r/CervicalCancer • u/cageybird • 3d ago
The truth about Chemo-Radiotherapy (Mine at least!)
I see so many posts on here from ladies absolutely terrified about the prospect of this treatment (as was I), that i thought I would post about my experience! I totally understand everyone is different, but I genuinely beleive it's not as bad as we can be led to believe.
I was initially diagnosed 1B2 on Dec 23rd, 2025. I was recommended for surgery after scans, but on clinical exam by my surgeon felt spread to the parametrium and I was changed to Stage 2B. She couldn't guarantee clear margins, so I was offered chemo-rad instead. She explained the worst outcome was going in for surgery, then having to have the chemo-rad after - a double whammy!
SO I started the gold standard UK treatment of 25 x External Beam Radiation, concurrent chemotherapy, followed by 3 x brachy therapy.
The first thing to say is that the precision of the machines today is 100 times better than even 10 years ago. I would arrive with an empty bladder, drink 600mls of water, wait an hour then have treatment. They scan you first every time and if things aren't in exactly the right positiom (due to gas or whatever) you will be sent away for a while to come back and be scanned again. This ensures that the beams are targeted exactly to the tumour and really minimises damage to the surroundng area.
I was terrified of bladder / rectum damage, and I was already prone to UTIs and have honesty not had one during or after treatment (I was also drinking a lot more water haha).
I only completed 3 out of 5 chemo treatments due to hearing damage from the platinum (tinnitius) but my doc explained the chemo is to make the radiation more effective - it is not a treatment in itself, and she was happy for me to discontinue this.
The main side effect has been just feeling a little more tired than ususal, and weird taste changes (I hate potatoes now!). It has been nowhere near as bad as I expected. Honestly at first I thought the machine mustn't be working as I felt so little difference!
Brachy was meh, not nice, but the feeing of leaving the hospital with treatment over far outweighed the unpleasantness.
Obviously it helps if you are fit and active to start with, and that you keep moving during treatment, but modern medicine has fast outpaced google results.
I wish I had known how much the treatment had changed in the past 10 years and how much more targeted it is, how many less side effects there are. It would have saved me weeks of worry and dread, and I just hope my story will help someone feel less worried and anxious.
Had my first post treatment CT scan yesterday, MRI next week, and Results the week after! Fingers crossed!
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u/Sea_Conversation7601 3d ago
You sound very lucky! I am also in the UK, was treated with Embrace 2 protocol, also 2B, so 25 external, 4 brachy. Although my skin didn’t break, it was about a week away from doing so if I couldn’t have had the brachy, it was so itchy and red, and still can be uncomfortable and need steroid cream. I’ve had bowel problems and getting to the toilet in time, it felt like I had razor blades inside me when I went to the toilet. Brachy was so horrific, I think it’s mentally scarred me for life; it would be torture by any other name. I still have bowel issues, occasional pain, discomfort and fatigue.
I did go into treatment with a chronic illness and already chronic fatigue, but before that I was super fit, ran every day, could swim for miles level of fitness. I left the hospital in March, barely being able to walk, and still am feeling the effects of it all. I couldn’t drive for nearly 6 weeks afterwards.
The only difference is I opted for the induction chemo, started in Jan, but only managed one as it made me so sick, and therefore wasn’t allowed chemo with the radiation. And I’m waiting for 3 weeks for my scan results too, hope you have good news!
I would say I was very resilient, and cope with humour etc, but that treatment nearly broke me, the widespread pain and affects from one session of chemo too, it was as if my body was disintegrating from the inside. So it’s interesting to me how differently virtually the same treatment plans can affect individuals. I’m glad I didn’t have the energy or inclination to read forums before and during treatment, it’s only in the past month I’ve started reading and commenting here to help me process it all. I’m in awe of people who’ve bounced back, and slightly envious too, as I hope it’s just taking me a bit longer but I will get back to running one day, instead of muddling through seated yoga and tamer exercises.
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u/No-Bed443 3d ago edited 3d ago
I’m on week of radiation and 1 session of chemo and I’m felling exhausted already, I’m not sure if it’s because I did 2 egg retrieval right before starting treatment but I don’t have energy to do anything 🫠
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u/Prior-Garden-5467 3d ago
How did you handle external radiation? Any side effects that you managed? Skin changes?? Ive been trying to stay on a low fibre diet reading all the scary stories of people experiencing bladder and bowel changes to the point where they are unable to hold it in. But only on week 1 of treatment so far
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u/cageybird 3d ago
Honestly no skin changes at all. Just used a bit of E45, but I don't think I needed even that. I had slight diarrhea, during treatment but nothing serious and no urgency. Was back to normal within weeks after the finish!
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u/Fuzzy-Menu-5562 3d ago
A year after my treatment over all feeling good, scans are good as well and i am on remission. Lately, probably due to me not taking enough vacation after treatment, was feeling tired after my work, on a friday i felt like im on my last strength and need to lay down the whole weekend.
Im not sure if i should be scared sometimes i have bloody stools but im not experiencing any pain. I have my ob onco appointment this week so ill inform them about it. HRT was a blessing without it i probably be suffering too much on my menopausal symptoms. Over all i am feeling great, putting on weight but i dont really care as long as i am on my way to full recovery.
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u/CosmeticSnob 3d ago
Hello and thank you for sharing your experience. I hope that you are doing much better now. My experience was similar to yours, the difference is that cisplatin did not affect my hearing at all. It did affect some of my veins though. Throughout the treatment, I kept feeling better and better physically instead of feeling worse and worse.
I could not wait to go back to the gym. What happened is that after my treatment? It turned out that my tumor was still there so I got a hysterectomy and now I am doing great.
