Coping with Chemotherapy-Induced Changes in Appearance Improve self-confidence by focusing on positive physical signs in your appearance. Talk to your doctor about ways that you can mitigate the damage that cancer treatment can do to your appearance, such as your state of mind and how you feel mentally. Masking the changes caused by your cancer treatment can help you feel more attractive and focus on positive features of your appearance. The following exercises in front of a mirror can help you adapt to the changes in your body. 1. What do you see about yourself in front of the mirror? Many people only notice what they are unhappy with about their appearance. When looking in the mirror, they see pale skin, hair loss, thin limbs, and fistula appliances, but not a beautiful smile, bright eyes, or a standardized face. Wang Fusheng, Department of Breast Surgery, The Second Hospital of Shanxi Medical University 2. Find a private time of at least 15 or more. Be sure you spend enough time carefully considering the effects of chemotherapy on your appearance. Use one of the largest mirrors you have to carefully study the changes in yourself. What part of your body would you most like to see? What part do you least want to see. Do you catch negative feelings that arise when you see certain parts of yourself? What are you most happy with about your appearance? Has cancer and treatment changed your appearance? 3.First try doing the mirror exercise with your clothes on. If you generally wear clothes or accessories to hide the changes after cancer treatment, wear them for the initial mirror practice. Practice this 2-3 times until you are able to accept looking at your body and have discovered at least 3 or more nice features of your appearance. 4. Once you feel comfortable with a stranger looking at you, try the mirror exercise with your clothes on to feel like your loved one is looking at you too. For example, if you are carrying a fistula, you can wear your favorite bathrobe. Observe yourself for a few minutes and repeat the first step of the mirror exercise. What is the most attractive or sexy thing about you? Discover at least 3 or more wonderful features of your appearance. 5. Better yet, try practicing in the mirror naked, without any cover-up. If you have any difficulty or bad feelings when you see scars, hairless scalps or fistulas, take enough time to practice getting used to it. The biggest change will be that you won’t feel as ugly as you did when you first saw them. If you feel tense, try breathing deeply to relax your muscles. Don’t give up on this exercise until you have discovered 3 or more good things about your appearance or remembered at least 3 or more beautiful things about your appearance. Practicing in the mirror can help you become more relaxed and natural when your loved one looks at you. Ask your loved one to tell you what they like about you. These positive responses will help you improve your self-confidence. Think of them when you feel unsure of yourself. Change Negative Thoughts Our thoughts and moods can often dictate whether a one-time experience is good or bad. Seek to make yourself more aware of how attractive and sexy you are. You may be bothered by thoughts like, “Would people want to have sex with someone who only has one leg?” Almost all of us are affected by negative thoughts. But here’s how you can change those thoughts. 1, Write down the three most common negative thoughts you have about yourself in terms of your role as a sexual being. Some may be related to cancer treatment, others may have been around for a long time. 2. Write down positive thoughts that are the opposite of these negative thoughts. For example, if you say, “No one wants a woman with a urethrostomy,” you can say to yourself, “I can wear a lace-covered fistula during sex. If some people can’t accept a woman with a fistula, that means they’re not right for you.” In the next sexual situation, you can use this positive thought to overcome a negative one. If you have positive thoughts in your sex life, this is a good time to indulge yourself and let that positive thought flourish. If this intrusion of negative thoughts makes you feel insurmountable and discouraged, at this point you can go ahead and speak to your doctor about the fact that you may need to get help from a psychologist. Overcoming Mental Depression When Overcoming Cancer Treatment Staying active is a great way to overcome mental depression when overcoming cancer treatment. Talk to your doctor for counseling on an exercise regimen that works for you. Even if you just participate in physical activity appropriately it can make you feel energized and healthy. You can reduce the pain and nausea caused by cancer treatment by learning some relaxing activity techniques. Although you can learn these activity techniques through books, DVDs, and other media, it is more effective to have direct instruction from an expert. If there are weeks of depressed mood, you should tell your doctor. What doctors call depression includes the following symptoms; 1. Lack of interest in sex or things that give you pleasure on a regular basis 2. Not feeling happy about anything 3. Insomnia 4. Changes in eating