Living with incurable ovarian cancer - Jill Emberson's Story

Описание: My name's Jill Emberson. I'm a mom, I'm a journalist, and I've got ovarian cancer.

Throughout the second half of 2015, I'd been suffering constipation and gone to my doctor, I'd gone to a naturopath and they kept saying, "Let's fix it with this, fix it with that." I had a bit of lower back pain as well, but again, I was used to that. That had happened to me a lot during my life.

In the summer, January of 2016, on my way to the beach, I had a very sharp pain in my pelvis that caught me in my step. So I went to the doctor and the doctor sent me off to do a pelvic ultrasound and a blood test. When I saw the radiographer's face gasp, I knew there was something wrong.

So I went out and rang my doctor, got an appointment straightaway for the Saturday morning. On the Monday morning, I had to make an appointment gyneoncologist. He saw me three days later and said, "You look like you've got ovarian cancer, but we'll only be able to tell when we do major surgery. So sign away here to let me open you up from my pubic bone to my chest." Because it's only when they open you up completely and have a look inside that they can confirm if it's ovarian cancer or not.

After my surgery, major, five hours on the table, the doctor sat at the end of my bed and said, "We did the best we could. I think I got it all out, but I can only offer you a 50/50 chance of being alive in five years." I couldn't believe it. He thought it was a successful operation, but the best odds he could give me were five years.

After that, and this is quite typical, they give you six months of really strong chemotherapy to try and kill whatever the surgery couldn't remove. You then cross your fingers and your legs and pray that it doesn't come back.

But mine came back in nine months. When ovarian cancer comes back, it's incurable, it's a terminal disease because there is no cure for relapsed ovarian cancer.

So that bought me a bit of time. It brought me up to about July of 2018 and the doctor said, "You've now got a window, Jill, hopefully of several months of good health. Go off and make hay while the sun shines." I came home hoping that the chemo wasn't back, that it wouldn't be back until around about now, but it was back by December of 2018, which means that I'm back on more chemo.

Often, that's when I see young moms with their babies and I go, "Oh, that might not be something that I'm gonna be able to share." And that's when I really struggle. That I might not be able to share being there for my daughter.

I don't have a bucket list. I don't need to see the world. I've seen a lot of things in the world. I took my daughter to seven different countries before she was two. I do feel profoundly driven to make a difference with this disease. It really horrifies me that unless we get organized and change the outlook for this disease, my daughter, who's 23 risks facing the same prognosis and all of her friends in their 20s and 30s risk facing the same prognosis when they get into their late 50s and 60s, which is a lousy 46 percent survival. It's so low and I'm driven to make sure that women repeat what they did for breast cancer to get it up to the fabulous survival rate and do that now for ovarian cancer. And I'm really driven by that.

I'm also driven by making sure that every day is pretty damn good, that everyone is happy, that we eat good food, that we have a nice time, we swim in the ocean, I stay in touch with my family and my friends. So that drives me. Just having a happy, peaceful quality of life. Staying really close to my daughter, which is pretty normal 'cause we're a duo, we grew up together for 18 years.

Why has ovarian cancer not had the money? Only 1600 women get this cancer every year, but a thousand of us die and we die really quickly. You know, on average, we have 47 months of good health. I was diagnosed 37 months ago and I'll be buggered if my daughter is going to have the same prospects of this cancer when she gets to my age.

I probably knew this, but I realize absolutely now that life is a gift, an incredible gift and we do have the choice. I'm horrified that it might be robbed from me. I would make a great old lady, I know that. I'd make a really good old lady. I'd be really bossy on the bus and I'd played old ladies cricket or something so, you know, the prospect of being robbed of that makes me see.

When I see older people who are grizzling about their sore this or their sore that, I go, "Oh, come on. Wake up. You're alive, lucky you!" So I see staying alive to be old as really, even though we can whinge about, what a lucky break.

I wish I hadn't have wasted so much time feeling shit about myself which I did for a long time in my younger days.