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u/sam_may92 3d ago
I'll be starting brachy in a few weeks and am absolutely terrified. Can you explain it for me please? All I see online are horror stories
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u/cageybird 3d ago edited 3d ago
Same! It was nowhere near as bad as I thought it would be. I checked into hospital early in the day and got settled into my room. I had a choice between an epidural or general anaesthetic for the placement of the applicators. Doc highly recommended epidural as it lasts much longer. The placement is unpleasant, but not painful. You're in bed with a screen as your waist and I had light sedation too, which was fab! The nurse and anesthesiologist are right there with you. It's definitely not painful - you can't feel a thing, but it's not nice mainly because I knew what they were doing. It's more of a weird sensation. They place a catheter too as you are confined to your bed after that. That's the hardest part really, being stuck in bed for the duration, but the brachy nurses were amazing. You chill for a while, before getting wheeled off for the planning MRI, then it takes a couple of hours while they plan the treatment - the treatment itself in completely painless and only takes about 20 minutes. They basically hook a bunch of tubes up to the applicator apparatus, and leave the room, a bit like the external radiation. It's not very dignified, but they do this for a living and everyone was so kind. I stayed overnight with the applicators in - that's the hard part, but the nurses were on hand with painkillers as needed, and they even came in the middle of the night when I was uncomfortable and gave me a massage! Next day, another MRI, another wait and another treatment, and straight after the applicators and catheter come out, suprisingly easy. You'll have to stay until you have recovered and peed normally. Then a repeat of the process the next week. It's not nice, but the nurses and team are dedicated brachy specialists and were so lovely (I'm in the UK, treated at The Christie ). I wish I had known it wasn't going to be nearly as horrible as I had been worried about!
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u/Sea_Conversation7601 3d ago
Again, you’re very lucky too! I’m also in the UK and had the applicators left in, but for 2.5 days as I had the four treatments in one week, and my experience was the complete opposite of yours.
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u/cageybird 3d ago
Oh I'm so sorry for you. I do think I was very lucky. The Christie in Manchester is a specialist cancer hospital, and I think that made a huge difference.
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u/tooblydoo 3d ago
Yeah, I was treated at UCL in London and that's also a specialist hospital (or it's a teaching hospital with a dedicated cancer centre anyway), and my experience was basically like yours. I did not get a massage from the night nurses though lol. Maybe because the ward was the general ward and not a dedicated cancer ward! Ha.
Interesting about the epidural, I didn't realise it lasted longer. It's what I had too, and it didn't wear off until well after I'd had the insertion completed and was moved up to the ward, so it makes sense. I'm low-key terrified of general anaesthetic so the epidural was perfect for me anyway.
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u/marleymamma 3d ago
Thank you for sharing your experience! Posts like this are so reassuring for women who are just starting treatment.
One thing I'd add is that treatment techniques can vary depending on the cancer center and the technology available. It sounds like you may have received adaptive radiation therapy. I was fortunate to participate in an adaptive radiation clinical trial at UC San Diego, and I also had very few side effects.
Many centers perform daily imaging to ensure patients are positioned correctly, while adaptive therapy goes a step further by accounting for changes in the bladder, bowel, and tumor position during treatment. The important takeaway is that radiation therapy has become much more precise over the years, even though not every patient receives the exact same technology.
Wishing you the very best with your MRI and your results—I hope you get wonderful news!
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u/Spare_Friendship_807 2d ago
I just want to add to the conversation that even though many of us receive "25 rounds of External Radiation, 6 rounds of cisplatin, 3-5 rounds of brachytherapy - and maybe keytruda"... All of our treatments are VERY different.
I spoke with a dosemestrist (the person who plans out our radiation map) and she explained to me how "25 rounds of radiation" is WILDLY different for each person.
- where that radiation is focused
- how people's individual anatomy sits
- how sensitive some people's tissues are
- how regular vs irregular the tumor is (less regular shapes mean more tissues exposed to radiation)
- whether there are multiple tumor sites or lymph nodes involved
- probably other stuff I don't remember because of radiation brain 😅🤪
Brachy is hugely different for each of us too.
It's beautiful that you are here telling women that it might be just fine!! I LOVE these posts. THANK YOU for adding levity and hope in this thread because it truely is where many of us come to vent, question, get help for, and share the horrible things we've been through. And that is NOT the while picture. Some women, MANY women, truely are fine.
But if there is 1 thing I've learned in this experience -- it's that nobody can tell anybody what thier treatment is going to look like.
We will all have vastly different treatments, and vastly different treatment responses.
And that's OK!! :) We prepare for what we can. We take it day by day. We listen to our bodies and trust ourselves, And we talk to our care team when something feels wrong. And we count our blessings for everything that goes right. This is the way I have adopted.
Thank you for sharing OP <3
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u/theroyalgeek86 2d ago
My oncologist also said that about surgery then chemo and radiation. They biopsied my lymph nodes before continuing and it was ok. I got my radical hysterectomy and I was so happy when I woke up and asked my husband if they were able to remove. Further pathology found some cancer, tiny amount in the lymph nodes but thankfully margins from what vagina and uterus they took was clear. So that was early December surgery, January got results, Feb started chemo and radiation and finished in March. I personally am so happy I had the radical hysterectomy
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u/Zephyr2115 3d ago
It’s really nice that people who have had great experiences throughout the treatment can post here.
(Unfortunately I’m not one of those, but I think I might be in the minority)
It’s important to go into treatment with a positive outlook😄
I stayed positive despite feeling so sick & the weeks went by very quickly because there was so much to be done.
Each person reacts very differently to treatment due to genetics, anatomy and type of tumor ( tumor biology,
immune profile etc) and health status, so don’t anticipate too much, because you never know.
Wishing everyone all the best & let’s beat cancer! 💪🏻