habits (excluding changes due to chemotherapy or other cancer treatments) 5. Feeling easily fatigued (excluding fatigue due to chemotherapy or other cancer treatments) 6. Lack of concentration 7. Feeling worthless and unhappy Depression It can be treated by medication and also by some other methods such as improving sleep, appetite, energy and other mental pleasures. On the other hand it can also improve your self-evaluation and sexual interest. If you experience depression be sure to report it to your doctor. But be aware that some of the newer antidepressant medications, such as selective neuroamine reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) may interfere with reaching orgasm. If these medications have an effect on your student, you should tell your doctor. Other types of antidepressants may be available. Overcoming Sadness and Disappointment The sadness and disappointment associated with cancer is common. You may also have noticed your own annoyance, anger, and hostility toward those around you. Cancer changes the way you see yourself evaluating yourself, which includes your body and your life. It disrupts your peaceful and happy life and affects the way you view your sex life. It may also affect your ability to handle relationships. Sadness is a normal psychological response to giving up an inherent ideal of life and having to adapt to a new lifestyle caused by cancer. It may take some time to recognize and accept this change. Even after you have stopped feeling sad, it will take time to adjust to this life change. If you are able to talk to someone close to you about the situation, it may help you to adjust to these changes as quickly as possible. If there is no such person, you can seek the help of a psychologist. Just as it is important to care for your physical pain, it is also important to treat overcoming your mental pain. Rebuilding Your Self-Confidence Attractiveness is only one part of your self-image. Psychologists describe self-confidence as being like a set of bank demand passbooks. The first bankbook stores your physical worth – what your body can do and how it looks. The second is your social value-your ability to interact effectively with others and the kind of emotional support you receive. The third is your total accomplishments-including your positive achievements at school, at work, and in your interpersonal and family relationships. The fourth depository is your spiritual world-including your religious and moral beliefs and the strength they give you. Throughout your life you have saved different aspects of your values in these passbooks, and when you have a crisis, such as cancer, some of them need to be taken out. This includes time and energy, physical abilities and even function. It can affect your relationships, damage your career and even your beliefs and values. When the net value of your life savings declines, you may need to “borrow” from others to keep the books balanced. Understand the cost of cancer in your life and try to keep your life bank positive by saving again. With effort, the loss of a portion of your life’s value will not bankrupt you completely. If your cancer and its treatment have damaged you is outward appearance, you can feel a deeper level of love and care from your closest family and friends. If the disease has affected your work, you can work to make your spiritual life richer. Although you may sometimes feel that the savings in your life’s bank book are dwindling, if you look closely you will find that there are still areas of “income” flowing in to enrich the value of your life. Good Communication: A Key to a Successful Relationship The most important part of having a good sexual relationship with your lover is good communication. Some people avoid talking to their loved ones about their fear and pain of cancer because they fear it will add to their psychological burden. But in reality when you take this protective approach, it’s just something that everyone suffers in silence. No couple can get through the diagnosis and treatment stages of cancer without any anxiety or pain. Why not go ahead and share this stress as a couple by discussing these things? Sexual sharing is one of the most important ways to bring couples closer together in the midst of the stress of illness. But if your loved one is in a state of repression or depression, you may worry that making sexual suggestions will seem like a demand. You can broach the subject of sex in a healthy and positive way. The kind of rebuke (won’t you touch me again?) and simple demands (we haven’t had sex in a long time and I can’t stand the frustration!) are not helpful. Instead, you should express your feelings in a positive way (I really miss our old sex life, let’s talk about how we can continue our old intimate life!) . Overcoming Sexual Anxiety Many people believe that when couples have sex it’s a natural and easy thing to do and doesn’t need to be specially planned out. However, because of illnesses that sometimes require adjusting to some of the symptoms and side effects of treatment sex can’t be as casual as it used to be. The most important thing is that couples should actively discuss the issue and schedule sex at a