Watch your letter box

Nationwide now have my photo (my usual PR shot - the one from the top corner of my blog... a little out of date on the hair length now though I suppose). I have also ok'ed a little paragraph outlining my breast cancer and why I support Macmillan. Just a few lines, but national distribution awaits me. So I guess it should be coming through letterboxes soon.

I've also had a nice long weekend in Dublin last weekend. James gets back from his conference there today (I flew back on my own and left him out there), so I should have some piccies to put up soon. I guess generally I've been doing OK recently; ticking along, going to work, that sort of thing. There just hasn't been much to come here and report on.

The New Face of Cancer

Whoop Whoop!

I am to be the face of the Nationwide Building Society's AGM booklet due to be coming through a letterbox near you sometime soon. I am so excited. My face will be landing on the mats of Nationwide customers all over the UK (poor them!) to persuade them to return their AGM voting forms; for every form returned Nationwide will donate money to Macmillan Cancer Support and I am to be the face to persuade y'all what a worthy cause it is. Whoop Whoop!

Pull the Udder one!

Well, I just have to come and plug my friend Leigh (aka "one of the cows") fund raising activities. He is running a very long way for charity (52.8 miles including The Silverstone Half marathon, The London Marathon and The Great North Run). It's all in aid of a very fantastic cause; The Willow Foundation. Remember that charity that organised my amazing-pamper-extravaganza-weekend at Ragdale Hall (One of Europe's Top Health Spas no less). One of the most top things I will remember to have come out of my pants cancer diagnosis and something to keep me going and looking forward to. Well, Leigh is running to raise money for this charity to keep Young-un's like me in special days out. Boy does he have some money to raise!

So, here is the plug for his sponsorship site

www.justgiving.com/leighchurch

I don't think he is running it in costume - polyester and running a long way probably don't go together too well ;-D

“Lydia", "Dawn", "Celia", "Rebeccah”

Its been a few days of intense highs and lows for me over the past few days.

I’ve been away on a works conference to Toulouse. It was good fun, oooppss sorry, very productive ;-D

Social events where the champagne flowed and much fun was had by all. I had such a great giggle, especially on the evening of the Wine Casino; where you had to bet on casino tables based around wine tasting to win chips for an auction of prizes at the end of the night. The girls and I won the top prize after I bet “one trillion dollars” – we didn’t have this amount of winnings but everyone around threw their chips into the circle to allow us to win – so touching. The title of this post is also related to this and is a totally in-joke; one of those you-just-had-to-be-there type of things. Oh my sides hurt from so much laughing. I would have had photos to put up on the blog to show just how much fun was had – but Lydia lost her camera on the last night – typical, she just wasn’t considering the blog potential was she! Nevermind, Celia to the rescue.....

Then there have been some breast cancer lows thrown in for good measure too. I heard some news about someone a few months down the line from me who’s cancer has returned. This has totally shocked me and made me very sad. It has just shown what fine a line it is from being fine one minute to facing it all over again the next. You just have to believe you will be one of the lucky one’s I suppose and carry on as though it’s gone for good. But, there is just no “All-Clear” when it comes to breast cancer and I guess that’s why I have been taking the discharge with a pinch-of-salt recently. So, in amongst the fun and laughter I have snuck in a few sneaky private tears (and some not-so-private in the Girls Loo’s on one of the social events, however, with a little help from my friends and some emergency Clinique makeup I was able to return to boogie the night away until 3am!!). Sometime I just think this breast cancer is just so unfair.

One MOT down since evil boob went bad.

Well, I have just been for my first annual breast MOT. That's my first check-up with the breast team and breast examination, or what I think I will refer to from now on as my annual MOT (I guess it sort of fits too; M.O.T = "maul of tit" - sorry couldn't resist). 

All appears fine ;-D

I have to admit I had been a bit apprehensive about going. I had no reason to be; nothing had changed since the mammogram, I had no new lumps or bumps... so it was always going to just be routine.... but I had still got myself a little apprehensive. I only became apprehensive yesterday, up until then I just thought of it as routine. But after waking up Monday morning from a dream in which they found lots of tumours at a check up and told me I was done for (not a nice dream really!), I started to get apprehensive where I once was calm. 

