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Melissa explains to Michelle King Robson how her energy level drops when she is taking multiple pain medications for lung cancer.
Michelle King Robson:
So how are you feeling now? Are you feeling better and is your energy level a little bit better?
Melissa:
My energy levels are little bit better only because I switched the painkiller medication and before, I was on so many drugs, I think I was over-medicated because I had too many doctors that had their hands in the mix.
So, I had like four different kinds of painkillers that I was on and, to the point where I didn’t feel comfortable driving. It wasn’t safe. I would fall asleep mid-sentence when somebody was talking to me. I would have hallucinations and I just thought that was part of going through this cancer.
And it wasn’t until I actually, I had talked to a couple of doctors at CTCA and they said, “What are you doing on all of this medication? You don’t need to be on all this medication. You are still in pain, so let’s reduce the medication. Let’s try these other things and see how that works.”
So, I am on half as much medication as I am now. So my energy levels were through the roof, like I was going, you know, cleaning house, bouncing off the walls and everything.
So, and for the first time I felt actually, alive again. The only things that I still have a huge about pain and the cancer hasn’t spread to any organs yet. It’s just in the bones and I asked a doctor once, you know, “What’s worse? Is it worse to have cancer metastasized to your bones or is it worse to have cancer metastasized to somewhere like your brain?”
And to me it seems like it would be worse to have something go to your brain because that affects everything you do. And the doctor said, “Oh, you know, I think that’s about the same, I mean the bone pain is so horrible that it’s something you have to live with every day and trying to keep a balance between being over medicated and then, yet, still handling the pain. I would say that it’s almost as bad as having cancer, you know, spread to your brain.”
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