liver mets

[Tami]

I hate to even ask this...

For those of you with liver mets, or colon (?) can you tell me what symptoms you were having? How long you tried to pretend nothing was wrong and did it continually get worse or just off and on??

thanks to you all..

[MelanieLR]

Hi Tami,

Unfortunately, I had all my mets before I was ever dx with cancer. They just kept telling me I was fine for 3 years & sent me home with antidepressants. So, I really am not a lot of help here. I do know one thing. I was having pain where the liver is (and a lovely shade of yellow) & I was having the worst kind of digestive problems. I simply don't (& didn't) have - sorry to be so blunt but - any bowel movements without taking a laxative.

GO HAVE YOURSELF SCANNED!!

Take care & I'll be praying for you sweetie,

Melanie

[Addie]

I was still NED, based on a CT done on Jan. 3rd. A week later...my stomach was "unsettled"....I was mildly nauseous. Went to my primary doc. He said it was a virus. Back and forth I went, as it didn't improve and my appetite was "off" too. Bloodwork showed my thyroid was off as well....and then a good month after all this started, the doctor said I had pancreatitis!

I had an ultrasound looking for gallstones. Nothing there.

So....the gastroenterologist my primary wanted me to see, said he wanted an MRI of my gut first. Voila.....liver tumors and "multiple masses" in the pancreas. A biopsy confirmed that these were sclc mets and I'm now getting chemo again.

So...in general, the symptoms were an unsettled stomach. I never did get sick...but the mild nausea never really went away either. For a while, my primary doc had me taking Nexium....which helped a bit, even though it never felt like acid reflux to me. But I guess the Nexium helped settle any tummy acid that was roiling. Also, my tummy was puffy...distended a bit.

If I learned anything from this experience....it is NEVER to assume it's NOT the cancer. I mean, ONE WEEK after a clean CT scan....the symptoms were there and I didn't really push about testing what it was, because I figured "no way" was it cancer right after a clean CT scan!

Small cell is a sneaky, aggressive cancer. Any future syptoms...and I'm going to push to have them checked out. No good reason NOT to and many good reasons to be as aggressive in pursuit of what is causing our symptoms as the cancer is aggressive, huh?

Everyone is different. Some people with liver mets will show signs of jaundice. I have not. But don't live with the worry....go get checked out. I didn't "live with the worry"....I went right to the doctor's when my gut started acting up......it's just that neither he nor I figured it was the cancer causing the problem when I'd just had a clean CT. Goes to show you, eh?

Go to the doctor, Tami. "Pretending" nothing is wrong won't make it so.

[Larry]

Tami like everyone else has suggested go get that scan done as if it is tumor's the faster you attack it the better. My wife was DX'ed with met's to liver when it was first discovered she had cancer. She had no symptom's of any kind so if your feeling something is wrong do not let me repeat do not second guess and get the scan done. By the way my wife's cancer was found out by accident while being hospitalized for a minor surgery....

[Remembering Dave]

Dave has a liver met which he would have never known he had except for a routine ct scan.

my mother has stage iv colon cancer with four liver mets. Big ones. she'd never know she had them, either, except for a routine ct scan during her treatment.

Karen

[KarHart]

The same thing with my husband. No symptoms at all with the liver tumor which has been steadily growing. I read somewhere that 80% of your liver can be compromised before you show any symptoms. My husbands cancer was found "accidently" as many are, he had no symptoms then and he has none now, so you really can't make any judgements based on lack of syptoms at all. Hope you find out everything is o.k.

Karen H