Radio Done...

Actually, it was done last week. Last Tuesday to be precise. But if I’m going to be completely honest (and that, after all is the point of this), I’ve been a little stumped about what to actually write. And that’s mainly cos I don’t really know how I feel about it all. Relieved obviously. And glad that all the main, horrible stuff is safely out of the way without hitting me too hard. I think, above all else, it just feels nice to feel normal. But normal’s quite a boring thing to write about.

When I was doing the chemo, I was happily telling everyone (myself included) that I felt “surprisingly OK”. Looking back now, the past 6 months are a bit of a crackers, massive blur – I can remember things happening, but it’s like looking back at things through the bottom of a milk bottle, or a particularly stuffy head cold. That's news to me, having up til now been convinced that I was trotting along nicely, but it wouldn’t surprise me if there’s been a heck of a lot of sympathetic nodding, vague smiles, glances of desperation and mutterings of “yes of COURSE you’re OK” whilst I’ve been rambling on and leaving the house in my nightie and suchlike (God, I hope I didn’t do that. Luckily, as far as I can remember, I only got on a tube with just the one boob the once…).

So finally, life is as back on track as it can be. Herceptin will be going on once every 3 weeks and at some point I’ll get Tamoxifen pills to neck daily, but the hurdy gurdy, helter-skelter, bonkersness of the past few months is over. My hair’s beginning to grow back (current status is a peachy fuzz on a par with my 8 month old godson) and it finally feels like I’m no longer the hospital shop’s biggest customer. I can hit the rowing machine and try and shed some of the chemo-induced chub (“It’ll drop off as soon as the steroids finish”. Apart from it won’t.), and but for the missing mammary I’ll soon be good as new.

Which all means that for now, I’ll be putting this l’il blog to bed. I never really thought when I started writing it that anyone would read past the first couple of entries and, if anything, I thought the whole idea of writing it was pretty self indulgent. After all, who on earth would want to read about me?? But, turns out that my musings have tickled a few funny bones, raised the odd smile and squeezed out the occasional sniffle. It’s hopefully made it a bit easier for people who didn’t know what to say to know what to say, and it’s completely overwhelmed me to realise how much support I’ve had. So thank you to everyone who’s have read it, to the people who’ve sent me messages, and the people who’ve read it and decided to go and run through parks on their weekends to raise money for the other gals going through this shiz. Without wanting to sound all soppy, I have felt very much humbled.

So I’m signing off for a bit. Fingers crossed this year’ll whizz by, and before you know it, I’ll be signing back on to sing from the rooftops that the Rack is Back.

Radiotherapy 1

Firstly (absolutely honestly, truly) they put a CD on while I was having the treatment and the first song was Lady Gaga. Radio. Gaga. Genius.

So, two weeks ago I went in to have my radiotherapy planning – they pop you in a scanner and mark you up with 4 tiny (so tiny I thought they’d forgotten to do one) tattoos that they then use during the radiotherapy to line you up to the exact millimeter to the scanning machine.

And today was the first session proper. I got all weirdly emotional heading into the hospital. I’ve been in and out like a fiddlers elbow for the past 6 months without a care in the world (well, you know…), but I did feel like I was going to burst into tears at one point (that said, it could’ve been thanks to walking along Euston Road in the pouring rain). It hit me out of nowhere to be honest – I wasn’t expecting to get upset at all, but after giving myself a quick talking to I was right as a rainy London afternoon again. I suppose I’ve had 2 weeks without any sort of treatments or appointments, so I’ve had a taste of getting back to normal and then I’m right back in again. Ah well, there’s not a chance I’m repeating sitting in a doctor’s waiting room sniffling away and scaring small children though – especially when everyone else is there for exactly the same reason. I’d look like a right idiot.

Luckily, I get disproportionately excited about new machines and stuff, and this one was ACE. Like actually being in James Bond or Alien or some 80s film about what the future would be like – I lie on a bed in the middle of the room (I don’t even get the ubiquitous blue gowns for this though – just a square of blue paper to attempt to cover my one remaining bit of modesty) and two radiotherapy nurses shuffle me about to line my teeny tiny tats up to the millimetre with lasers (actual lasers) coming out of the walls and ceiling (see, the future…). Then they leg it out the room and leave me lying there being zapped and trying to concentrate on not concentrating on breathing. Which is IMPOSSIBLE.

So one down and 14 to go. Just in time for the Queen’s Jubilee. Maybe Liz and I can have a joint party. 

The Port's Left

(Or at least I think the port’s left. If starboard’s left then my little joke doesn’t really work so well).