Obviously, no need to get worried. They are quite happy for me to toddle off into the real world and get on with things. They don't want to see me for another year. 

What did I say when they told me it was just yearly check ups from now on;

"So, no-one will see me till this time next year.... really, no one........ no check ups, no scans, no nothing"...... Yikes, I am on my own, this really is what discharge means. It's sunk in now that that is a good thing and I know they are just at the end of a phone and at the first sign of trouble I can be right back in there.

Rudding Park.

Last night we went out for dinner to the Clocktower restaurant at Rudding Park in Harrogate. I had been given some vouchers to go and have some Yorkshire Tapas as a end of treatment gift rom Ade and Sarah. So I saved them for a special Valentines treat and James and I went out for a posh meal. It was lovely. First we had a drink in the cool bar, then dinner in the retro dining room, followed by coffee in the comfy library. We did have the yorkshire tapas.... but as a starter so we could also sample the main courses and a pudding too.

I was so full afterwards! Yum, thanks guys.

Working from home

Someone has been a bit unhappy about my return to work recently.

Today I compromised and worked from home, the result was a very contented pussy cat

a weighty issue

hmmmm, I am coming to the conclusion that I might have been a bit niave in thinking that my chemo-weight would just drop of me after treatment finished.

Yes, the pills-from-hell (steroids) had made me water retentive and my face bloated like a big bouncy ball and yes, that went not long after finishing taking them.
However, I can't really blame the 2 stone that seemed to accumulate on my body during chemo on the steroids entirely. That was down to me being totally sedentary and eating like a crazy woman (well, some of that was due to pills-from-hell actually making me crave food to take away a funny taste in my mouth, but still there is no denying that scientific equation about calories in = energy out).

So I did think that once I stopped taking the pills-from-hell, stopped eating like a woman crazed, started being active in my daily life (let alone actually do some proper exercise), that I would see the weight just drop off me.

No! Despite having concsiously tried to eat healthily and sensibly since christmas and taking on a new love of (low-level) exercise - it ain't doing all that much. Yes, I am feeling so much healthier and more energentic and I am slowly tip-toeing down the pounds. But my BMI is still in the overweight category - Grrrrrrrrrr - although if I am generous with my height measurements I can just teter on the boundry with normal ;-D

Don't get me wrong, I am not unhappy with my weight and don't think I am actually all that fat (whatever my BMI score says!) and I certainly don't feel self-conscious anymore like I did with the bloated bouncy ball face. I would just like to be my old dress size and I guess it will just have to be a gradual continued effort to get there (no big suprise that then). I have read that many women think that Tamoxifen can make you put on weight and so that might be why I am not loosing much. But, I don't really beleive that - I think that is an excuse to explain away being lazy and fat!

Anyway, perhaps I should resurect the graphs and publish my weight for all to see - that would be an incentive to shift those pounds! I thought for the purposes of this blog entry I should also include some photos to illustrate me at the start and end of 6 months of chemotherapy - I think it is self explanatory which waist-line is which (I haven't selected a deliberately-horrible frumpy post-chemo one to prove my point or anything! honest ;-D ).

Update: Romance isn't dead!

My hubby has just taken me to the poshest fish restaurant in town for a valentines supper... yes, that's the local fish and chip restaurant/shack in our village. Two haddock and chips (with bread butty) and a pot of tea for two. Ooooh arn't we romantic.
I am also eating out on Sat and Sun nights too... so I guess I can't really go complaining at the size of my waistline now can I!

Discharged!

I've been discharged from the oncologist.

"Go away - we don't want to see you again!"

Yippeeeeeeee. I am going to be followed up by my breast team and the lovely Mr Turton breast surgeon. I will next see him at the end of Feb and then I expect it will be 6-monthly/yearly from then on, with the obligatory yearly mammograms of course. But this years mammo was clear; no sign of recurrance. Jolly good.

