Starting chemo tomorrow

I am trying to find Carla's thread on the forum and can't. If Carla or anyone could tell me where it is, I would appreciate it.
Thanks

Dana,

Don't mess with the statistics. As of this point, with some lymph node involvement and prostate involvement, it means T4. Many have local spread to lymph nodes and are successfully treated with chemo.

CT/PET scan is one test for looking for any distant spread but that will be up to his doctor. There are other things, and no, it is not by biopsies.

I'd say it may be a good time to stop searching the internet.
Go with the assumption that he does not have mets if mets have not been found. Get the chemo and continue to get the scans to see if it shows up anywhere else. Hopefully, it will not.

Declare a part of your house to be a "Cancer free" zone. Either that or maybe declare a certain time of the day as a "cancer free" time. Kind of a time out from cancer. During that time out, there is to be no thinking of or talking about cancer. It's a put it all on hold, break from cancer. It can get all to overwhelming and consuming so both you and your husband need a time or place where you put it away and do and think about other things.

Stress is bad for everybody and it is not denial to "take a break" from it all now and then.


Not sure if you've seen posts from Jimswife (Carla). Her husband Jim had lymph involvement and chemo and he's doing well now.

Mike

The biopsy was done by the urologist after the cystectomy, he did have cancer in the prostate but that is out.
No biopsy has been done by the oncologist because we only met with him last week, he told us to do a number of tests and he will see them tomorrow.
The oncologist said it was Mx because the biopsy was done only on the old bladder and area surrounding it where the lymph nodes were removed.
I imagine we will be having another biopsy, I don't know what to ask, how is it assessed if the cancer has gone elsewhere, what do they do, just get a biopsy from everywhere?
The doctor was pretty sure that only the lymph nodes in the surrounding pelvis have cancer as the cat scan showed nothing in vital organs but still they could only be cells and not show up on the CS.
Am I correct in assuming this?
I am lost and sick and tired of searchng the internet, the statistics just get me down.

Dana,

Unless I missed something, your husband has not been diagnosed with distant mets.

M (0/1): presence of metastasis
M0: no distant metastasis
M1: metastasis to distant organs (beyond regional lymph nodes)

Use of an "X" instead of a number or other suffix means that the parameter was not assessed.

You posted above that it was Mx, which means it was not assessed. Did mets show up on some other test? If not, the probability of successful treatment with chemo is much higher than if there are distant mets.

Mike

Here is a link to a site that explains the stage and grade quite well: cancerhelp.cancerresearchuk.org/type/bladder-cancer/treatment/bladder-cancer-stage-and-grade