Chemo Brain

Chemo Brain is worse than ‘baby brain’.  Anyone who has ever been pregnant will back me up here, right from the moment that little embryo starts growing and developing your mind power isn’t quite what it was before, and this is magnified once your dear little one arrives and you don’t have a decent nights sleep (in some cases, ever again!).  You start doing silly things like loading the washing machine but not turning it on, putting the car keys in the fridge, leaving your car unlocked even though you checked it twice by pressing the key fob button or driving off with your purse on the roof!   Well in my experience having chemotherapy treatment is very similar.    Yesterday I put a dishwasher tablet in the washing machine drawer! I frequently forget people’s names, including my own children’s. And anything can happen when I'm required to concentrate fully on a task, like cooking a dinner!!    

My BF likened the whole of my breast cancer treatment to a bad pregnancy, and I can see she was right.  It is about 9 months of feeling nauseous, tired, bloated, gaining weight, having a bad taste in your mouth, broken sleep and suffering aches and pains.    You get stuck with needles every few weeks, tested for this that and the other and told not to eat certain foods (when neutropenic you should avoid ALL uncooked food).   Of course the main difference is what you get at the end of those hellish 9 months.   But are they so different?  On the one hand you get a beautiful baby, a new life.  A reason to celebrate.  Something to love and cherish, nurture and watch grow.  On the other, I will get… a new life, my own.  Hopefully and if I do the job right, I will feel healthier than I have ever before.  A fresh start, something to celebrate, love, cherish, nurture and watch grow.  Looking at it like that, its worth the shitty 9 months and is actually quite exciting!

I owe a lot to my BF for putting me in this positive mindset – thank you Mrs A, I Do Love You! x