I am picking up energy-wise as well. I have been using my recuperation days to go for small swims and I think it is making all the difference - it has been noticed that I am not so comatose in the evenings and am walking with a bit more of a spring in my step - including tackling the stairs at work! I still am pooped by my days in work, but they are working really well being alternate days. I am relucatant to increase this just yet because I would then have to sacrifice the exercise and I think that is helping me get better and it is really important to me. So slowly but surely I will get there. I still have my low days (like yesterday my limbs were tired and I hardly had energy to pick my feet up by the end of the day) but they are getting fewer and I am sure there will come a point where I just don't think about it.

Slowing down again.

This fatigue is a strange thing. After the last post of throwing myself with energy into my work, today I am tired through to my bones and it has been all I can do to keep going and I had to resort to 2 hours asleep in bed and 2 hours snoozing infront of Shrek 2. I had good intentions to go to aqua aerobics as exercise is good for fatigue - but thats easier said than done when you are fatigued!
But, i actually now feel a little refreshed again and so hopefully can throw myself back into it tomorrow after an early night tonight (although these days every night seems to be an early night for me, ho humm)

Clinical Trials and me.

Well, I am throwing myself into work in the New Year. I still feel ever so tired and am sticking on 3 (reduced) days a week for a further 3 months until I can get into the routine of it. However, I have got a huge incentive to throw myself into work. I am going to apply for a Fellowship grant which would fund me for 4 years of research... but the best thing - I could do it part time! I am struggling to imagine working full time (very hard for a 30 year old career girl to admit!) and so if I could just get support to work 4 days with a Wednesday recuperation day in the long term it may help me eventually get there. So I am throwing myself into it and actually enjoying the mental challenge.

Mammogrms and lumbar punctures

Well 2 more medical things done and dusted.

Mammogram done on Friday. Boy, they are painful things... especially where "evil boob" post surgery is concerned . Imagine a boob, put between 2 plates in a vice and squished flat until you think it can't possibly squish anymore... and then tighten some more. Then add in lots of "just move that arm there", "just relax that shoulder back", "just suck your belly in out the way of the machine" ;-D
Results in the post within 4 weeks. I am not too worried about this.

Lumbar puncture done yesterday. I didn't like it all that much. It was mainly uncomfortable and you don't feel much apart from a bit of pushing and crunching between my vertebrae. I got myself all crunched up into a ball and I had a very nice doctor come and do it. The pressure was normal, which is great - but means I went through it for what is probably going to turn out to be nowt. But as long as nothings wrong there then that's all that matters. The neurologists have now lost interest in my and it's just the opthalmologists tests to come now. Afterwards, I had to lie down for a couple of hours before going home. I then lay around some more at home and had James wait on me like old chemo days. He is good to me. I seem to have escaped headaches that can happen as a result and apart from some discomfort in my back (only to be expected after having a needle pushed into my spine!) I am feeling fine.

Back to the medical stuff.

I am never too far away from the medical stuff. The last 3 months I have had the pressure in my head hanging over me without any answers as to whats causing it. Due to several unfortunate events, such as delays in referral letters getting written and failure of medical staff to contact me when they should have done, I am still waiting. I finally got into see a Neurologist and Opthalmologist just before my San Francisco trip. They both decided I needed some tests to work out whats what - but as they were not without side effects they left them till after my little holiday. I need an MRI to check the blood vessels behind my eyes for blood clots which they could treat with blood thinning drugs. They also want to do a lumbar puncture (YIKES) to check the pressure within my skull. But as the LP can cause headaches they left it till after my holiday. But then never contacted me to get me in and I had to chase them up to arrange it for me. So after several mis-communication problems I now have to wait till 8th of Jan to get this done. And of course now I have this hanging over me I am getting headaches and pressure pains in my head so am convinced all is not right. Oh well, I just have to wait. No word on the MRI at all yet.

It's also my first annual mammogram scheduled for the 4th Jan.

San Francisco.

Yay! I had a wonderful time and managed to get out and do sightseeing and shopping galore.

