Fatigue prior to reaccurance

[mercyriver]

Just as a quick recap, my husband was diagnosied with and had his tumor removed back in 9/06, tumor levels were slightly elevated prior to surgury and dropped quickly back to normal after. His tumor was 100% embyonal carcinoma. His first CT scan found 4 lymph nodes between 1cm and "less then 2cm". The oncologist and my husband opted for surviellence. All blood tests and chest x-rays have been clear and his next CT is schedualed for this Friday with blood work and chest x-rays next week and the follow up appointment that friday...boy does the every other month of survellience seem busy!

Anyhow, my question is about fatigue. I try to remember what his complaints about fatigue were prior to them finding the cancer, but I honestly cannot rember. Since the surgury and cancer diagnosis he seems to be so fatigued all the time. When the ongologist asks about his energy levels, he says he is fatigued but that it is because of our two youngest children. They wake up occasionally, but by no means to the point where he should be so worn out everyday. Beside that I am the one that stays at home with 4 kids all day long, running around with them, shopping, cleaning the house and cooking. I am not discounting anything he does, he has a desk job, stressful at times, but not physically demanding. So you would think if anyone is worn out and fatigued from the kids it would be me.

So I worry. It is my job as a woman and as his wife. I am very concerned that the return of cancer may be haroled by his constant fatigue. His tumor marker levels were never that high to start with and it does worry me.

And yes I know it is still very curable even if it comes back.

So I am just wondering if anyone has experianced fatigue prior to reaccurance or if there are any articles on the subject.

B

[dadmo]

Has your husband had his testosterone levels checked? He may be a bit low.

[Martin]

I second Dadmo's remark. Fatigue is one of the indicators for low testosterone levels. He should go have that checked out.

[mercyriver]

Thank you for the suggestions

It never even occured to me to think of low testosterone, I will do my best to see if I can't convince him to ask the Dr to check it. He isn't an easy person to try to convince to do anything, even if it is bothering him.

Of course with all that said, he doesn't really show any other signs of low testosterone, so he may be quite hard to convince to even mention it to his Dr.

Thank you for the heads up on it though and it does make me feel a little less paranoid!

B

[retroperitommy]

your senario sounds familiar

your description in recap soundss imilar to me - and I also have very high proportion of embryonal carcinoma.

you should ask for a PET/CT scan, not just a CT. PET scans lymph node function, not just anatomy.

My nodes were enlarged but not much, and markers mostly down (1 with slight elevation). The PET scan, however, lit them up quite nicely, so after looking over that, with one of my markers rising agin, it was a obvious: chemo ASAP.

Also I had lower back pain. You might want to keep an eye out for those and not think its ergonomics or stress. Whn lymph nodes swell, they can push against kidneys and feel like a dull ache, for example.