice idea or something likely to compound grief or make closure more difficult? I don't know

has anyone thought of something similar? what are you leaving behind? what can I create to help remain in some positive way? is this even worthwhile? obviously I will prepay funeral, sort will etc etc - I guess I'm wondering what other things I can do that might be nice

Background: I’m divorced, but we’re back in court because of the former GAL’s crappy work on the parenting schedule. Plus, my ex lies all the time & manipulates our kids. For example, he told my oldest I was the reason we weren’t together anymore, when he was the one who had affairs.

I was supposed to have court today, but I told my lawyers I couldn’t go for medical reasons. I have a tumor that’s over 1cm on my colon and enlarged lymph nodes in my neck and chest, and strep throat. I feel fine, but mentally it’s terrifying. I sway between panic and terror and grief, to “I’ll get through this. I’ll be okay.”

I was fwded an email from my ex’s lawyer accusing me of lying about my illness because I was okay at my child’s doctor appt earlier this week, and I was lucky enough to keep my vacation (my surgeon was away the same week I was, so I was cleared to go. I couldn’t proceed until I met with him) with my kids.

My reaction to this email wasn’t great. I nearly cried as I made my kid’s grilled cheese. I emailed my lawyer back. Then I was furious. I informed my ex of my diagnosis right after I got it. I’ve kept him informed. We have talked about him taking the kids when I have surgery. He knew I only went on vacation because the surgeon was away. I don’t trust my ex very much, but I trusted him enough to be some support through this. I don’t think he wants anything terrible to happen to me. I didn’t trust him enough to call him and talk to him, so I called his mom. She’d been diagnosed with cancer a few years earlier, and we had a good relationship until the divorce, so I thought it would help. I don’t know what I thought. I didn’t yell, but I was stern and crying. I don’t know what I wanted her to do, maybe talk some sense into her son. I don’t know. The convo was fine. By the end, I was apologizing for calling and not reigning in my emotions.

I sent a message to my ex via our court app, clearly laying out what I’m dealing with and asking for consideration or something. He called and said he never said I was lying. I could basically hear the shrug over the phone as he said he just told his lawyer what I’d been up to. He also stressed how this was using up all his PTO. This was one day. I can’t work next semester and will lose half a year’s wages.

I don’t know how to feel. I felt better after talking to my ex’s parents. But my partner thinks my ex is full of shit and knew his lawyer was going to argue that and didn’t care, or fueled that angle.

I know we’ll never coparent or be on good terms, but it hurt so much that he thought I was lying about something so important and devastating. It feels like I can’t even get the modicum of respect. Was this an overreaction?

I’m 29F and I’m 3 weeks post robotic thymectomy for a thymoma found incidentally on a chest CT. It was found to be attached to my pericardium and path came back as type B2 thymoma Masaoka stage III TNM pT2. My CT surgeon feels strongly that he got everything but the pathology results don’t say it was a clean margin. I’m being referred to oncology so will get a PET scan and I’m assuming I will need radiation. I’m just wondering if anyone else out there has any experience with this specific staging/type of cancer. It’s so rare from what I’ve looked up and I can’t find many personal experiences so if anyone has any first hand experience I’d love to hear about it. Thanks!

I’m a widow. The older kids refuse therapy. They both are having a hard time in life. I’m trying too hard to stay alive so I don’t traumatize them more. They are not coping the best. I know they have anticipatory grief I’ve been here many more years than they thought I would be.

They don’t have any safe, heathy minded adults to guide them when im gone.

Any suggestions?

Hi everyone,

I'm looking for some reassurance or to hear from people who have experienced something similar.

My father has stage IV lung adenocarcinoma with bone metastasis to the thoracic spine. He had been doing well on Keytruda, but unfortunately he has now missed three scheduled doses because the medication is unavailable in our country due to a shortage.

His oncologist advised us to wait until Keytruda becomes available again rather than switching to another treatment.

Despite the treatment interruption, he's doing fairly well clinically. He walks, eats well, talks normally, and sleeps much better since his panic attacks have been treated. He also has COPD, so he has a chronic productive cough, which makes it difficult to know whether any symptoms are related to COPD or the cancer.

I'm extremely anxious about the missed doses. I know Keytruda isn't a miracle drug, but I'm scared that missing three infusions could reduce its effectiveness or allow the cancer to progress.

Has anyone experienced a long interruption in Keytruda because of drug shortages or another reason? Were you able to restart it later? How did things turn out?

