BEP chemotherapy

[floriri81]

Haha Matt, it should be fun to have curly hair but in my case I will miss that if it comes to chemo because i am already half bald or maybe I will be lucky to have my hair back, maybe a miracle of chemo....

[JohanusEU]

..chia pet stage Really hoping I'm getting close. I'm quite impatient and really curious what will happen on my head. Hearing all these stories of curly hair and color changes... My hair used to be sandy blond and straight. Now the fuzz is transparent blond and it still seems to be straight, but it is hard to say since it is still only ~3mm.

[Profion]

Wanted to show a picture of my current state of hair http://tinypic.com/view.php?pic=b9iz2b&s=8#.VOSSiC5QksB
I was very worried that my hair would not grow out, that it would be different and that it would look stupid!

- First month the hair came out like soft baby hair.
- Then it startet to mature and thick black hair came out on head and beard
- My hair came out alittle thiner "before it was like sheep wool" so im quite happy about that
- Beard came out the same, but turned from black into red as you see... I think it looks awesome
- this picture is 4month after chemo.

I decided and dedicated my hair to my health. Im growing long beard and pony-tail now

[vasileios]

Hi all its been about 1 month and a half ( if im not mistaken with the calculations) since i finished my second and last round of bep. i have to admit that our cases do look very similar. I had lost about 60-70% of all body hair in the end of the first round and in order not to look like a freak i shaved it all(i mean all from everywhere). Soon after the end of the second round (1-2 weeks) hair started coming out. Now the mustache is all full grown and actually bigger and densier than before the chemo. The hair on the head have started comming out but they are still not so dense . Actually for some really weird reason i have a lot of blond hair now (i was full black hair), and thats really weird and funny. I reallized that if i cut the hair with a hair cutting machine then they grow faster (so i would advice you to give it a try). The hair on the chest and belly have grown back to about 80% but on the legs i would say that im at about 20% only (not that i really care about that). Im really thankfull that i didnt lose the eyebrows.Please dont get me wrong but i always found people without eyebrows strange.Im lucky i guess.

One small note my testosterone test was better after chemo and is now at about 10.5 nmol (i was expecting to be lower than before chemo,weird again). I had my ct scan 1 month after the last bleo and it is clear so now im on a per "3 month" surveilance.Also the tinnitus is significant reduced and barely noticebale on 90% of the time.

[JohanusEU]

It's almost 2 months from my last bleo and I have all public hair back except the legs (where I have ~40% of former hair) and sideburns. What is strange is that regrown body hair is more dense than before, especially mustache. My sideburns are barely growing.. which is funny, because I have to shave my mustache 2-3x more often than sideburns. Hair on the head is still blond-transparent not so dense but growing fast. I've already trimmed it with 6mm.

@vasileios - loosing eyebrows is not very common even after 3xBEP, but you are right.. you can cover your head with scarf or cap but without eyebrows you look different.

My tinnitus is still present, although my had adopted to it pretty well. I barely notice it when I'm busy, but once I start thinking of it I realize it is still there.

[vasileios]

its funny (or weird) but now im having another issue. it is kinda explained also in another thread (http://www.tc-cancer.com/forum/forum...hs-after-chemo) and seems what im having. i had my 2 rounds of chemo in decem-janua. all hair had come back to normal by march-april. now suddenly (totally) my mustache has blank spots with no hair growing.i was happy to see that all hair had come back to normal after chemo and now totally suddenly my mustache seems weird (like strips of hairs with gaps).all the rest of the hair seems normal.do you guys have something like that too?so its like chemo->losing hair->end chemo->hair grow back to normal->have normal hair-> suddenly mustache loses hair and seems weird with gaps...weird

[JeskiM69]

This is funny ! The exact same thing happened to me. My mustache was the first facial hair to come back and then a couple months later it fell out and a few weeks later it came back. Then after that the sideburns did the same thing. Now it's happening on my chin.

It's the weirdest thing. It falls out all of a sudden then suddenly grows back about 3-4 weeks later. It also happened on my legs. To make it even weirder it has not happened to any hairs on top of my head.

