The Cancer Survivors Club by Chris Geiger

felt so alone in the hospital room that night and had a multitude of worrying thoughts racing through my mind. I had fought and pushed to have surgery as soon as possible. In some ways, I was relieved. This would be the end of the cancer. They would get it all out and I would be on the road to recovery. I’d have probably seen the whole night round, if it wasn’t for the medication they administered to help me sleep.
    I was woken and out of bed early the next morning. I was going into theatre at 8:00 A.M. I had two surgical teams waiting for me. One was led by my oncologist, who would be doing the mastectomies. He estimated that the operation would take around three and a half hours. The next team would be led by the plastic surgeon who would do the reconstruction. It transpired this part of the operation took a massive seven hours. When I came out of recovery, the whole day had come and gone, and it was now dark outside.
    During my last appointment with my plastic surgeon before surgery, I was told I’d feel like I had been run over by a truck when I woke from the operation. You may think this was a silly thing to say, but it actually helped me prepare mentally. Not that I know what it’s like to be run over by a truck, but I remember thinking, when I woke up in my hospital room, this must definitely feel worse than being hit by a truck. I had drains coming out of both sides of my chest and two others coming out of my pelvic area. My legs were covered in what looked like ‘space boots’, which expanded and contracted in order to prevent blood clots from forming in my motionless legs. I had two more blood transfusions on top of the two units they gave me during surgery. I was too weak to have a port installed for pain medication. They therefore had to administer it through injections every few hours. Yes… it really was like I’d been run over by a truck, I can assure you. Luckily, thanks to the anaesthetic, that first night was a blur. The adult members of my family were all there when I was brought out of theatre; what a sight I must have been. For some reason, I was placed on the maternity ward to recover. The weather had suddenly turned very humid and the room, which had no air conditioning, was stifling hot. I kept drifting in and out of sleep as they watched over me.
    I was in hospital for six days. My mum and sister, who are both practising nurses, spent the entire day during my hospital stay with me. They made sure I was washed and was moved in bed and later helped me get up.
    By the time I was discharged, I really did feel ready to leave. Looking back, I was still quite weak. Thankfully, my parents lived with me for the six weeks after I was discharged. This certainly helped and increased the speed of my recovery. I couldn’t walk up or down stairs and wasn’t allowed to walk outside on my own. The doctors were worried that, if I fell, it would have a detrimental effect on my whole healing process. I was also not allowed to drive.
    During this time of recovery, I did a lot of thinking. Going through cancer is a life-changing experience. I’m sure most cancer survivors will tell you the same thing. I wasn’t the same after I’d gone through the operations and follow-up treatment. I did much soul searching. I found out who my true friends were and who truly loved me. I can now distinguish between the positive people and influences in my life and those who aren’t.
    Four weeks into my recovery, I received my pathology results. The supposed slow-moving and non-invasive cancer had started to migrate through my lymph nodes. As a result, they took seventeen of my nodes out on the side the cancer had been lurking. So this wasn’t the end after all. I was sent to another hospital, to what they call a ‘Tumour Board’. There, a team of doctors including pathologists, oncologists and other cancer specialists met and discussed my case. They collectively decided