There’s this little side effect of chemotherapy that no one really warns you about. It’s not the nausea, or the bone-deep fatigue, or even losing your hair... people at least prepare you for those.
It's the brain fog or as I like to call it: the brain farts.
It feels like my brain’s running on dodgy WiFi. Some days, the signal is strong and clear, I can think straight, string sentences together, feel sharp again. Other days, it’s like everything is buffering mid-thought, mid-sentence, mid-task. One minute I’m totally capable, the next I’m wondering if my brain is actively sabotaging me on purpose.
Take the time I tried to organize a fun night out at the cinema with my girlfriends. I booked the tickets online, feeling very “on top of life.” Halfway there, it hit me: Brighton doesn’t even have a Vue cinema. I’d booked us tickets for London. Cue me, standing on the pavement, staring at my phone like: Really? Again?
Or the time I was invited to speak at a cancer conference in London. Big moment, very grown-up. I booked my hotel well in advance, felt ridiculously smug… until the night before, when I realized I’d booked it for the wrong date. Not the date of the conference. The date I made the reservation. Instead of rehearsing my talk, I was frantically searching for an affordable room in central London, giving myself the world’s biggest mental facepalm.
Oh, and my personal favorite: the travel fail. Bags packed, snacks ready, smug sense of “I’ve got this” fully activated. I got to the station, hopped on the train… and realized I was going in the wrong direction. Missed my flight, obviously. Classic chemo brain.
Sometimes it’s smaller stuff; burning dinner until the smoke alarm tattles on me, turning up to appointments on the wrong day, or panicking about losing my phone while literally talking on it. What used to be funny once in a while now happens so often it feels like my new normal.
And honestly, the worst part isn’t even the mistakes. It’s the second-guessing that follows. I don’t trust my brain the way I used to. Now I double-check everything. I send screenshots of bookings to my husband just to make sure I haven’t accidentally booked a flight to Madrid instead of Manchester. I reread emails three times before sending them… and sometimes I still ask someone else to check. Basically, I’ve become my own overworked, unpaid PA, and not a very good one.
It’s exhausting. And sometimes, really embarrassing. It makes you feel stupid, even when you know you’re not.
So these days, I’m trying to be gentler with myself. I’ve stopped expecting my brain to work like it used to. I stick to routines, write things down, make lists, set reminders. I try to avoid multitasking (spoiler: I’m terrible at it now anyway). I ask for help when I need it. And I remind myself that needing help or extra structure isn’t failing, it’s adapting.
I don’t demand perfection anymore. If things slip through (and they do, often), I try to laugh, roll with it, and remind myself: this is just how my brain works now. It doesn’t mean I’m less.
If you’re nodding along while reading this, I want you to know you’re not alone. The brain fog is real. The brain farts are real. And so is the frustration of trying to feel like yourself when your mind has other plans.
But here’s the thing, we’re still here. Still showing up. Still finding ways through the fog. Still laughing when we can.
And honestly, that’s more than enough.
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