Interview LC29

Age at interview: 56

Age at diagnosis: 52

Brief Outline: Diagnosed with non-small cell lung cancer in 1998, followed by pneumonectomy (left lung removed).

Background: Community support worker for those with learning difficulties (retired), married, 2 children.

Describes what is was like to have a VQ scan in the nuclear medicine department.

So all this time nothing showed up on the X-ray?

It did, I had a shadow on my x-ray, but they just said it was a shadow and it was the blood clots. They said it was pulmonary embolisms from the anaesthetic on the knee, from when I had my knee done. And I think that, that was one of my down falls, because I'd had the knee done I think they just automatically took it that, but when I went back to see the specialist and I actually said to him, "I've had CT scans, I've had VQ scans, can you tell me why all those never showed up the cancer?" and he said "It was because we weren't looking for it."And that's all it was, because they weren't looking for it so...

Yes I had a VQ scan.  For that you have to go to the Nuclear Research Department, which I did. I wasn't allowed to have anything to eat or drink for so many hours before, and then they come out and they just put a blood, like an injection into your arm. And then they take you in and then they fit you up onto a video camera and you can actually see the screen and you can see your lungs actually working and you can see the dye going through the, to all the arteries in your lungs, and you could actually see where the mass was. 

Comments that others are afraid of lung cancer and assume that it has been caused by smoking.

I think they're frightened, I think it's like when you get a death in the family people will cross the road so as not to actually have to bring up the subject and I think it's the same with cancer. 

Do you think it's the same with all cancers or more so with lung cancer?

I think so more so with lung cancer because people think you're dirty because you smoked. But they don't, I don't think they really realise it's not only from smoking it's, there's other things that you know that it's caused by. But also I think that they can't bear to think that they're going to see you suffer. With a lot of cancers you don't actually suffer, with lung cancer your breathing is very bad and you're gasping for breath and I think that is the bit they don't want to know. So if they detach themselves from it then they're not'.

What makes you feel this feeling that people think you said you're dirty because you smoked?

Well I think a lot of people think you've caused it yourself by smoking. I know eighty percent of the lung cancer cases are caused by smoking but there are cases that it's not caused by smoking.

Have people actually said that to you or is that just your thoughts?

No, no I did have one person say to me "Well you shouldn't have smoked should you?" But it was fashion in the sixties you, it was fashion, you went along with it and once you're on it you can't get off it (laughs). But no a lot of people, even now when you say "Oh I had lung cancer," they look at you and say "Did you smoke?" you know and it's just really a natural reaction that when you have lung cancer people automatically think you've brought it on yourself and it's a sort of a stigma. 

Describes how reflexology helped her.

I had reflexology and they massage your feet. And when, I just couldn't believe, the girl that I went to was a friend of my friend's and she did it for nothing, she didn't charge me a fee because I was so stressed out after having the op and everything else. 

And I went there and she just massaged my feet and I cried and I cried and I cried and I cried and I cried, just like a baby. And I don't know why I cried. But when, when she'd done it I just felt a whole lot lighter and she said she knew, she didn't exactly know that I'd had lung cancer, she didn't know I'd had an operation but she knew that my breathing, that my airways were badly congested by being able to, by the sense of my feet. And I'd never believed in anything like that before, but it was absolutely fantastic, it was so uplifting it was really good.  

And I seemed to, I don't know, I mean I didn't believe in it, I thought well how can people play with your toes and cure your lung (laughs) or make you feel better? But it was so uplifting it really was, to go through that, and come out. And I went back three times after that when I began to get a bit low and each time it's worked, it's worked for me. I don't know it seems to give you an inner peace and lift you. 

Her biggest fear is the fear of cancer coming back.

What are your biggest fears and worries if you've got any at the moment?

Of the cancer coming back. I think anybody that's had cancer because I never dreamt I would have cancer I don't know why I just never, it never hit me that I would have lung cancer and even when I was having the VQ scans and I was having the bronchoscopy I thought at the most I would have TB. That was, I did lose an uncle to TB, I mean it was years ago but I did lose an uncle to TB. And I really thought that that was it. But I never dreamed it was lung cancer, I never. And it just, the bottom just dropped out of my world, it really did.