It’s okay to cry…isn’t it!?

Start the weekend with a new set of tablets that I take for two days only and I get through the weekend with my Twitter account keeping me busy as I am more or less logging my progress day to day and receiving plenty of support and also providing plenty of support to other blokes affected by this terrible disease. Only addition to my ongoing treatment is from the 10th April I have 7 nights of injections in the stomach to help boost my white blood cells, I’m very lucky in that Ellen does this for me, as I just can’t seem to be able to jab myself.

I was lucky enough to be in a position where over the weekend I was able to get our and run, I managed to run two miles and it helped me feel better about myself.

Week commencing 12th April, starts with me at work almost like any other day over the past couple of years just with that nagging inner voice reminding me I have cancer, I don’t know what his problem is but he seems to be at me all the time. The tiredness is slowly increasing but the sickness has stayed the same and I’m eating fine just not able to drink as much, but it’s all good, I’m still able to drink the required amount. Monday night I start prepping myself mentally for the next day; I have to go early so they can listen to my lungs and make sure I have the go ahead for session 4. Tuesday starts with 2 new sets of tablets that I take for the next seven days, 1 set taken breakfast lunch and the other 3 times a day. One of them is anti-fungal and the other is a steroid. Up early as ever, have my breakfast (bagels, egg, cheese and ham seem to be my main craving right now) but for 7 days I can’t have coffee/tea and cereals because I can’t have milk with my tablets. Off we go to Addenbrookes to get tested.

The nurse at Addenbrookes chats to me and scares me a little (reminding me of what other symptoms I may experience) and listens to my breathing. ‘Okay sounds good to me’ brilliant so I can go get my treatment now..’oh no they make it fresh once you get the all clear, so you’ll have to wait an hour’

And so begins the first patient wait for chemo…I had arrived chilled with my veins popping ready to be cannulated, but by the time the chemo was ready and i was taken through to get sorted, my veins were hiding, my hands were clammy and it took 3 attempts to get the cannula in! All the nurses talk and it’s only my fourth session but I’ve already got the reputation of ‘tough to cannulate’ and for me so far the hardest part of chemotherapy is them putting the cannula in. I don’t know why; it doesn’t hurt, it’s just a scratch but just having been stabbed so many times in 4 visits really cements itself in your head.

Ellen as always so far has been an absolute star, she gets me to and from my appointments and looks after me when I get back home, I really don’t know what I would do without her.

That night (13 April) just sat on the sofa chatting with El about work and my hair going, out of now where I just blubber. Absolutely cry my eyes out and my instinctive reaction was to get angry at myself, and El bless her cottons did her best to reassure me that it’s okay to cry but being proud and stubborn I tried to stop myself but after plenty of reassurance I stopped and just let the floodgates open. I’m a sensitive soul but showing weakness and emotion is still not something I’m comfortable with.

I work the rest of the week, with work being fantastic and supportive. They’ve eased my workload and put no expectations or targets on for me, which I really appreciate but I go above and beyond because I always worry that they may feel I’m taking the mickey if I don’t work. For me; regardless of how I’m feeling, I work from home from a laptop, if I can’t lie in bed with a laptop when feeling poorly, then for me personally I’ve let myself down. Prior to this cancer, I’ve never step foot in the doctors and lived by my dads example that hard work pays off and unless your physically broken, you can do something.

The next week commencing 19th April follows the same pattern, as on the Tuesday I have to go in early to get tested to ensure there’s no issues with my lungs, then wait around, veins hide, freeze up at the thought of being cannulated and then great treatment. Me and el begin what becomes a little 5th session tradition, with us stopping off at maccies on the way back home due to my insatiable appetite. During chemo, I was just craving a big fat burger and I wouldn’t be able to tell you the last time I had a maccies as it’s something we don’t get often. El drove us, I paid, and I absolutely pigged out because as I said before, the time I feel least sick is whilst I’m eating. I get a large Big Mac meal and a side of chicken selects with a toffee late (the toffee late didn’t go down well!). Again; I work the rest of the week and my days seem to all merge into one, my only issue is the increasing amount of tiredness I’m experiencing and me taking control of the hair situation. As bits of hair had slowly been coming out over the previous week or so I decided to just shave my face and my head, and boy did I feel naked!

Again I was lucky enough to be in a position over the weekend (24/25th) where I was able to complete another run. For me it was mentally needed, to show that this disease and this treatment isn’t going to get the better of me.

Monday 26th April I worked in the morning and then went to Addenbrookes from about 11am onwards for a meeting with the doctor and to get tested ahead of my next round of treatment starting the next day. I got good news that day which was my tumour markers were a lot lower, so I was reacting well to the chemo and they gave me the thumbs to start the next round of treatment. I just had to get a chest X-ray to make sure my lungs were clear and more blood tests. It was a long day ahead of my 3 longest days of treatment within each round of chemotherapy.

I’m a third of the way through and still trying to be positive, I’ve got a long way to go but it is what it is.