I was a bit worried that Jet lag on top of an already fatigued body would see me sleeping my time away in the USA. however, far from it - I felt fabulous! the time difference really worked in my favor so I was able to get up and out in the morning and do 2-3 hours of sightseeing or shopping each morning before flagging and heading back to the hotel to relax in front of movies or have an afternoon kip before meeting up with everyone for dinner and drinks in the evening. I did this every single day! woo hoo. The weather was so glorious - fresh and cool but so sunny and clear, it really gave my spirits such a lift. I loved San Fransisco and managed to pootle round on buses, cable cars and street cars galore to see the sights including the golden gate bridge naturally. James and I even managed to make a trip to Alcatraz which was really good and, the highlight of my whole trip, the Nappa valley wine tour. We went to 4 wineries, i sampled every wine on offer on the tour, and we came home with a cheeky little bottle of port to enjoy over the Christmas period. The tour was kicked off at Domaine Chandon, the Californian brother of moet and chandon and so I thoroughly enjoyed starting the day tasting 4 sparkling wines at 11am in the morning!.

You can find me on face book to check out my photos.

I'm oh so tired!

I'm struggling.

I just feel so exhausted all the time these days. Today it's 12 o'clock and I've just woken up and I will probably spend much of today in my PJ's. I am working Monday, Thursday and Friday which gives me Tuesday and Wednesday to recuperate mid week. I need it; a simple overnight sleep doesn't seem to recharge my batteries these days.
I seem to be finding it harder mentally to deal with than going through much of chemo (I am sure it probably isn't but that's how I am feeling right now). My body just isn't living up to my expectations and won't do even the simplest things... like staying awake on my second day in work on the trot on Fridays - I end up a walking zombie on these days with my eyes so sore, tired and squinty. Monday and Thursday's at least I can function - all be it sleepily, but Fridays I literally have closed my eyes and almost fallen asleep while walking into work. Now that's just weird!

I watched the Kylie documentary this weekend. Miss Minogue started her tour about 5 months from where I am now (so I have a few months reprieve yet before needing to start my own world tour!). It was reassuring to see even Miss Minogue got tired; she fell asleep on a rug straight after her first tour and the way she described how tired her body was at that point just rang so true. She described that time as a battleground with her own body - oh how I feel like that... mentally I am up for getting back on track but physically I am not quite managing it. It's just getting me so down.

I just have a couple of weeks left of battling on and then I go to San Fransisco and then it's Christmas and then I will be better! I WILL be.

Page 11 girl!

My glittering media career has just taken off..... I have been featured in the Yorkshire Post! Sadly other news event took precedent over my appearance on Look North News last night, but I will settle for the paper instead...
What am I babbling on about.... this;


That's Me!!!!!
My local Macmillan centre contacted me earlier in the week to see if they could put my name forward to the Macmillan press office to kick start a new campaign they are launching this week. The campaign is to highlight issues affecting working and cancer and because I had always said my work were very supportive they thought of me! They said it helps to have a "face" to put to the story and it would help exposure for the charities campaign if I could give an interview. I didn't realise when I said yes it was to go on the telly! Yikes! they wanted to interview me for the 6 o'clock news! However, these things move quickly and next minute they chose another feature. Boo, I quite wanted to go on the telly after all. However, the Yorkshire Post contacted me instead and asked to talk to me. So I did, and here is the result; Page 11 of the Yorkshire Post.
You can read all about me at; http://www.yorkshirepost.co.uk/features/The-cancer-patients-who-face.3507056.jp

I am just off down the newsagents to buy a few copies.

Sleep.

Well, pretty much over these last few weeks my time has either been spent sleeping or thinking about sleep. I have been doing 3 slightly reduced days at work per week for a couple of weeks now and finding it really hard going. I had hoped to be up to 4 days in the next couple of weeks but after admitting that I was struggling it has been agreed that I should slow down my return to work. I may do more working from home or perhaps do a few less hours and hopefully that should mean I will have more control over life outside of work. Being so tired all the time has really got me down this last week and I don't want to arrange to do anything outside of work just so that I can take it easy and catch up on kip. I really can't keep that up long term, hence slowing down the return to work.