I guess the only thing I can say is that maybe we are twins Or you can expect more than just the 'stache to come out and back.

- Matt

[JohanusEU]

Just a short update after longer time..

- I have all my hair back and I would say (and people confirm that as well) it is thicker than before
- public hair is back to normal (incl. mustache)
- I'm back in the same shape (physical/psychical) as before TC
- No side effects (except tinnitus) from 3x BEP (no neuropathy)

Hope all of you are doing well or even better

[JohanusEU]

Hi all,

I'm currently more than 5 months post chemo and have started to notice some wired things. My mustache is starting to be patchy and I lost all underarm public hair. I don't complain since I was shaving my face and underarm since my 18, but its very strange though. Public hair on the rest of my body is normal and my hair is still visibly thicker and more dense than prior chemo.

Do you have same experiences? What could be the cause of this?

Thanks.

[Talis]

Hi Johanus,

I noticed some similar things. One thought that occurred to me was whether hair growth was somewhat cyclical and perhaps the chemo caused these cycles to all align, so after regrowth you might get occasional periods of noticeable thinning.

My second thought was whether it might be related to low T. When my facial hair started to thin and I started feeling rather lacking in motivation I had a test and it was towards the low end. Again, it's possible that this fluctuates for a while after chemo causing such issues.

If you have any other signs, it might perhaps be worth asking your doctor to check your T levels again.

- T

[Davepet]

My head hair came back super curly for the first year, took around twoyears to get back to "normal", it still sems a bit different than I remember it.My body & fcial hair just all came back & has stayed back. Everyone is different & we all seem to have different chemo experiences.

Dave

[kingstonian]

to lighten up things my doctor dismissed my desire to have my hair regrown as my baby blond as whishful thinking...but kept an open option of having them back without the gray!!

[kingstonian]

Thanks Vasileios,

I'm really glad I've finished with 3x BEP (and cancelled 4th cycle). It wasn't that bad, but nothing pleasant I would like to go through again As for lap-RPLND.. based on my current good results (see my signature below) it is out of scope for now (thanks God). Honestly I would like to avoid it completely if possible. I'm still scared of possible side effects from RPLND (especially performed after chemo).

As for side effects from 3x BEP I'm still suffering from:

- very strong tinnitus (present even in very noisy environments) and damaged hearing of high pitch sounds (I've got prescribed some medications to reverse it),
- slight neuropathy in my left leg (thigh) sporadically appearing as a stabbing pain (e.g. while coughing or sneezing),
- some very small pigmentation changes on my fingers (I guess from bleo) barely noticeable,
- and of course I'm still without hair

What is strange I never had any issues with stomach or taste changes (e.g. metallic taste). Nevertheless, at the end I've lost approx. 4kg (mainly muscles).

Unfortunately neither me nor my oncologist knew about effects of slowing down the cisplatin infusions during my treatment (I found and read it just few days ago while I was trying to get more details on ototoxicity). I was done with cisplatin bottle every day within approx. 1 hour.

As for fatigue, tremor in my hands and overall weakness.. these are fortunately already gone. I hope that remaining sides will resolve after some time or at least mitigate to bearable level.

hello...do you mean that you can do it in longer hours than the the 1hour shot I have? with less side-effects?
thank you

[JohanusEU]

Hi Kingstonian,

yes, the slower you get cisplatin the less probable are side effects (tinnitus, neuropathy).

BTW.. Today I got ALL CLEAR after 6 months from finishing my 3x BEP.

[JohanusEU]

Hello Everyone,

I am no longer very active here on this forum since I am enjoying normal life after my TC struggle. So far everything is ok. I am back in surveillance with all clear for more than 7 months. Although I have one small issue I would like to ask about...

Approx. 3 months after 3x BEP my hair grew back with even more density than before TC. My public hair was back as well (mustache even stronger than before). Next 3 months was everything OK... then suddenly my armpit hair disappeared, my beard is weaker and I am loosing my hair as a hell (almost same progress as during chemo). My onco have no clue... I was sent for Thyroid check (still waiting for appointment). Do you have similar experience ?

Thanks,