Mr Fat: It's been a while.......

It has been so long now since posted any kind of a blog post and I felt that you at least needed something from me just to remind you that I haven't yet died......

I have been so exhausted over the last few months that I really haven't had the energy to do much, haven't even read any of the many books I still have in my kindle and so many of you wonderful authors are publishing great books and I am buying them and not finding the energy to push the on button on my reader, sheesh ......

Then I started the chemo again a week ago as the tumour seemed to be getting bigger and as usual the actual day of the gunk input was ok and it gave me renewed feeling of energy. ALthough having said that, I did get the right hump over the wait for treatment on the morning and unfairly started to take it out on the nursing and ward staff, but it's not their fault that they are understaffed and there are so many of us cancer stricken old farts hanging about  It even seemed to 'cure' the gagging and choking effect I was prone to every time a morsel of food passed from my mouth into my gullet and that in itself was a relief.  Four days into it though, last Friday I phoned the cancer specialist nurse as I wasn't feeling at all well, lethargic, nauseous, completely run down and in pain.  I was in work, as usual, but ended up going home I just couldn't cope and it went down hill  even more in the afternoon.  I really thought I wouldn't make it to the end of the day, never felt so horrible before and the last time I was on the chemo I was bad and came off it but....

After speaking with Mel the cancer nurse and her reminding me about ALL of the meds ... shit I have so many of them I forgot what I had and for what symptons.  There is one I call Dom Perignon, sounds like it but it's domperysomething .... anyways this is to counteract nausea.  I also have tablets for constipation, have been taking them but then I ended up with diarrhea but hey, I have pills for that too.  Anyway I didn't feel any better Friday and was still at deaths bed on Saturday but began to make a gradual improvement and continued to do so on Sunday but gawd was I pleased that Ishbel took the weekend off to look after me and of course Marie, Peter and the twins Holly and Charlie turned up to cheer me up.  The only problem with that, having gone through life as a big tough scotsman with no outward show of emotion I find it difficult to not just start blubbering and just seeing the kids and the grandkids turning up is enough to turn me into tear streaked numpty.

Oh, I've posted this, as you can see under the Mr Fat page but I can report that he has left the building ...... which everyone but me is getting their knickers in a twist over.  Yep, lost just over a stone and a half in the last three weeks and had a visit from a dietician while I was in getting gunked up last Monday.  Infact they are so concerned he told me I have to start bulking up again... WTF says I.  You do realize that for the first time in 15 years I have just seen John Thomas, if you think .......

And he says, yes very good but a lot of good John Thomas is going to be to you when you are dead. So, I want you to eat more;

Mashed potatoes with extra butter and grated cheese Double cream full fat yoghurt chocolate .....
Thick Gravy on meat dishes
Salt
Sugar
Full fat Milk
Shakes
Bread lashings of butter, toast

Now for some, that is an invitation to heaven I suppose, but for me, to be honest I'm finding I am full after a couple of bites, providing I can get it down that is.

And another thing why is that I feel good enough, well most days anyway to come into work, but at the weekends I feel shitty, when I should be chillin and relaxing and then there is the pee problem. What's that I hear you ask? Well let me tell you.

You know this chemo lark.  They want you to get it into your system but perversely they also want it out again as soon as, I mean WTF again.  Well you know me I never argue and alway, always do as I am told. So I have to drink gallons of water.  Not a problem, I like water and so I drink gallons of the stuff anyway.  Now tap water is good enough for me, not Ishbel though she has to have bottled water, just wait till I'm gone and she has to hump it back from the shops, we'll see how long that lasts then... anyway I digress

So, Take the chemo, drink gallons of water and flush the system.  Fine and then that's where if there is a god  he is messing with me again. like the feeling shit at weekends when I should be partying...
I'm drinking gallons of the stuff sat here at my desk in the office but do I need to keep running up and down the corridor to my private loo, yes well what can I say I deserve it.  No, I am not running up and down to the loo although with the amount of water I'm taken I'm thinking there must be a problem there too.  So off home I goes and of course when I get home, it's time to take the next bunch of chemo meds so I'm drinking buckets of water again and do I need to run up and down the hall to the loo, no I bloody don't! But what I do do, is get into frigging bed, close my eyes fall asleep for an hour and then the first of my three or four 5 frigging minute visits to the loo starts... I mean WTF is going on there and who is messing with my head and body sheesh, I just cannae win .........