But, through working normality seems to be returning.
You would therefore think that I would want to put breast cancer far behind me and move on. Oh no, not me!!!! This weekend I have been to a younger women's forum run by breast cancer care. It was a 2 day event with talks on medical updates, diet and exercise after treatment, fertility and adoption, coping with uncertainty, and of course the mini makeover and mini manicures. I was put up in a hotel for a night in Leeds and there was an evening meal to get to know other women. I was able to meet others who had finished treatment about the same time as me and was reassured that how I am feeling at the moment is normal; most are not planning on going back to work till the new year so I am doing pretty well. I was still almost the youngest there even though it was supposed to be a younger women's forum - the majority being in their 40's. It was a really fab weekend all in all, especially after I had umm-ed and ahh-ed about going as it was time to move on, but I am really glad I went.

I also have signed up as a Macmillian patient volunteer to get involved in various things for them. My first assignment has just been sent to me in the post. I am to read and review the book "Breast Cancer for Dummies" so they can know whether it is useful, reliable, interesting and whether I would recommend it to others etc.

I have only started on a few pages so far. It seems like it will be quite good and its refreshing seeing it in the "for dummies" format. However, I am already getting annoyed by the "American-ness" of the book; talking about cheerleading squads and yes ma'am's and general American biased things. Grrr, it's really annoying but well a reviewers work is never done and I must just read-past that!

One Year On.

It's my anniversary today!

one year ago today I went to get my biopsy results and got the shock of a lifetime.

But, rather than get all melancholy about what a big year it has been... I feel like celebrating all the great things that have come of this...

Firstly, I now have a bank of wigs for any future fancy dress parties I get invited to... my costumes will be based around which wig I can bring out of retirement
(who am I? if you have been watching Heros... "Save the Cheerleader, Save the world!", James is Arthur Dent from HHGTTG - "Don't Panic!").

The other things are all going to sound really corny.. but;

I feel I have learnt a lot about myself and have surprised myself that I am actually quite strong to get through this and I have just got on with it really (not that you can do much else).

James and I have been made stronger - not that we were not close or strong before but in some ways we have got through this together, never once wishing the other would have acted in some other way or said something else, not once with a bad word to one another. We know we can face anything in the future now.

I've made new friends. This may sound silly but I have got to know others who have had breast cancer, especially younger girls and although the circumstances I have got to know them are not what you would wish for it's nice to know they are out there. I've recently enjoyed a lovely evening out over dinner and a couple of glasses of wine with my new breast-friend Sarah which i really enjoyed. Long may that friendship last!

Breast cancer is now a part of me. It has shaped who I am now and who I will be in the future. I am certainly not going to shut this year off and never talk about it again, I am quite proud of getting through this. In some ways I am a different person with slightly different worries now. But I still let the little things worry me and I still can enjoy a good gossip about the trivial things in life!

Cold, phah!

I laugh in the face of colds these days!

It is pretty much on the way out. However, I am still pretty feeble and have had to stay at home today after going into work yesterday has left me a little tired and headachey. The return to work has not been going as well as I had hoped. What with one thing and another..... the clinic appointments, scans, worrying myself silly, catching a cold.... I have hardly done more than 1-2 days a week so far. I had wanted to be doing 3 regular days by now, but I seem to be just grabbing them when I can.
Next week the 3 day week begins properly.....

I must be ill!

Today, I cancelled my manicure at the Robert Ogden Macmillan centre.

I must be ill!

A common cold!

I seem to have caught what it known as "A Common Cold"!

I haven't had a cold for ages and that's pretty good going with my immune system over the last year. It's actually quite refreshing to be sufferring from something bog standard and so I have been snuggling myself up in bed enjoying feeling royally sorry for myself and trying to self medicate myself with everything under the sun to get rid of it quickly. Any old wives tales I should be trying??? Think I have licked the worst of it though and am getting better already.

Bouncing back

I am bouncing back slowly but surely after last weeks storm-in-a-tea cup (I can say that now - it didn't feel that trivial at the time).
It's quite freaky at this particular moment because I am lying in bed with a bit of a sore throat watching This Morning and listening to an item about a lady who went to the opticians for a routine eye test who was diagnosed with a brain tumour because they saw swelling of the optic nerve at the back of the eye. Erm... well that's just a bit freaky.... luckily mine isn't a brain tumour but it shows it wasn't all that far fetched!