Anyway, the port’s gone – hurray! In and out and home on the sofa with Phil and Holly and some weird magician types who cure phobias live on telly by half 11. And the pain is nowhere near as bad as when it went in, so I’ve managed to stay more-or-less upright not yet hobble around like a hunch-backed 90 year old. Which is nice.

Rather excitingly, it was all done under local anaesthetic so I got to see the ever-brilliant Mr W in action. It’s all a bit weird having a local – apparently it dulls your pain receptors but not your feeling receptors so while it doesn’t hurt, you can feel someone tugging on something in your chest. They do kindly put a bit of cloth round your chin, so you can’t see what’s going on, although having said that, I’m not sure that might not actually be quite fun… All in, I had the local at 9.35 and was lying back on the ward having a cup of tea by 10. I swear, the man’s a miracle worker.

It was pretty darned ace being in the operating theatre and actually knowing about it – usually the second my feet go through the swing doors into the room I’m out for the count, but I got to see everything that goes on. So now I feel like I know a bit more about what’s happened before. And, he also showed me the port after it had come out and it was MASSIVE (the bottom was about the diameter of a 50p, if not a little bigger). No wonder I could feel the sodding thing. All in all, quite an informative little morning (I’m SUCH a geek!).

So all this means I’m clean as a whistle and good to go and get on with the next bit – radiotherapy planning on Tuesday. 

Duncan Goodhew...

Yul Brynner

Right Said Fred – all 3 of them

Sinead O’Connor

Blofeldt

Britney

And me!

This morning, in my infinite wisdom, I decided enough was enough and cut what was left of my own hair with a pair of nail scissors (I’m well aware that in typing this, I sound a little mental. But infinitely less mental than insisting on ponytailing up my remaining 34 hairs into a two year olds hair band for the past two weeks). Admittedly, it’s not the most professional of haircuts, and I didn’t even use a mirror as I was in the bathroom and it was steamed up so I’m fairly sure I’ve missed bits, but it was SOOOO satisfying! I’d worried that I might get a little emotional about the whole thing, but it’s not often you can just hack away and honestly not give a hoot what you look like. Why I didn’t do it weeks ago is beyond me.

Also, it’s super soft, so I spent a good 10 minutes this morning stroking my own head like a cat (which, to be honest, is the real thing that’s going to make me sound like a mental).

Chemo 6

And, most importantly, the last chemo of them all!! Whoop whoop!

It’s a bit of a weird one to be honest. While it’s absolutely brilliant to have got to the end of the chemo and ticked that box and know that the worst of the side effects will (in a couple of weeks) be over and done with, it’s also brought home more than ever how much more there is left to do. That said, although what’s left are things that will take time, at least my hair can grow back (it’d better be better than my old hair…), and the days of living in fear of peach slices for breakfast and feeling like bits of broken glass are shearing into my spine will hopefully be over.

First things first, the portacath is coming out on April 19^th, back in the capable hands of Mr W (I have no idea what the women of North London are going to do when he retires…). There was talk about this being done under a local so I’d be able to see the great man in action, but they’ve scuppered that plan and I’ll be having a full on sedation (how dull). Clearly they’ve realized that I’d be far too distracting to him if I had even half of my normal wits about me… Rumour has it the drugs they give you for a sedation are pretty squiffy though, so at least I’ll have something to cheer me up…

Then, the following week and into UCLH for my planning meeting for radiotherapy –a CT scan to see if there are any glaring bits left over from what they’ve attacked me with so far, then they tattoo me up so they get the precise co-ordinates of where they’re going to fry me (heaven forbid I should be in anyway cool and have a proper tattoo – just some random dots on my chest for me thanks…). Two weeks later and I’ll be in every day for three weeks for a 15 minute session of sunburn. That should be over by the end of May and just in time for the Queen’s Jubilee weekend (I’m hoping it will be at LEAST as fun as the Royal Wedding – one of my favourite days EVER for the uninitiated…).

And then back on the Herceptin until this time next year – a session on the drip every three weeks. Hence the dawning realization that the chemo is but one little bit…

But, as we all know, a silver lining is MOST important, so……

-       The chemo is DONE! And that is definitely the worst bit.

-       I get even more Mr Wilson time, and that CANNOT be a bad thing.

-       None of this is still a patch on anything Hitler did (even to his niece who we’ve now established he wasn’t actually that nice to).

-       A year on Herceptin means a year of Ivy bringing me tea and biscuits on the ward. Ivy is MENTAL. And lovely. But also a bit mental.