November 2009 - Diagnosis - Went to hospital about my chest pain.

I was admitted immediately and had all the usual tests - BP, pulse, ECG, etc. They noticed som e anomalies in my ECG results and took me to have an ultrasound. I was watching the screen and could clearly see a huge lump. They then got me x-rayed and I was discharged once my breathing settled a bit. However I did (and still do) have a really fast heart beat - tachycardia. Then I waited around at home, in a lot le ss pain, for a call from the doctor to explain what they'd do (surgery or biopsy ) Then I got a call saying I'd be having surgery on December 16th. I was also told to go jerk off into a cup at the local fertility clinic. The porn they had was really shit. There was like a copy of Mayfair and some other shitty softcore mag azine. I can't fap to that. Anyway, I got a call the same day I'd been to the cl inic and was told they couldn't find any sperm. So they said to try again. The 2 nd time I was wiser and took some real porn on my ipod. However there was still no sperm. I was then given a choice - have 'surgical sperm retrieval' done, or just not do anything about it. I thought I'd give it a chance. I don't really want kids but it'd be nice to have the option. It was a 1 day procedure where they put a need le into your balls and try to retrieve sperm. It hurt but I was given loads of p ainkillers and the area was numbed. It was more bad news though as it wasn't suc cessful, so I'm infertile :hsd: All that pain for nothing. Oh well. December 16th 2009 - Surgery I got to the hospital at about 7am and got myself admitted, then spent a while w aiting around in the bed for a doctor to come check me over and get me prepared for surgery. It was late afternoon when they actually took me down to the anaest hetic room. I got talking to the girl who was working there, she was a student a nd was shadowing the main guy who worked there. She basically talked to me to ke ep me calm. I wasn't that bothered though - I don't worry about stuff. They put a few needles in me and injected some stuff that made me feel really stoned. I d on't remember much after that - I was KO'd for surgery. I woke up after what seemed like a few hours and couldn't open my eyes. I only r emember that my Mother + sister were there, holding my hand and stroking my hair . I told the nurse to get rid of them because they were annoying me and I wanted to sleep. Then I woke up again and was a bit more aware of what was going on. I looked dow n at my chest and could see a fucking huge scar and 2 tubes coming out either si de of my chest. I was also in quite a lot of pain but the nurse was there and to ld me I had a morphine thing where it'd automatically give me a specified dose b ut I could press the button to receive more. However it was capped at a certain amount. I just pressed the button, slept, woke up, pressed the button, repeat. S eemed like days. I also remember feeling really hungry but they wouldn't let me eat. I also wasn' t allowed to have any fluids for the first 2 days. Then on the 3rd day they star ted giving me 60ml of water every hour. I drank it but it kept coming back up th rough a tube that went in my nose and down my throat. They syringed it out every time. It felt really unpleasant. After about 4 days I was able to hold down fluids but still so made to get out of the bed and sit in the chair to avoid ction. It was extremely painful and aswell as having my own hest drains (boxes connected to the tubes either side of my ss fluid) to carry. not eating. I was al getting a chest infe bodyweight I had 2 c chest, to drain exce

I was still on morphine and having to take loads of pills each day aswell so it' s a bit foggy. One thing I do remember was that I couldn't pass urine. This mean t having a catheter installed. They ram a tube up your dick. It hurts just as mu ch as you'd think it would. I was also constipated (couldn't shit). They gave me an enema and my ass exploded. While we're on pain - when they removed my chest drains, that was probably one of the most painful things I've ever experienced. The tubes are stitched into you and effectively touch your lungs. When they remo ved the stitches it moved around and then when they pulled it out I couldn't dea l with the pain. Nearly passed out. I still have scars there and still get 'phan tom' pains in that area nearly every day. Once all my bodily functions were back to normal I had to try and become mobile again. I had a physiotherapist (who was pretty hot) to help me. I was managing t o walk about 20ft before becoming really out of breath and just generally tired. It was extremely difficult because my brain was telling me I could do things bu t my body didn't respond. Towards the end of my stay in hospital she told me tha t if I felt like it I should try and walk by myself. So I went for a walk and en ded up somewhere in the main part of the hospital before becoming fatigued again and having to prop myself up on a wall - a member of staff saw me and got a whe elchair to take me back to the ward. Once I got back I just broke down crying. F irst time I've cried in years, I guess it all just got to me. I don't mind admit ting that part either. While in hospital I also got wheeled away to have an x-ray every single day. Thi s was tough on me because I wasn't able to put a tshirt on and the hospital corr idors are freezing cold. Plus I had to stand up to get into the chair, then stan d up again to have the x-ray. It was really painful but I just had to put up wit h it. After about a week I was discharged. I actually didn't want to go home because I was getting on really well with the staff and felt safe there. The food sucked though. I was especially worried about having to navigate the stairs at home. I' d been doing 5-6 stairs with the physio and it was punishing me so I wasn't conf ident at all. However you can't live in hospital so I had to go home. Just in ti me for Christmas (December 24th). I had the shittiest Christmas ever. Although a ll my family were obviously supportive and whatever, I couldn't eat more than a few mouthfuls of Christmas dinner and just generally felt like shit. I was home for about 6 weeks before starting chemo. I had to take about 8 differ ent pills, most of them 3 times a day. Plus I had to take laxatives when necessa ry. Luckily my Mother is a nurse so she took good care of me. I would have been fucked if I still lived in my old apartment. She did everything for me and suppo rted me financially aswell. I can't thank her enough for that, she put up with a lot of shit from me as on a bad day I'd be really pissed off with everything an d everyone. There was actually a long wait between surgery and chemo because they had to ana lyse the tumor removed from me to see whether it was cancer or not. With Christm as and New Years etc it took them longer than normal to tell me. Then I went to see my Oncologist who told me I needed to have chemo for about 9 weeks. I was ho ping that wouldn't be the case but at the same time was kind of relieved to know where I stood. Chemotherapy I had 3xBEP chemo treatments. That's a combination of 3 drugs, bleomycin, etopis ide and cisplatin. Etopiside and cisplatin are given via a cannular (intra-vein needle) over 3 days. Bleomycin was an injection in my ass, on the 2nd day of tre atment, followed by another one a week after. The injection really fucking hurt every single time because it's injected into a muscle. It also made me feel real