So after a frightful weekend I have been back in the office today and felt much better, been run ragged with that bloody contractor again and not stopped, but it has been a good day so the sun is shining and all is rosy in the garden again.  The chemo? I did say to Ishbel and the kids that I was going to phone the hospital and tell them to stuff it where the sun don't shine, but I'll give it some more time.  YThe amelioration from the gagging has been good, but it's beginning to creep back again. so maybe the chemo has had an immediate effect but may not be doing all it might be... bastard, but I'll try and persevere and Jules is telling me to try radiotherapy, which wee Ollie the oncologist has also talked about, so I'll discuss that with her next week and by then it will soon be time to go back to Southend for another round of gunk input AND SOUTHEND HOSPITAL IF YOU ARE READING THIS DON'T HAVE ME FRIGGING HANGING AROUND COS I'M NOT NICE WHEN I'M GRUMPY.

Other news: None. Well apart from the fact that we have had astro turf done in the back garden and all the kids love it, including the neighbours kids and tip good quality astro turf seems much cheaper from the carpet shop, I know, I know, than from the garden centres in fact in south east Essex can't give enough Praise to MD Carpets for the job they did with ours.

Steve, Son in Law No 2 who lives down in woking came over and took me to hospital and Peter son in Law No 1 took time off from his work to come over at the weekend.  I said it earlier in the week, life has been pretty good to me, pretty shit upbringing in terms of an abusive alcoholic father, but the hardest working caring mother as compensation.  Ishbel who has put up with me for over 38 years, and I can see the pain in her eyes when I just want her to cuddle me, but not too tightly as it hurts, and three of the most loving, caring and hardest working kids, in Marie, Brian and Jennifer  it would be any parents privilege to have helped bring into this world and from them we have been given 5 beautiful intelligent* loving grandchildren and then the added bonus of two of the most hard working sons in law that you are ever likely to meet in Peter and Steve who clearly love and adore their partners and their children and work all bloody hours to support them - guys take it easy once in a while will you - I love you all dearly and I want to be the first out the door

*intelligence and tattooed eyebrows I'm sure there is a contradiction there.........

So a few photos of what's been going on recently

Fun in the garden before Astro turf

The new Astro turf

Ishbel planting pots but no pot for my pain!

Our first Indian Restaurant Lacey loved the popadoms!

Peter, Holly and Goalie Charlie K 

Mollie loving the hot towel after the meal

Lacey Mae, Mollie and Shannon aks KatNip

Mollie teaching Lacey Mae 

Grandmama and the darlings 

Daddy Steve and cuddly Lacey Mae

MY JENNIFER with curls and.....

Charlie beginning to outgrow Holly 

Daddy Peter also being shown how to lose at archery

MY MARIE

Mr Fat: An Update

So, Sunday 1st September and I woke up feeling like a new man today... I have no idea why,still have cancer, still have a 30 odd centimetre tumour growing from my oesophagus downwards to gawd knows where, and I was taken off the chemo two weeks ago as it was making me terribly ill and giving me particularly dark thoughts.

I don't think I would ever have ended it but I do have to confess the footbridge across the M25 close to us was looking particularly inviting but then I would have had to call myself all kinds of names and used extreme profanity in a self loathing description for causing havoc to the road users who suffer every day on that parking lot approaching the Dartford crossing!

I thought that as soon as I came off the chemo that I would start to feel much better but alas not. And I seemed to just get worse as the last two weeks progressed. I felt not too bad yesterday morning, last day of summer, managing a trip to the supermarket with Ishbel but from the moment we got back home I really did feel like a luke warm cadaver ready to be picked over by a committee of vultures. I couldn't even manage to take Ishbel to work later who had been asked to do some overtime. In fact she says she said goodbye to me and that I was wide awake when she gave me a kiss and a cuddle but I couldn't even remember any of that either.....

Today, a complete volte face if you like I feel absolutely marvellous and it may well be just a short lived hiatus, the chemo may now be out of my system and I am patiently awaiting the next phase, having had a CAT scan during the week, hopefully ahead of surgery, which I am hoping will be in the next few weeks if not sooner and then no doubt back on the chemo. So, I am going to make the best of today with Ishbel's warnings ringing in my ears to not be a tit and not to start rushing about today doing all the jobs I have been ignoring, the garden, stripping the hall and stair paperwork that Steve my defacto son-in-law started a couple of weeks ago and generally tidying up although I have managed to keep on top of the ironing ......

