felt sleepy even when she had just waken up. There was always this sensation of faintness when she stood up. Gastroscopy later showed stomach cancer attacked again
(CEA 2.7). Due to her age, the doctor disregarded medicines that would have caused
harmful side effects and instead, prescribed traditional Chinese medicine. The effect of
the latter was not so successful.
In February the following year, my eldest brother, who worked in Taiwan,
brought back Tian Xian liquid, said to be very popular for its anti-cancer properties.
Mother began taking 4 bottles of Tian Xian liquid every day. To our delight, CEA
dropped to 2.0 in March and to 1.6 in May. The cancer was deemed to be on the decline.
In August, we took it for granted that Mother had fully recovered so she stopped drinking
Tian Xian liquid. Consequently, in the middle of October, she became infected with
acute enteritis with a fever above 40 degrees and suffered from diarrhea, which lasted for
three days. She was again brought to the hospital and released in one month. Again, she
was afflicted with diarrhea and the CEA rose to 2.7.
Late in January 1997, she began to drink three bottles of Tian Xian liquid again
until October when the CEA dropped further to 1.4 and was kept under control. She,
then, reduced her Tian Xian dosage to one bottle per day.
Now, Mother does not feel any pain at all. Although she is still physically weak,
her digestive function is quite improved and she says she can taste the food.
Mother is in the twilight of her years and she has a bad memory. She complains that she cannot sleep at night. For me, this is the flimsiest of her problems.