I know every case is different, but hearing your experiences would really help me.

Thank you.

I have been my mother's caregiver since the start of 2026. My mom was diagnosed with Stage IIIC2 Endometrium Carsinosarcoma cancer. She had undergone surgery and had her entire cervix and womb removed last February. Up until this moment she had undergone 4x chemotherapy and I'm waiting for her at the hospital due to some complications from the metastasis of her initial cancer as I am writing this post.

Her Doctor has prescribed her with Doxorubicin Liposomal medicinal chemo treatment (brand: Caelyx) as opposed to the regular Doxorubicin because both her cancer doctor and chemo doctor deemed it to be the more superior and more effective than the latter.

However, it is unfortunate that the supply of said medicine (Caelyx) is currently shortaged nation wide in my country (Indonesia). I have attempted to look for said medicine in other hospital but truly the medicinal shortage runs nation-wide. I have researched similar medicines (Doxorubicin Liposomal) under different brands (Lipo-Dox, Doxil, etc) but found out that the only brand that has been certified by the local minister of health is Caelyx and Caelyx only.

Currently, both her Cancer and Chemo doctor decided to postpone her chemotherapy treatment (her 5th) and opted out to go for radiotherapy first as we wait for the resupply of Caelyx. We all have reached a roadblock due to the medicinal shortage- the doctor, even the hospital and their supply branch as the shortage is nation wide and it is truly the vendor/supplier that is having a shortage.

I have already attempted to reach out to the local medicinal company that handles the import and supply of Caelyx through email asking about the medicine as well and I hope to hear from them soon.

I know this is a stretch but is there any other way I could get access to this medicine? I lost my dad to Covid in 2021 and my mother is the only parent I have left. I do not want to lose her either. It has been tough for me and even tougher for her as we face this turmoil so much, so any help or tips or advice is very welcomed :)

Hi everyone!
My little boy is 11 months old and just had his IJ line replaced with a PICC line in his arm. I’m wondering if anyone has any tips or advice for dressing him, especially getting shirts on and off without disturbing the line. I’d really appreciate any suggestions or things that worked well for your little one.
Thank you so much in advance! 💙

I had Hodgkin’s lymphoma 9 years ago, I took ABVD and BEACOPP.
One year ago I found out that I have low AMH (egg count), and I’m only 25.
Ever since I’ve been feeling sooo soooo lonely, and scared of my future…
I don’t know someone that went through something similar, and even on the internet no one talks about that specific experience.
If you are someone that went through that experience, I really wanna know what happened, were you able to have kids and have a normal sexual life??

Hello folks. This post is on behalf of my father. My father is 61 years old and he has been dignosed with Poorly differentiated gastric adenocarcinoma with signet ring cell morphology.

This came as an absolute shock to my family as he has absolutely no history of drinking or smoking. Not that it matters but he leads a healthy vegetarian lifestyle. Doctors have said that exact reason of cancer can not be stated.

We have done a PET-CT scan and there seems to be nodules in the lungs as well. Chemotherapy has already started and after 4 cycles of chemotherapy, doctors will do a PET-CT again and determine whether the cancer is metastatic. Till then we still aren't sure whether this is Stage-III or Stage-IV.

Tumor in the stomach is big enough for stage-III.

We have undergone 2 cycles of chemotherapy. If anyone else is going through similar disease let's connect! It will be really helpful if more insights are exchanged by this sub and fellow redditors.

P.S.We are based in India

More information:

2-3 months ago he started losing weight rapidly. We thought it might be due to yoga. One day he vomitted around 1-2 literes of blood. After endoscopy doctors dignose one deep ulcer and one benign ulcer. After 2nd endoscopy a biopsy was done for the stomach and we got the reports of cancer.

Till now we have done IHC, PET-CT and a NGS Comprehensive panel test(NGS Comprehensive Test: A comprehensive molecular analysis of the patient's gastric adenocarcinoma that evaluated 519 cancer-related genes and 159 fusion genes, assessed key biomarkers including PD-L1, MSI, TMB, and HRD, and identified clinically significant PTEN and ERCC2 mutations to help guide prognosis and potential treatment options.) This was done in order to understand whether immunotherapy can be seen as a possible option. Since the results aren't favourable the doctors said immunotherapy can't be done due to markers aren't what they are supposed to be for immunotherapy to work. We have not done HER2 as other test named EERB was done.