What I haven't managed to do is any reading, although I have pre ordered the next Kydd novel CARIBEE from the wonderful Julian Stockwin and the next in the series from Bernard Cornwell in the Uhtred, The Pagan Lord, as he serves the Kings of Wessex and tries to retake Bebbanburg in the North, so looking forward to them. Nor have I managed to keep up with all my friends blogs and posts or to engage on Twitter so apologies to my friend for all that but if I 'go dark' again don't worry too much as I am and always will be, a Survivor......

And then, I started this, which I think may have been a bad idea but got to press on now ....

Keep smiling :-))))

Mr Fat: Chemotherapy, Phase Two

So, phase two of the chemo was had on Thursday 1st August. back in Southend Hospital as a day patient this time and not overnight, yay.....

Drove myself in and arrived in good time hoping that I would not be sitting around as I was when I was admitted for the first one, an overnighter. Arrived at 8:20 and the waiting room was already beginning to fill up but at around 8:45 the male nurse in charge, Alan called my name first, another big Yay to that, and I was taken through to a bay with six bed/ chairs and given first choice. I took the one nearest the open door to the outside world, just in case I needed to escape, well you know what I'm like by now ......

Answered the usual battery of questions on how I was, any adverse reactions, bowel, vomiting, etc, and then satisfied, cannula and drip attached just after 9:00, result. I was then asked what toilet I would be using to pee in, which one would you prefer me to use? I asked. The male one round the corner would be better, as the others get a bit congested throughout the day.... And no doubt there would be at least one scream if I opened the door to the ladies while one was in there, I supposed!

The reason for the question though was to inform me that a measuring jug would be placed in the loo and I needed to pee into that and record how much and what time I pee as they needed to get the gunk in to the system but it also needed to be got out again in quick order, it works apparently this chemo stuff, but not to good if allowed to hang about in the system for too long.... So let the peeing commence.... But of course this peeing lark isn't always as easy as it sounds. When not in hospital I do drink a lot of water and do pee a lot but during the day not so much, last night though is a typical example of my peeing - sorry - 10:30 bathroom, pee, wash, teeth, bed sleeping as light goes off.
12:15 Am bathroom, pee, shake, wash, bed
2:30 Am bathroom, pee, shake wash, bed
3:40 Am bathroom, pee, shake, wash, bed
4:20 as above
6:15 awake, 6:45 got up and prepared b/fast for the boss

But, in hospital this seemingly Olympian ability to produce vast quantities of pee seems to desert me and instead of being in a medal position I am left in a cloud of dust in the starting blocks, analysts have at it......

So, back to Thursday and I should just mention that after the first session and the three weeks of pills I had felt remarkably well part from the constant but small and irritating nausea that I feel every day, but no actual vomiting and so hoping largely for the same outcome again with the start of this session.

Next big question, does this take as long as the first time, probably says Alan and that's why we have to measure your pee to see that it's getting through and out, so if there are no problems you should be out by late afternoon... Now he's putting the pressure on.

Thursday was the hottest day of the year and hottest I think since about 2007 up around 93 /94 degrees. Now I know this is not unusual for many of my friends not from these shores but here, oh dear, I wilt like the flowers in my garden when they see brown fingered Tom the destroyer of many a beautiful flower approaching them to try and care for them and end up killing them, which 7 yr old Shannon will be doing to grandad if he doesn't manage to save the gorgeous wee thing she bought him that bloomed so beautifully and that I appear to be killing with water!!!


So the day wore on and it was hot and sticky and making me drowsy and On. Couple of occasions just as I began to drift into a sweaty puddled nap, I would be brought round with: "Thomas, Thomas, Thomas! we are just about to change your drip and we just need you to confirm your name, DOB and first line of your address" this was about the third time and by then Mr Grumpy, who I had managed to suppress was beginning to gurgle his way to the surface, and as I struggled to wipe away the sweat from my brow and eyes I responded, "you do know that I've had no visitors in the last 5 hrs, none at all, not even my lawyer who I was I confess thinking of talking to about changing my name by deed poll from Thomas to Mr Grump, but she never showed up, so I am still Thomas, my DOB is still the same and unless my wife has chucked me out and changed the locks on the doors I still live at the same address as I did when you booked me in this morning and since you changed the last three frigging drips ....... I mean, but of course they try and explain this by saying it's procedure and it's also to make sure that the patient isn't becoming confused or non compos-mentis, which my response to that was, "as professionals wouldn't you be able to tell with the glazed over look and the non responsive actions of a patient who is in here for 7 or 8 hours ..... Me being a tit, again but it did get very wearing very quickly......

