I'm with you, Neville.  Who can possibly tell you how much work you can or
cannot do while on ADT or RT?  Admittedly, I'm 20 years your younger, but I
never took a day off work during RT or ADT.

Clarence:

You know best about how you feel and what you want to do.  You should
do what you feel like doing.

I was 64 years old when I started treatment.

I had ADT3 for 21 months and while I didn't feel the same as I did
before ADT I managed to get through it.  It was tolerable - not
terrible.

I also had 12 weeks of chemotherapy (50 mg Taxotere once a week) while
still on ADT3 and at the end of that therapy I certainly felt beat up
but I was able to keep moving - somewhat slowly - which helped me
mentally.

I also had 43 sessions (5 days a week for 8-1/2 weeks) of Intensity
Modulated Radiation Therapy (IMRT) after having completed the chemo
three months earlier and was still on ADT3 while doing the radiation
therapy.  Granted toward the end I was weary but I also felt it was
important to maintain as much a normal lifestyle as possible.

2 days after completing IMRT I drove (well, my wife and I drove) from
Los Angeles to the San Francisco area to attend the annual BIG GAME
between Cal and Stanford and a couple of days later drove back to Los
Angeles.

I say all this not because I want to say "Hey look what I did" but
rather to provide an example of what can be done.  Having ADT3,
chemotherapy & radiation therapy did not confine me to my house to sit,
brood and feel sorry for myself.

You seem to indicate you want to stay on the job and live at least a
somewhat normal life so I'm just encouraging you to make the decisions
you feel best about and not based on what some physician "thinks" how
you feel.  You said you are finding it difficult to "throw in the towel
re work."  Well, then don't unless it becomes apparent to YOU that you
are doing yourself more harm than good.

We all react differently to treatment regimens and we do need to take
care of ourselves but we also need to keep on living while doing
treatment we hope will keep us alive.

Best regards to you.

Harold

You can stop thinking in boxes.

When I started working, I was a sales assistant in a music store and moved
on to a clothes store. I got jack of that sort of life and went into
accounts and on to working 3 years in a bank. After that I landed a great
job in accounts again (9 day fortnight, good pay) for 7 years before they
retrenched 56 of us, no warning. By that time I was 29 and thinking my time
was limited in the accounts area but landed a stressful job in charge of the
whole finance side for a wine import company. I lasted a good 3 months
before I got sick from an overactive thyroid and chucked in the towel. That
was fixed and I moved back into accounts again and worked my way up through
the levels in a car company until I was second in charge of finance there.
At that point I was working 8AM to 10PM no break, 5 days a week and 9AM to
4PM Saturdays and was starting to go crazy.

I decided my life and wife were worth more than that and changed career
entirely and went to an internal sales rep for a printing company and ended
up going through quite a few companies always doing better and better until
I had a great job, company car, great pay and then got pretty sick with yet
another health problem. 7 years later and somewhat better though never going
to be what I was before, I realised I could earn some money again and took
up computer repair.

Look to what skills you have, what interests you have and use them. If you
aren't hard up for money, do the thing you like and can do on a casual basis
where you name your own hours. That is ALL I can do now. I don't earn enough
to live on and my wife has to work and support us both but I still earn
SOMETHING and don't feel quite as much a bludger as I used to do.

Added to all this the prostate problem and many other problems. However, I
still get up each day, do what has to be done and continue till it IS done.
I worked a 23 hour shift (for myself) last week and followed it with an 18
hour one. I don't want to do that again and will turn it down in future as
it badly affected me but the pay was good. I have a reputation for honesty
and good work where I live, too.

If you aren't fully incapacitated, you aren't too old and useless unless you
decide to be that or allow it to be the case. If people tell you that you
CANT do something, amuse them by agreeing then go and do it anyway. You'd be
amazed how many people are kept happy by being treated like idiots.

I think going to work during treatment has a very positive effect, at least
in my case it did.  The oncologist that I see even encouraged me to work
during chemotherapy, which I was able to do 4 days a week.  Aside from
seeing supportive riends and colleagues on a daily basis, it is important to
feel you are able to make a contribution...  Also, it gets your mind off
your illness for a while.

Hello again

Approximately a week ago I posted "at the crossroads", (about ceasing
work after a lifetime of it),to which I received quite a number of
different responses.

I then concluded that everyones' circumstances, (including mine),
would be different, and that no inspiration or solution could be
gleaned from the varied responses.

So I'm sorting myself out, taking Meds for my OA and still working
when I'm able.

I'll see what I feel like when I come out the other sides of RAD and
HDR Temp Brachytherapy, whilst still bearing the SEs of ADT for at
least another 12 months.

Thanks for all the responses and accompanying tales

.


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