🎶 Wooooah we're half way theeeeere....
WooooOOOAH! Living on as much food as I can possibly shove in my mouth at any one time....and a prayer 🎶
I can't believe I am half way through all of this nonsense already! 14 out of 28 radiotherapy sessions ticked off the list, and 3 out of 5 Chemo's done and dusted. Now it's the countdown to the end and dare I say it....single digits!
Week 2 passed pretty quickly, luckily without all the sickiness and crying and self pity that the first week had brought.
Monday morning started with a present from Clarence, in the form of a dead bird. He even brought it upstairs to the bedroom for us. So thoughtful. So another pressie in the bin and off to chemo I went.
Nothing exciting to report there, another easy session with Baxter and lovely Tom, who we'd met at my induction. Fluids, chemo, fluids, done.
A very sweet Macmillan volunteer gave me a very relaxing foot massage, until the very noisy and obviously all very troubled family piled in and did nothing but complain. I of course feel awful for anyone who is having to go through such a yucky time, but have a thought for those around you. I started getting very annoyed when they went to find a list of the free massages they could all get from Macmillan and started picking them out because 'carers can get them too'. Yeh, I don't think they mean all 6 of you. Definitely had to hold Dad back from saying anything a couple of times, mainly because they were sprawled all over the floor around him. Poor Tom had his work cut out for him there. And funilly enough we didn't see him there this week. Our money's on him being signed off with stress. Or they have him pinned in a corner somewhere, still moaning.
Then off we popped to radio. They don't seem to take into account that I'll be at chemo for most of the day when they book appointments in, so I was very late for my slot and they had to fit me in. There was already a delay so I didn't go down until just after 5. All fine though and home. Mondays are loooooong. Poor Dad must be completely pooped, especially knowing it all starts again super early.
The rest of the week was ok. Off the table a couple of times because my bladder wasn't full enough and therefore out of the way enough to avoid doing damage to it. Really struggling to nail this drinking thing, and feel so guilty that I'm wasting everyone's time. Very frustrating! But everyone is so lovely about it, I'm never made to feel bad. I guess because I'm doing everything they tell me to do? But all the old men with their prostate cancer seem to do it, why can't I?!
On Friday my wonderful chum Kaidee sacrificed her lie in and took me to Brighton hospital for a follow up scan. This was the letter I received just before all my treatment started that didn't have any explanation and I had to chase 3 times to find out what was going on, panicking that my treatment was being delayed. Apparently it's quite normal to have a follow up scan a couple of weeks into treatment to make sure everything is still in place and nothing has changed. When I questioned what they were looking for on the scan, they mentioned my ovaries. After getting lovely Hetel to chase this further for me, it turns out that because the IVF treatment made my ovaries so big they wanted to ensure they had 'shrunk back' to a normal size. Plus the radiotherapy will shrink everything anyway, so they can now adjust my treatment area to ensure the radio beams are only zapping what they need to and not the wider area. All makes perfect sense and is very reassuring but why does no one tell you any of this?! It has been so much better this time around in terms of communication but still, this is MY life changing treatment and it always feels like I'm the last to know everything. But I do know it's all done for the best and they're so busy I understand they don't have time to communicate every little thing. I'm more than happy to be a nag now anyway, gone are the days of not wanting to bother anyone!
The weekend was lovely and chilled. The boy and I went out for dinner and a movie on Saturday (I finally let him watch Wonder Woman. Bloody hell I'm good.) Then we went out for breakfast and some crazy golf on the Sunday morning. Sadly these few hours out and about completely wear me out so the rest of the time was spent chilling at home doing a whole lot of nothing. Personally that's fine with me but I hope Steve's not too bored of me yet 😞
Lots of new symptoms kicked in over the weekend too. To add to the back pain and tiredness, we can now add in constipation, weak old lady bladder, stinging when I pee, blood when I pee, and the cruelest one of all - my stupid period. As if that's fair given the circumstances. But thankfully the nausea and headaches have gone. Some fabulous new tablets from Tom have also stopped the acid reflux so I can eat a whole host of naughty foods when I crave them!
And so to week 3. Again nothing much to report, chemo was easy, radio has been as up and down as before with more off the the table than on. But they started my new treatment plan from today and have mapped it with a smaller bladder (as well as smaller ovaries!) so fingers crossed there shouldn't be so much trouble. There have been a couple of very close calls this week where I've drunk too much. Lying there thinking of nothing else but your twitching bladder is horrid and scary and my new goal is to just not wet myself before this is all done. Little things!
The side effects are still there and I'm feeling pretty tired because I just don't sleep at the beginning of the week. I think the combo of steroids and weak bladder doesn't help. I was up 6 times in the night on Tuesday, not ok! Slept in the spare room in the end to avoid waking the boy. I think I just need to accept that sleep is going to be non-existent the first half of each week. But that's only another 2 weeks, hooray!
I can't believe how quickly this has all gone, and there is light at the end of the tunnel now. I am absolutely fed up with the daily radiotherapy, but it is what it is. I'm lucky to be alive, I can't moan about a couple of hours out of my day. There is one man I see every week at chemo who is a week ahead of me and he is clearly suffering a lot, so I do know how lucky I am to have such minimal side effects...so far. I've been told about some pretty horrific ones that could be coming my way towards the end, but keep everything crossed they don't happen please!
I am now out of motivational t-shirts, but enjoying the memes I'm being sent to keep me going instead. And thank you to everyone who has text me and sent me love over the last few weeks. I am tired and boring and not being a very fun or attentive friend, so to know people are thinking of me is amazing. I am one lucky girly.
And as ever ladies, please please please go and get your smears. The number of people who have told me they've been for their appointment after reading my blog is amazing, but please keep spreading the word. All of this was potentially unnecessary had I just gone when I was first invited (although we'll never really know, and I cling to that so I don't feel overwhelming guilt).
Love yourself, love your lady bits. Just go. Thank you please.