Other than that I had a book or two to read and fellow patients to chat with but unfortunately no one else seemed in a very chatty mood! I suppose wrapped up and worrying about their own particular brand of cancer to be bothered to chat a though I did manage a good chat with a lovely woman who was sitting outside after being booked in 5 hrs earlier and was still waiting for her treatment to start - I remember that from my last post and the thing is she has lymphoma something or other and is on a experimental drug giving by injection which apparently takes all of 5 minutes, sheesh. I saw her leaving about 90 minutes later, so a 6 1/2 hr wait for a five minute injection. Is it any wonder that depression in cancer sufferers is high, it's bad enough having the damned thing but surely there is just no excuse for that kind of treatment.

We wished each other well, having discuss what we were reading, I pointed her in the direction of Secret Doors: The Challenge by Brian D Meeks a great Sword and Sorcery magical tale with from a Potteresque perspective that will take on and rival Harry as the series develops and gets bigger and better - go get it now - I'll wait

And so the day wore on.... I escaped a couple of times with drip and dolly trolly, she had a nice set of wheels, but did not mange the 18000+ steps I did on my first visit, far too hot for that regrettably and my energy levels seem to be dwindling. A bit like Friday someone sent me an email asking for me to write a report, it was about 2:30 Pm and I responded that I would do it on Monday as someone had opened a valve and my steam appears to have been let out for the day, so I am following it out the door.....

6:00 Pm and I was watching that last drip like a hawk, which was silly as it seemed to make it go slower but by 6:20 the machine was buzzing away and I did notice throughout the day that of course this happens to everyone as their bags empty or the machine just needs a gentle nudge or you (me) have created another blockage, but the nurses never seem that eager to attend and it can go on for as long as 5 mins before anyone can be bothered to check it out ....

Eventually a nurse who says she had been on all day, but that I had never seen arrives and I ask if I can get out now, she checks the records, checks the pee records and says YES.....

she starts to unhook me and gets the cannula out and as she gets the plaster on all, hell breaks loose with alarm bells screaming out.... Some inconsiderate other patient who is hooked up to monitoring devices along with his treatment goes into some kind of shock and the rest of the ward becomes like the Marie Celeste, bless no real complaints and he turned out to be ok after the ministrations of the nurses, so my sorry griping is soon put in to perspective, ah well....

The nurse who was dealing with me clearly forgot all about me and I had to find another one to give me my meds to take home and go through the paperwork and get my next blood test form ... Oh did I mention I have to get my blood work done not more than two days before I go in for the treatment each time, something about checking the white cells. Did that on Tuesday, went to Basildon hospital on the way past to Southend as we had taken the day off as Marie and Peter were going for a Spa day and we were taking 7 year old Charlie and Holly to the beach and fun park for the day.

Arrived at Basildon blood testing the number on the wall was 63 I asked what the next one was, 93, says the woman behind her glass screen, forget it says I , and we headed on to Southend.  I do not know the difference is size between these two hospitals, they look pretty similar but there was six or so others waiting for blood tests here as opposed to Basildon crazy and then I felt guilt too as no sooner had I sat down when my name was called! Apparently Southend, unlike Basildon and Broomfield like to get cancer patients seen to quickly and there is off course a need to get the bloodwork report done quickly as the treatment is in the next couple of days, but off course Southend, unlike the other two also give free parking to cancer patients .......

Oh, 7 year olds Charlie and Holly were invited in to watch the process which was a bit worrying but also good, but only if granddad didn't whimper, which he managed not to and as the blood was drawn out and into the test tube their wee mouths and eyes gaped open and then big smiles as the nurse applied the dressing and drew a smiley face on it as granddad was so good and didn't faint....

