Outsiders often think it will be the best day in a long time. After a period of uncertainty about the diagnosis, discussions with practitioners and case managers, numerous examinations and many more blood tests than after months of treatment, the day of the last treatment has arrived. The last radiation. The last dose of the last cure. Discharge home after the last operation. When I talk to patients and their fellow sufferers about that last day of treatment, they say they have opened the proverbial champagne of course. But at the same time, the relief of that last day is nullified by worry and new uncertainty. After all, it is not only the last day: it is especially the first day.

The first day of the post-treatment phase: the follow-up. The aftercare phase (I think that’s a terrible word!). The phase in which it will become clear whether side effects are permanent. The phase in which the structure that gave the rhythm of the treatments to the days falls away. The phase in which the interest of family and friends fades away slowly or perhaps even quickly. The phase in which you are expected to ‘get back to normal life’. But especially the phase where it will have to be seen whether the treatments with which the cancer has been fought with all their might were effective.

But how? How does it work in that follow-up phase? During the discussion about the diagnosis, prognoses and probabilities are often discussed, but they are often very abstract. But in the follow-up phase it is suddenly very tangible, very close. What does it really mean that there is a 20% chance of the cancer returning? And do you just have to wait for that?

And how do you do that: waiting for what is to come. Scans without abnormalities and blood values ​​that are good give a safe feeling. But is that real security or just a false sense of security: after all, those results say nothing about the future. But often results are ‘just not quite right’: how do you deal with that? And suppose you can detect the cancer on the scan with a scan before you get complaints: do you really want to know that you will soon get complaints? Perhaps if the chance of recovery is greater. But very often it doesn’t matter. And being sick again always starts immediately. Scans and blood tests often make waiting more difficult and rarely easier.

It is not ready at all on that last day of treatment. In fact, it just begins…