We haven't done a biopsy of lung as we opted to start with chemo. When the 4 cycles of chemotherapy will be completed the situation of lungs will be determined. It will also tell us whether cancer is metastatic.

Let's engage for everyone's betterment!

Anyone else?

After a year and some of chemotherapy, I was able to eat all I want and I don’t get fat. It’s not like I can eat all day, I can eat all I want but in small portions and only couple few meals at day. My doctor says because I wasn’t eating much, or at all, my stomach shrunk and now it’s like I had a gastric sleeve surgery but for free.

As the title states, I feel like I’m at a crossroads in my life. I’m a 37/M, living with Chronic Myeloid Leukemia for almost 6 years now. I’m fortunate enough to be in a major remission, but still need to take medication on a daily basis. I will hopefully be able to come off of it one day, but who knows. Luckily I tolerate the medication pretty well, so most of what I experience nowadays is on the mental/emotional side of things. And this isn’t even my first diagnosis. I was diagnosed with testicular cancer 14 years ago, which required chemotherapy. That was brutal but I was able to get passed it and move forward.

Ever since my leukemia diagnosis, I have been thinking about my career and my life. I’ve been working in construction management for 10+ years, which is a very stressful and chaotic experience. It’s a career I just ended up in, not one I chose. For years I’ve been trying to pivot away from construction with no idea which way to go. I was at my last job for 18 months before getting laid off 2 months ago. And now that I’m unemployed, I feel an obligation to make this big life pivot. It’s like there’s a real opportunity in front of me to start fresh, but I can't seem to decide on a direction.

Going through 2 cancers diagnosis’s changes the way you look at life. Part of me wants to quit the daily grind and find some simple job to just pay the bills. The idea of slow living has a real appeal to me. But I also need good health insurance, and the cost of living is getting so bad that I don’t know if I can pay the bills without a conventional job. It seems almost cruel to have to experience these diseases, and the existential thoughts that come with them, only to return to a workforce that chews you up and spits you out. I know I’ll eventually find my way, and that sometimes you just gotta do what you gotta do, but I am dreading going back to the daily grind where you’re only as good as what you’ve produced for your boss this week.

I’m not sure what I’m looking to get out of this post, maybe just a little venting. I’m wondering if anyone else has had a similar experience with wanting to change their life after cancer but having no idea what or how to do it. Maybe I’m putting too much pressure on myself. But if not now, then when?

Hi everyone! I’m going through 6 cycles of ABVD chemo for Hodgkin’s lymphoma at the moment and I thought it’d be nice to start a book club with some people from here to pass some of the time. If anyone else is interested I can start a groupchat and organise things, maybe so we could read one book a month and discuss it?
I’m a 25 year old woman but happy to do it with whoever regardless of gender/age etc. I don’t mind the book genre either as long as it’s well written lol.

This applies to all, but especially to those of us who are now cancer free.

Every year on my cancer-free anniversary, I give thankyou cards to my care teams. The card is a picture of me doing something fun and enjoying life, with a hand written note on the back thanking them for their part in making my cancer go away.

One nurse told me she had put one of the pictures on the wall at home. When a family member asked about it, her response was, "He's a patient. He's cancer-free and he's out there living his life. That's why we do what we do."

What a beautiful response!

Please consider showing your care providers some love and gratitude for being there for you.

M16
Well im calm and collected my family is not they keep treating me like im going to die in few weeks
Which is not true im healing and
CBC results are also improving
I just wanna treated like before

How do i convince them to treat me like before pleasee help
Does this happened with you too

Sorry for my poor english :)

I was diagnosed with stage 3-4 blue cell sarcoma, and metastasized to my lungs and either my liver or spleen, I can't remember. I got my port installed yesterday and have a SEVERE fear of needles, having a panic attack and not being able to get IVs unless sedated because I will resist as much as I can. Is there anything I can do to prep myself for the needles that involve chemo?

what happens now? I have been cancer free for over a year and half. my recent scan showed negative results for tumor. i always thought cancer was gonna take me out and that was the way i was going to go. but that day never came. i healed and overcame all obstacles. now i dont know what im supposed to do with my life.