So I managed to escape and felt as well as I did the first time on the drive home and into the Friday morning but unfortunately from there on in it was down hill all the way Wasn't sleeping but oh so tired, acid reflux still so awful and constantly wanting to be sick but not doing so, hardly able to lift my feet gums, teeth, ulcers sore back, kidneys felt like they had been given a good kicking and the footbridge close to us and over the M25 the london orbital motorway was looking ever so inviting to jump off, I really felt that awful and have done for the last 12 days still struggling into work though, even if I wasn't managing a full day I was at least keeping up with the paperwork.

Today, 13th August, after still getting up a couple of times during the night, I FEEL BLOODY GREAT, as if the last 2 week were a thing of the past which of course they are, but a complete turn around, go figure.... and that's why it has taken me so long to write this post and apologise to all those whose sites and blogs I have been ignoring and not leaving my gold plated comments on and to my friends and family for being a miserable bugger, I shall try to do better :-]

Mr Fat: Chemotherapy - day 1 to 3

view from hospital room 

Well It finally got here, but I suppose if looked at logically it wasn't that long a wait and If I hadn't been the usual dumb ass moronic man it could probably have started a lot sooner!

Have you noticed how much dumber humans and particularly MEN have become since the advent of the Internet and Google (other search engines are available) have become part of our daily lives? We want to know something, before Google we would have asked a friend, picked up a book, visited the local library and done a bit of digging; not any more, whether it's the smart phone, the laptop, the office pc or the tablet open up the search, type in your question and miracle of miracles, your answer appears, unfortunately it is usually wrong!

chillin

I did that way back in October/November time and put in my symptoms and was convinced I had a sliding hiatus hernia and I was up in the middle of the night, almost every night with it. It wasn't until April , after seeing the practice nurse for my MOT on Asthma that I mentioned this to her and she said I should really see the doctor, so an appointment was made. It was about a week or so later and in between seeing the nurse and the doctor I lost almost a stone in weight too, go figure.

My Bed!

Anyway the upshot of this was she made an appointment for me in hospital, which I have to say came through pretty quickly and I saw an upper GI specialist. He listened to me and made an arrangement for me to have a gastroscopy which again was done within a week or 10 days. it was at that appointment when little happy doctor who met and greeted me and carried out the test came back down the corridor looking all gloomy that I knew that it was something else, ah well shit happens and he went on after a little humming and hahing, bless,must be difficult for them - that I had a cancerous tumour in my oesophagus.

The fun really started then with the shunting between three hospitals but really for all my grumpiness and my perceived shortcomings, particularly where Broomfield Hospital in Chelmsford is concerned, I suppose all in all April to July for all the various tests and minor ops before into Southend on Thursday just gone to start Chemo, is not too long a wait at all, so I am grateful, even if I don't sound it at times .....

Having made that last comment though it would be remiss of me not to point out that I did turn out, once again, to be the patient from hell on Thursday towards the staff on the Elisabeth Loury Ward at Southend hospital.

I was booked in for an 8.30 Am appointment and due to stay overnight. As it turns out you get all these drips attached the first one being a little saline solution to clean out, I suppose any dregs of crap in the vain and then they hit you with something called the red devil, which turns your pee red and could make you feel uncomfortable, they tell you. I was keeping folk up to date, even with this and I got this message back from Jenny our youngest, " @jenniestronach: mollie said she is interested to know how you are but not about your pee :-) xx" Mollie, as you know, is the oldest of our grandchildren at 10 and is a handful ......

I should mention that the reason for my grumpiness was that having arrived at 8Am for my 8.30, given a bed I was the pretty much ignored for the next nearly six hours. If I had known that they would say to me once they actually got me hooked up but that all of the drips in total would take around 8 hours to get into me and then tell me as they were doing it that I would probably be allowed out that night, I would probably have asked them during the intervening six hrs of being ignored, to get it frigging started. When they arranged for me to come in they asked where I lived and how I would be getting there, drive or train said I. No, said they, we'll arrange transport. Fine says I ...

Then they tell me I can go home that night after the drips are finished, only problem is the drips won't finish until gone 10 pm and the volunteer drivers who shuttle the patients in and out of hospital don't work until that time, so why say it, really got on my tit.

Black Bag of Death!

On the plus side, through you can wander about both the ward and the hospital dragging your drip machine with you as long as you have had it plugged in and charged, as you re wandering about and it bleeps you keep getting stopped by folk looking at it and advising a trip back to whence you escaped from might be in order.... The only timeI couldn't escape was when they put the drip on that then gets fitted with it's own little black bin liner cover. Apparently this signifies Chemo treatment but I thought my description was better and funnier, The Black Death Bag, but as usual my humour was not appreciated, sheesh, some folk... and during all my wanderings hooked up or not I still managed to go over my step target for the day, well no point in sitting around when you don't need to.

