17/10/12

17/10/12.

ok.

This is to save me filling up the “What’s on your mind” box on facebook.

I am a father, a son, a husband, a brother, as well as a cousin, a nephew and an uncle also a friend to many and I have many good friends.  I don't know if this will help or not, but I thought it would be worth a try.

What happens to me and my life, affects many around me and my life is changing, not for better or worse, just changing and I have to cope with the changes as do those around me.

The change? Well that would be being diagnosed with cancer. Tongue cancer, who would have thought that you could get cancer there, eh? Not I. but never the less, it happened and I just thought it was tooth ache 5 months ago but I am told that the diagnosis is:

 T4N2cM0 SCC (squamous cell carcinoma) base of tongue (staging explained at the end of this blog).

And that the proposed treatment will be Radical Chemoradiotherapy.

Wow.

So what is next? Apparently because of the treatment and the way that it works, any possibly “dodgy” areas have to be made “tip top” before I get into the beam. This means that because of those times earlier in my life, when I choose to just go to bed or to just leave the house without brushing my teeth, causing that little bit of blood in the sink after brushing, now means that although my oral hygiene is described as “fair” I have to say goodbye to 8 of my teeth in one afternoon (sad smiley face). This is to be happening next Monday.

After that takes place I shall be having a solid mask made of my face, neck, shoulders and chest so that I stay still enough so that they can target the tumour with the Radiotherapy machine.

I would be a fool if I said that I wasn’t scared, I am scared, of many things and yet they are all related to this cancer.  I just hope that by tapping away at these keys it helps me in the long run. This may well become my sounding board and to the reader it may well become “boring” this I do understand, trust me I have read enough other blogs from cancer patients such as I and they all are on the morose, melancholy, gloomy side and I can understand why. Bottom line, cancer does still kill and we have to be aware of this and when it doesn’t kill, the treatment is not a “walk in the park”. All the books I have read on the subject tell me this and over the next couple of months I get to experience it first hand.

This is going to be it for now, it’s a start. It may have helped me, who knows? Maybe there will be another instalment I don’t know yet.

 

 

Why the cakes?  I recently found baking as have many others courtesy of the Great British Bake Off and did you see the final last night? “Invent your own Chiffon Cake”??  Vodka and Orange!

 

This is me Steve Royal.  39 years old.

Have a week.

 

 

 

 

 

TNM stages of mouth and oropharyngeal cancers

TNM stands for Tumour, Node and Metastasis. The system describes

·                             The size of a primary tumour (T)

·                             Whether the cancer has spread to the lymph nodes (N)

·                             Whether the cancer has spread to a different part of the body (M)

T stages

There are 4 main T stages of mouth and oropharyngeal cancer

·                             T1 means the tumour is contained within the tissue of the mouth or oropharynx and is no larger than 2cm (3/4 inch)

·                             T2 means the tumour is larger than 2cm, but smaller than 4cm (about 1 ½ inches)

·                             T3 means the tumour is bigger than 4cm

·                             T4a means the tumour has grown further than the mouth or oropharynx and into nearby body tissues such as bone, tongue, sinuses or skin

·                             T4b means the tumour has spread into nearby areas such as the space around and behind the jaws, the back of the upper jaw where the large jaw muscles attach, the base of the skull, or the area of the neck that surrounds the carotid artery

N stages

There are 4 main lymph node stages in cancer of the mouth and oropharynx. One of these, stage N2, is broken down into 3 sub stages. The important points here are whether there is cancer in the lymph nodes in the neck and if so, the size of the node and which side of the neck it is on.

·                             N0 means there are no cancer cells in the lymph nodes

·                             N1 means there are cancer cells in 1 lymph node on the same side of the neck as the cancer, but the node is less than 3cm across

·                             N2a means there is cancer in 1 lymph node on the same side of the neck, and the node is more than 3cm across but less than 6cm across

·                             N2b means there is cancer in more than 1 lymph node, but none of these nodes are more than 6cm across. All the affected nodes are on the same side of the neck as the cancer.

·                             N2c means there is cancer in nodes on the other side of the neck, or in nodes on both sides, but none of these nodes are more than 6cm across

·                             N3 means that at least 1 node containing cancer is more than 6cm across

M stages

There are two M stages for cancers of the mouth and oropharynx

·                             M0 means there is no cancer spread to other parts of the body

·                             M1 means the cancer has spread to other parts of the body, such as the lungs

Together, the T, N and M stages give a complete description of the stage of your cancer. For example, if you have a T2, N0, M0 cancer, you have a tumour larger than 2cm but not larger than 4cm. There are no cancer cells in the lymph nodes and there is no spread of your cancer to other parts of the body.