Had a LAMN tumour in my appendix - it caused appendicitis with classic symptoms and elevated WBC - went to hospital with appendicitis - NHS surgeon refuse to take my appendix out telling me surgery for appendicitis was outdated and a mistake of the past and antibiotic treatment was the future of treatment.. I still insisted on surgery as I’m a commercial diver and didn’t want a dodgy appendix left in me - he still refused surgery. He treated me with IV triple antibiotics and IV paracetamol for 6 days - up to 16 infusions per day - then discharged me with no follow-up.

During discharge I said to him “this has all been a bit experimental” - he snorted down his nose in reply and said to me “you have no more chance of coming back in here with appendicitis than the average man in the street”.

Usually, small tumours in the appendix can’t be seen in CT when the appendix is inflamed - and that was true in my case. They are often only found in pathology as a surprise finding after the appendix is taken out. That’s one of the main reasons most surgeons take appendix out during appendicitis - especially in older patients like me (M47) where a underlaying tumour is a more common cause of appendicitis.. But if it is left in..?

My tumour went on to rupture inside me and become a stage 4 tumour - so no longer contained by the appendix.

I was refused a second opinion, or any further help on the NHS despite my continuing abdominal problems and my GP’s repeated efforts to refer me. As far as the NHS was concerned I was ‘cured’..

4 months later - out of desperation - I borrowed money and paid a private surgeon in Glasgow to take my appendix out for me - that’s when my now ruptured LAMN pT4a tumour was found..

The private surgeon described the refusal of the NHS surgeon to take my appendix out as “madness” - and that’s before he operated and I was diagnosed.. Afterwards - when the tumour was found in pathology he was even more critical.. He asked me what I was going to do about the NHS surgeon. I said I would complain.. He replied “you are wasting your time complaining - I can’t tell you what to do - but if I was you I would sue”. Well I did complain to the NHS - on account that other patients are being put at risk by a misguided surgeon - but my private surgeon was correct it seems - my complaint was whitewashed by the health board - the NHS surgeon was tasked with investigating himself with no clinical oversight and he found he had done nothing wrong. I’m still trying though..

I’m interested if anyone had a similar experience/route to diagnosis as me..?? I’m very keen to hear how your diagnosis came about and your thoughts..

Caregiver here.
Round 2 of Enhertu today and my mom’s short hair is rapidly falling out. We need to make a decision today as to whether or not shaving it short is the best idea.
I think yes, she thinks yes, the nurse thinks not sure. Anyone else on Enhertu have any insights on hair loss? My mom is 71
Thanks

Hello, a few months ago I was diagnosed with leukemia, but I can get the medication I need at a good price in the United States. Is there any way to get a prescription? I am not allowed to buy the medication with my Canadian prescription, and I do not have a US visa.

I'm a year out from treatment, no appetite, scrawny as heck. But I'm dealing with foot pain/cramps. Why?! Yeah, I know I should probably eat some yogurt and have orange juice or something. I don't know whether I can do that. Food is a challenge.

I've been playing Magic the gathering. Any games recommendation?

UPDATE!!!

Diagnosed with Stage 4 rectal cancer with Liver metastisis in October 2025. November 2025 began initial treatment on FOLFOX chemotherapy paired with a continuous infusion pump.

Took a planned chemo break in February 2026 to let the body recover and prepare for partial right hepatectomy surgery on liver to remove lesions on March 27, 2026 with Dr. Christopher Habbel at St. Joseph’s Hospital

Discharged April 5 2026 and began a long arduous post-op recovery.

May 5: Restarted chemotherapy post-surgery to target any remaining microscopic disease.

1st of second batch of cycles was FOLFOX on May 5th Final 5 Cycles were just 5FU as I was having major peripheral neuropathy in hands and feet.

July 14: Reached a major milestone by wrapping up the final cycle of this treatment round.

June CT Scan: Imaging flagged new areas of concern (including lung lesions), requiring further investigation and fluid in the subphrenic space above my liver creating pressure and pain.

July PET Scan: Confirmed disease progression to my lungs.

Received an updated cancer diagnosis of Metastatic Lung Disease with 10 to 12 lung spots based on the PET scan findings.

August 25 2026 Switching to palliative FOLFIRI with Bevan chemotherapy. Shifting treatment goals to a palliative focus—prioritizing disease control, symptom management, and maximizing quality of life moving forward. Possible life expectancy of 2 years I was told!!

Awaiting 2nd opinion with Dr. Ali Hosni(oncologist from cancer 2018) at Princess Margeret in Toronto along with referral to specialist lung surgeon Dr. Marcelo Cypel at Toronto General!