Oh, and I did read a book too, Rock and Roll Homicide by RJ McDonnell which I will be reviewing shortly. I enjoyed it. It's about the investigation into the murder of a just about to hit the big time rocker who puts on his sound excluding head phones to listen to some tracks he has just laid down, switched them on and oh dear, bang boom no head ... No kidding, but it was good

So, had all this chemo, stayed in overnight, mind you they pumped me up with steroids too and I was still strolling round the hospital grounds and corridors at 2Am and was expecting the worst feelings to be attacking me with all the doom and gloom info you get from the oncologists and then the specialist nurses in the pre chemo consults and do you know what, and I do realise that they have to give the worst case scenario and that I have only been on it three days but I feel bloody great.

I haven't been eating well at all over the last seven months as every time food has gone near my mouth I have been gagging and choking and poor Ishbel has been panicking a bit, mind you so have I and even managed to throw up a couple of times, but since Friday no gagging, nada, nothing and I think I ate more in the last couple of days than the last couple of months, so a good start let's hope it continues.

I am back in the day treatment centre in 20 days for my next session of intravenous and then three weeks of pills and then the cycle starts again for a final three weeks and at that time I suppose it is then back to Broomfield for the hackers to get there knives and laser cutters in to chop it out, then back for another 60 days of chemo all being well I should be fine by Christmas and looking forward to cooking the usual mammoth turkey for the family, oh joy ......

Talking of food, this is the hospital menu and very tasty it all looked too. But, and bearing in mind I have had this gagging reflex I thought I would go easy so ordered mushroom soup for lune, nothing else and then the Shepherds pie for dinner.

the mushroom soup was passable, just, the shepherds pie was .......

DISGUSTING 

So to make up for that horrible site, her is a butterfly from the garden this morning 

And here is a wood pigeon trying to be a contortionist and going to do itself and injury in the process....

Oh and I forgot to say to all my Family and friends, Thanks for your Love and support.... but I think these guys say it better than me

crank up the volume 

And to answer my Delicious darling @PennyRomance , this is how WE feel today, apparently the photo is to large for twitter

Thanks my Sweet xxxxx

Update: was sent this interesting info-graphic resource on the affects of Chemo check it out, from;

Maggie Danhakl
Healthline • The Power of Intelligent Health
660 Third Street, San Francisco, CA 94107
www.healthline.com | @Healthline | @HealthlineCorp

Mr Fat and the Oncologist

Before I get on to my day with the Oncologist I should mention that I was back at the dreaded Broomfield Hospital for the CPEX test on Monday 10th June.  If you don't know CPEX is where they attach all those electrodes to your body stick a tube in your mouth and sit you on a pedal machine while they monitor all sorts of crap.  I'd tell you what they were actually monitoring if I knew but it seems to be a secret and I can only guess that it's my heart and lung rhythms!

(c) unknown

The Doctor, Dr W, took me in and introduced me to the technician, and then he left us to it.  The technician wired me up going through the procedure, commenting that once wired up I would be sitting on the machine for three minutes while base lines were established and then the test would start with me pedalling until I got to 60 on the counter and that once I got there I was to maintain that rhythm throughout the test.  He went on to state that it would be a gentle pedal until I got to the 'hill' then the pressure on the pedals would steadily increase as I climbed.  'As you get to the top it will get harder, I've done it', says he, 'but don't worry I'll be cheering you on!

Well, all said and done, I never really noticed any change in the pressure on the pedals and I felt no discomfort or breathlessness at any point during the routine.  At the end he called the Dr back in and they started to look and whisper as they looked at the ten or so graphs that had come up on the large screen.  After a few minutes I asked if all was well and, 'Am I fit for surgery?'  There was one blip on one of the graphs that they were both scratching their heads over but again refused to tell me what they thought it might be or if they thought there was a problem, getting ratty now, again...... and he said that they would need to analyse the results.  I asked, well I don't know do I, if that's not what the computer did with all those graphs and 'how long have you been doing this?

