Gastric Cancer Support Group

Hi Mary, my name is Roni and I also found this site for me and my father, who was diagnosed with stomach cancer in July. He is 62. I would very much like to hear about your father's experiences throughout his treatment in order to help my dad get through his. Just a little background, my father has had a partial gastrectomy and is now going through chemotherapy and radiation. I have had huge struggles in getting him to eat enough. I worry every day about what I can be doing to help him keep positive and do the best thing for his health. Please tell me a little about what you guys have been going through. Hopefully we can compare our tactics. Talk to you soon.

Hi,I'm Tonia and I'm new here. My husband was just diagnosed with stomach cancer. He is 38yo and has never been sick in life. So this is a bit overwhelming for the both of us. We have 2 precious boys (ages 10 & 6). I'm really still trying to deal with my feelings. I really haven't been able to sleep at night. During the day, I'm fine because I can busy myself with being mom but at night with the house is still, I find myself anxious and restless. How do you as a caregiver take care of yourself as well as provide care for your loved one?

I have a question is barrets esopegus cancer?

I have Barrett's. It was explained to me as being a pre-cancerous condition. It can't be cured. There are numerous medications that can be prescribed to try to keep it from progressing.

I was diagnosed with Gastric Cancer on the 1st of Feb 2010, it originally started out as an ulcer. Which then progressed to cancer. I was very lucky in the respect that it was caught very early. I underwent a course of chemo therapy first to which I had an extremely bad reaction it almost caused a heart attack. (Extremely Rare Occurrence) I also had a Laparoscopy so that the surgeon could check out the cancer situation. And she found I had an Aneurysm as well.
I remained very positive all the time, as I had the full support of my wonderful wife.
I then had 40% of my stomach removed on the 16th June 2010, in The London Hospital (UK) by a brilliant surgeon Miss Hughes. The biopsies that they did on the removal showed that the outside edges of the removed part have no traces of cancer in them. So on that alone it says my cancer was removed pretty well successfully. I was very fortunate in the respect that I was very positive, my family and friends remained very positive, and my church said many prayers for me. All of which i am sure helped no end.
I had the Aneurysm stented on the 11th October 2010, so all in all 2010 was not a good year for me in the respect of Hospital.
But it was a fantastic year form the point of view that the Aneurysm would have killed me if t had not had cancer. So in theory I can say Cancer saved my life.
I should have had another course of Chemo but the onchologist (Dr Ahmed) said no way.If you need any help or advice please do feel free to ask the questions and i will do my best to answer them from my perspective.
Brian

Hi Mary; I just read your post and wanted to offer any help I can with what you and you dad are going through.

I am a stomach cancer survivor - 9 years now. They took my entire stomach and from the beginning I was blessed with many miracles.
Today, I eat everything, my weights back from 80/90 lbs to a nice 150! Took nine years but here i am.

Best advise is to have your dad as relaxed as possible. I kept a positive as possible ... always laughing, nibbling constantly, fluids as much as possible. In my case I have problems with water and still do to this day - it just causes me to dryheave and they don't know why. So I do what I can and have hot tea a few times through the day, soups etc.

I kept the belief that "well, now it's out of my hands. All I can do is do my treatments, learn as much as I can and not worry about WHAT IF'S.

I don't know if this works for everyone Mary, but it did for me. Honestly, I just wake each morning and send a special 'thank you' to God for another day.

I will try to keep up with my journal entries which I use to do for other's going through this terrible disease. If your dad wishes to communicate, please ADD me ... ok?

Also any other members living with this horrible disease please ADD me and I wll do all I can to check in daily to offer any help I can.

Peace, Love and Joy
Millie xoxox