relaxed time. Part of the worry and anxiety of returning to sex after cancer treatment is the pressure to satisfy your partner. One way to discover your own ability to enjoy sex is to start touching yourself. While this is not this is not a necessary step to restarting your sex life, it is helpful. By self-touching your external genitals to orgasm, you can find out if cancer treatments have changed your sexual response without worrying about frustrating your partner. It can also help to discover what parts of your body have become delicate and vulnerable so that you can show your partner how to avoid it. Many of us were taught as children that masturbating and masturbating is wrong and shameful. But for most people the act of masturbation is a normal and positive experience. Most men and women have tried to touch their external genitals at some time in their lives. Even some people who have a harmonious sex life with their partner sometimes engage in masturbatory behavior. Masturbation is also often practiced by both men and women, and among older people between the ages of 70 and 90. In a relaxed and natural environment, you try to caress not only your external genitals, but also other parts of your body, paying attention to the pleasurable sensations you can experience. Read some books on the subject, and then you can tell your lover what you have discovered about those parts of your body that are sensitive. Even if the cancer treatment did not change your sexual response characteristics, you can still discover some new ways of caressing to increase the pleasure of sex through this attempt. Masturbation 1, Studies have found that masturbation is the most common human sexual behavior, and although it is more common in men, it is also enjoyed in women. 2, Masturbation should not be forced even though it may not agree with your religious beliefs. Its most important characteristic as a sexual act is that it does not conflict with your personal thoughts and beliefs. 3. Masturbation should not be seen as a matter of choosing between sex with your partner and sex with your partner. Many couples who have harmonious inter-partner sex also have masturbatory sex. 4. You may find that gently caressing certain parts of your body, not just the external genital area, gives you sexual pleasure. Many women find that their breasts, nipples and other parts of their bodies are sensitive to touch. Different women have different sexually sensitive areas. Carefully explore your body, you may also find that after surgery and radiation therapy in some parts of the touch feeling changes and do not want to be stimulated, then you should tell your lover in the sex life to avoid stimulating these parts. 5, if you feel comfortable, you can choose not to be influenced by the private time to carefully explore your body to find sexually sensitive areas. You can share these discoveries with your lover to make your sex life happier, but you can also keep it as your own secret. There are many people who enjoy this sexual pleasure during bath time. 6. Some women enjoy this kind of exploration and self-stimulation. However, the feelings and ways of masturbation vary from person to person, but a basic principle is that this sexual act makes you feel comfortable and pleasurable and is not harmful to your body. Rekindle Your Sexual Passion Sexual thoughts and feelings can be present throughout our lives, but sometimes we forget or neglect our sex lives for a while. Your sexual thoughts can also improve your sex life. Try to create a personal and private “Sexual Thoughts Record”, which can record the following. 1. Keep a small notebook and write down your sexual thoughts and feelings as you have them. Make a note of what time of day it is, whether you are alone or with someone else. Of course, you should also write down the specifics of these thoughts and feelings. 2. Record and analyze whether there is a pattern of specific times, people, and circumstances that contribute to your sexual thoughts and feelings. 3, found this pattern, you can try to create to put yourself in this kind of environment to help ignite sexual desire. For example, in a relaxing evening and your lover together to read some books with sexual plot, some have romantic or sexual plot film and television program and fantasy some exciting sexual experience. 4, aspect to get your lover’s help. Example how to discuss with your lover about your concerns about sexual relations. If there are any medical problems, together with the doctor to discuss to solve these problems. If these self-efforts still can’t ignite the passion in your sex life, you should consider consulting a sex life expert to get their help. Sex with your lover Once you wish to try to start a sexual encounter with your lover, you should first take a little time to do some preparation. You should choose a time when you have good energy and feel good physically. You may also want a relaxing environment, for example you want to be in a cozy room with candles lit and soft soothing romantic music in the background. Even though you may feel a little shy, make sure you let your lover know that you are eager to have a close body-physical contact with him.