Anyway he asked when and who was my next appointment with. I responded that it was with the

(c) Caremed NZ

Oncologist back at Basildon on the 19th. He said that he would have the results by then and that he would make sure that they were sent to Dr C, and the team at Broomfield.  Needless to say when I arrived at the Oncologist yesterday they had no idea what I was talking about and said that they wouldn't necessarily get those results as those tests were for the surgical team and not the oncology team.  Fine, I can accept that but why then would Dr W say that he would ensure that they were available for me if he had no intention of doing so, getting really rat arsed now.  In the meantime I have had two letters from the Cardio department at Broomfields stating that Dr W has referred me for two further tests, one I can turn up any time for and another where an appointment has been given for 9th July .... Now I fullY accept that these folk are trying to mend my diseased riddled body and it's not their fault, did you get that Dr H, not your fault, that I have cancer.  But if you carry out a test and you find something awry then F*****g tell me what the problem is, I WANT TO KNOW..... don't just refer me for further test without explaining what you did or did not discover during the first test to warrant further tests.

So, on to the Oncologist yesterday.  Met with Dr P her registrar who went through a list of questions and how I had been feeling to date and what symptoms were presenting themselves. Had a wee rant about Broomfields but I don't think she was really that interested as it's just 'not cricket' to be showing any interest when a patient is complaining about colleagues.  Anyway after that she disappeared into the next room and Ishbel and I were left sitting there for about 10 minutes, presumably while she briefed Dr C who came whizzing through the door like a woman possessed (not in a bad way) I suspect she had many patients to see and needed to get through us all as quickly as she could...

(c) Iamnotyourdoctor.blogspot.com

So, she explained that I didn't need to have chemo and I could elect to go straight for surgery but results have shown that of the patients who elected to have chemo and then surgery, no numbers given on totals, that in 5% of the cases, the patients lives were extended by a couple of years.  I could sense Ishbel stiffening up at that little nugget as we sat together.  I asked if I was sitting there as her father and presenting the exact same symptoms, what would she recommend but she refused to answer that questing commenting that it was not their role to recommend but to present the facts and that it was for the patient to decided.  I agree but they are the ones with the training and understanding, much more so than the average patient and there is a lot of information and and it is usually all bad, to take in and I think it is a fare question to ask, so I did again and got the same response.

So I was told the possible benefits of chemo, it may shrink the tumour and make it slightly more easier for the surgical team to get at and remove. On the other hand, it may not!

And then the list of possible side affects , that went on and on and the only one I don't need to worry about is the hair loss!  So I signed the consent forms and now am on the circa three week waiting list before I head to Southend Hospital, at least I am getting to see all of South Essex, to start a 63 day cycle at 21 days per treatment cycle of chemotherapy and maybe by then the numpties at Broomfield will have sorted out what the problem is elsewhere with my heart or lungs or flabby belly and be ready to hack away at the offending little bugger - mind you, having said that I feel great today and I think we might be able to get back to normal and cancel all of these annoying wee hospital interludes.

(c) mouthfromthesouth.com

I have mentioned elsewhere about the gagging problem I have as soon as food enters my mouth and I have been 'learning' just to take the tiniest wee nibble and not each much of anything (apart from Crunchie chocolate bars - just to maintain my fuller figure you understand).  Well last night I couldn't be bothered, and you do know how much I like to cook, and decided to get a takeaway instead.  Sweet and Sour chicken for the boss, never varies bless her, and I decided I would just get some noodles in the hope that they would just slide down, ha, wishful thinking.  As soon as the first small forkful hit my mouth and the first noodle began to ooze its way down my throat the gagging reflex kicked in.  It was the worst one so far and I really thought I wasn't going to survive it as I stumbled towards the bathroom, no idea why as I have felt nausea on and off since this thing started but only actually vomited about three times, and as I got to the hall I hurled and a sticky gooey mess went all over the floor, thank gawd for wooden floors, and I think I may have dislodged the tumour, cos I feel great today, but it was a bit of a bummer at the time and poor Ishbel was as white as a ghost, what a fright she got.


But never mind she went back to her sweet and sour and left me to clean up my own mess, nothing disturbs Ishbel too much when she's eating.  I even asked her to sing Soft Kitty to me and was told to bugger off so I never bothered asking her to rub something on my chest, but at least my interweb Bestie Julia R Barrett sang soft Kitty to me via email later on, Ishbel are you reading that, Jules knows how to treat me .....