Kick S4 Colorectal Cancer in theBum

UPDATE:    Greg is now losing his desperate fight against this insidious disease he has now been placed in palliative care. 
                          He might come home soon but only time will tell.  The sands of time have started for him.

My dearest Greg was diagnosed with Metastic (stage 4) Colorectal cancer in 2014 and if we knew back then what we know today he would have been diagnosed sooner.

At the time we didn’t know what the symptoms were and he was sick on and off for 12 months yet travelling throughout Australia doing labour exhaustive shutdowns and coming home tired.  I would let him sleep, not knowing what was lying within. 

Being male and a tradie he didn’t complain, he didn’t talk too much about what he was feeling, just that he was having some issues and he had visited doctors and nothing was wrong.   He visited GP’s in different states on his shifts off and was given blood tests and they kept saying “NO, don’t have cancer it’s colitis, you need to change your diet” and “NO sign of cancer it’s chrones disease”. 

I pleaded with him to  see our local hospital and have every test he could.  He finally got a referral for a colonoscopy which took some 6 weeks to obtain as we didn’t have private health cover, we were okay with that as he wasn’t sick we were happy to wait. 

The day finally arrived for the colonoscopy we were confident they would not find anything.  That was not to be the case.  I remember being told to go and do something as he would be a few hours, so as any woman does, I went shopping  (window shopping of course).

I had been in the shopping centre for only 30 mins and I get a call asking me to return to the hospital as soon as possible, it was at that moment I knew something was up.  I arrived back at the hospital and ushered into a private room where Greg  was sitting with his specialist on the other side of the desk.  His head in his hands, he looked at me with a look of fear and I had never seen this look on his face in the then 28 years together, my heart sunk but my head somehow knew what the outcome was going to be, however never to the extent I got "It's Colorectal Cancer".

He had a tumour 10cm x 7cm at the very base of his rectal area and had to be removed immediately along with his bowel and other areas.  The specialist said that had general practitioners done what is referred to as a “finger test” then the tumour he had would have been found immediately and before it had even got to the size it was.  Of course all the questions run through your head how, why, blood tests never revealed anything and so on as any normal human beings.  Greg was shattered which is what hurt me the most to see him like that and know I could not take that type of agony away from him, as much as I would like to have.

His journey was going to be greater than we ever imagined.  We were booked in immediately to all the necessary centres for treatments doing duel chemo and radium and the maximums, many reading this will either have been through or have seen their loved one’s go through these and it is exhausting for them and what it does to their bodies.  

It was during this time that scans revealed that there were suspect markings on his liver and lesions on his lungs and that is was Stage 4.  We had to have that clarified as to what that was, and then the word “terminal” was dropped and again the world was rocked being told he only had around 12 months to live with "Stage 4 Colorectal Cancer".  Everything that could be done for him was going to be done through the health system.  Trying to support him emotionally and mentally was my biggest challenge now especially having never been around anyone who had cancer at that time. 

To make it worse the company I was working for at the early stages of all of this made me redundant and all the redundancy money for those months was all used up, before I was able to find some work all whilst Greg was in and out of hospital having tests, treatments and his biggest and most major operation was to remove his liver which was extremely stressful as this is a big operation for anyone let alone having two operations prior and he was already weak from them. 

We re-organised our lives, we spent numerous hours talking about what he wanted and how he wanted to handle things.  We changed our lifestyle although we ate and lived healthy it still wasn’t enough we had to go further.  He insisted that he would continue to work until he could no longer or he felt it was time to stop. 

We moved closer to the hospital treating Greg to make sure he did not need to travel hundreds of kilometres for his 3 weekly treatment cycles permanently, and as our son was attending a school closer to the hospital we made the decision to move the family from our home and be together for Greg. 

Greg never stopped helping others and running around for them even whilst he was undergoing his chemo treatments and major operations, he still travelled distances to repair things and dropped whatever he could to help others.  He has always been like that, he’s one of those guys who would “give the shirt off his back”, he’s kind and generous of his time, knowledge and hard to believe this happens to a man like my Greg. 

His generous and giving nature has had us both at logger heads sometimes as I wanted him to think and look after himself firstly.  Call it selfish on my part however I needed to be selfish for him at this point, but down deep I know it seems to be why he has survived the many timelines he has been given.

When he gets any opportunity to talk to other men about what he has and what he's been through he tells them, but most of all he persuades them to go and get checked and not be so "bloody proud", he educates them, and through these conversations a few of his mates have had colonoscopies and had things removed which gone unattended would have become a much different scenario.  He has never complained about what he is going through at any time.

Greg has had terrible and irreparable nerve damage to his feet and hands and muscle surrounding his heart has been weakened from various chemo reactions which were abnormal, at one stage being admitted to coronary care for a little over one week with heart attack symptoms from one of the drugs.  His dignity has been stolen from him regarding other areas of his body as well.

He has been undergoing chemo ever since he was diagnosed (around 70+ hits now), we have been blessed with him being with us for this length of time however it is now putting us under some financial stress.  We have used up his small amount of superannuation, we have used up our equity in the home and not able to renovate our home back 100km away, as he is not well enough to finish it.  He’s continuing at the present time with chemo, but Greg feels it’s time to give up his chemo as he wants to go home and not be in palliative care in a hospital when the time comes. 

I applied for carer allowance and it was rejected twice as they consider he is not incapacitated enough to need it.  So we gave up.  I tried to plead my case, but you read it right his terminal cancer is not considered for any carer allowance.

We survive on one full-time wage and the bit that Greg can bring in because of his stubborn streak to continue keeping himself occupied.  However, Greg is now finding it harder to breath and get around like he used to it’s now time we need to make the move back home, but don’t have the money to finish renovations and he doesn’t have the energy either, I wanted to go on House Rules but he would never withstand it with his condition. 

With money donated I would secretly have the house finished for him and surprise him so we can move back, take him on holidays away to a few places he has often mentioned in those “before I go” conversations, pre-pay for a small funeral for him and let him finally relax and enjoy what time he does have left with dignity and peace.

Thank you for your precious time I do hope you can help me reach my goal for Greg.

Catherine