ly ill for a few days afterwards. Just before going in for my first treatment I shaved my hair off in anticipation of it falling out. It's only just started growing back but I like having short hair so I'm gonna keep it at grade 2 or 3. Over the 3 months, pretty much all my bodyhair fell out aswell. That's leg hair, pubes, some arm hair, chest hair (mo st of which was already gone because they shaved it off before surgery) and faci al hair. I can deal with hair loss but it was pretty disappointing to be pulling handfuls of pubes out in the shower. It took me ages to adjust to my head getti ng cold though, I pretty much wore a hat for the whole 3 months. I was feeling a lot better by the time I started chemo and even after the first treatment I was feeling generally ok except being a bit tired. It was after the 2nd treatment that it hit me. There's a huge list of side effects from chemo but I was very lucky not to experience the majority of them except being extremely fucking tired and being sick a few times. Plus I almost completely lost my sense of taste, felt dehydrated constantly and still get tinnitus every now and then. I still have bruised toes, a rash on my arms, and scars from having needles in my arms for 3 days at a time. This is along with the scars on my chest. Here's a pic of my chest that I took on January 5th (linked as not everyone want s to see a man's chest!), in between surgery and chemo http://files.upit.me/1278082131.jpg So essentially chemo fucking sucked. As well as the actual treatment I had to ge t a blood test done every week between each treatment cycle, which meant getting to the hospital. It took a lot of effort to even get out of bed at the time and because of the frequency of my hospital visits it tired me out even more. It fe lt like I was constantly having to have something done (blood test, injection, c hemo) and I found it hard to keep track of it all. After chemo So this brings us up to about a month ago when my chemo finished. I took me a fe w weeks to feel 'normal' again but now I feel way better. My hair's starting to come back and I'm not as tired as I was. I have to get a job now. After not work ing for so long and having no routine, it's going to be difficult but I really n eed the money. I also want to get fit again. I've not been able to exercise prop erly for obvious reasons, so I'm extremely unfit now. It's all going to be an up hill struggle but I will say that it could have been much worse. When in hospital I met quite a few people with terminal cancer. Although we were in the same situation, having chemo, it was harrowing to talk to them and see h ow complacent they were knowing that they'd be dead within x number of weeks/mon ths/years and the chemo was just a way of pushing it back a bit. Then there's me with a pretty treatable cancer that has only a small chance of mortality. I als o have age on my side as I'm only 23. I'm sure anyone who has known people with cancer knows what a cunt it is. Chemo really takes a lot out of you both physically and emotionally. One of the hardes t things for me has been watching my family and friends making sacrifices for me . I feel like I don't deserve it but it just goes to show that I've got some goo d people around me and I should be thankful for that. I also can't fault the health service in the UK. They've been really great and p rovided all this care and treatment for free. If I lived elsewhere I would have been facing a fucking huge bill for all of this. They just need to make better f ood for patients.

For reference my cancer was an 'extragonadal germ cell seminoma'. It's a form of testicular cancer but it was located in my chest. It's quite rare for it to spr ead there and it's considered more serious than just having 'regular' testicular cancer in your balls. It is luckily very treatable and has something like a 95% success rate for being cured. Not sure about the longer term risks of death tho ugh. There's always a chance the cancer could come back at some point. There was no tumors on my balls so I got to keep both of them, even though they don't wor k properly anymore