All good points, Brian.

A referral to the Palliative Pain Team at my cancer center was one of the best things that was done for me. I doesn't necessarily mean end of life issues. They do a great deal of pain management via different medication regimens that are right for you. I still meet with them on an outpatient basis for pain management.

I was horrified at a couple of the drugs that were part of my regimen because they had such a stigma and were associated with coming off of street drugs, but they did the trick and honestly, I didn't feel all that impaired by them. When the time came, I was slowly tapered off them so as not to go into withdrawal. I slept a lot during my rads treatments, but I got blasted with the highest possible dose. All in all, the important thing is that my pain was finally under control once I was admitted to the hospital for pain management, leukopenia, dehydration, and malnutrition due to PEG issues. I don't remember this, but my husband does...he said I told my rads nurse that I thought I was dying. She asked me if I wanted to be admitted and I said yes. I was there for 2 weeks...and back 4-5 times more than I can remember for various complications...infected port, multiple PEG issues, etc.

I'm glad that's over! I think I block a lot of it out of my mind or it's chemobrain...maybe a little of both. I hope never to EVER have to go through the likes of that again! None of us does!