I am finding it hard to jump back after last week. Perhaps it's just because I am slightly under the weather. But it all shocked me deeper than I thought possible, deeper than going and getting my original lump results. I think in some ways with breast tumours you can just cut-it-out or lop-it-off but when you start talking about brain tumours that sounds scary - is it operable? do you have to have brain radiation? Is this it?
I think the main thing that hit me was that up to now I have had hope; we cut out the lump and it's gone and I am to be one of the lucky ones who goes on for 10 years and is never worried by it again. However, suddenly I was faced with the idea that I might not be so lucky, that it might have spread and was no longer "curable" (if it ever is!) and we would have to start talking time-scales.
Thankfully it was all nothing and I've popped back into the "hope" category just-like-that. So no more thinking like that for me, just looking forward now.

This is the way it is going to be from now on. Any sysmptom I present with that could be "cancer spread" will have to be investigated. Whereas in any old normal person cancer would be the last port of call in eliminating possible causes, with my past history I am now always going to be fast tracked into cancer world. I expect they won't all be as scary as this particular scare. After all I have been sent for bone scans to check for spread before and that didn't feel anywhere quite as serious. But this is me now. Hyperchondriac central!

It's OK, I can have my life back now.

I am writing this post to document how I am feeling right now, although you may be reading this at a somewhat later date (now Thursday) when I feel ready to post it. Hopefully I have been able to publish this with a happy title containing the words it's OK.. but I don't know what will happen just yet.

Sunday 14th October;

As you could probably tell from past posts I have been feeling on top of the world and getting back to work and exercise and making plans again when a thunderbolt has just came out of the unexpected and has hit me completely off my feet. I have had what I am calling a "Cancer Scare" and I really am; scared that is!

A random opticians appointment on Tuesday 9th October made to check whether I needed glasses as my eyesight after chemo is not what it once was has sent my world into turmoil. After testing my eyes the optician confirmed I didn't need glasses, however, he had noticed that my optic nerves were inflamed which could suggest some increase in pressure in my head and he would like to phone my GP and discuss this with him. So he phoned him there and then and after listening to words like "papilloedema" and "very much to the contrary" he said that the GP was going to phone my oncologist and I was to go home and he would call me later when he had discussed it with my oncologist who might want to see me. At this point I didn't think much of it except... "ooh I may have a bit of hypertension, better take my pressurised head home then".

However I arrived home to a phone call I didn't expect. The GP had talked to my oncologist and they were a bit surprised to hear about this and wanted to see me in clinic 2 days later. He then spent 10 minutes on the phone discussing what could be causing this intracranial pressure. It wasn't nice listening. It could be several causes; Stroke or blood clot in the brain (which was unlikely as I had no other symptoms), early signs of MS, or just random hypertension that they could treat with steroids to preserve my sight. But then he came onto the thing I never in my wildest dreams imagined. With my past history they would be worried that there may be some mass swelling within my brain and causing the increased pressure. The cancer may be there.

I needed to get into see my oncologist. But first I would put the phone down, crumple on the stairs and burst into tears... not now, I felt so well, I was not ready for this!

So two days later on Thursday James and I were back in the place we had hoped we wouldn't be seeing for quite some time. Chemo clinic and seeing my consultant. He looked in my eyes and confirmed that it could just be some hypertension so he would put me onto steroids straight away (joy, oh joy!). However, they had to do some tests to check it wasn't anything suspicious. They would arrange me an urgent brain CT scan.

"how long will this take?"

"This afternoon I hope" Oh, S**t that's quick.

It turns out I couldn't go in until the next day. But turns out the brain CT scan was much like any other scan and took it in my stride - after all I had a spa retreat to get to. But, its quite scary thinking that my brain scan is out there somewhere and it has probably already been looked at and someone somewhere knows what the outcome for me it going to be. That's scary.

So now we wait.... results will come and then we will do what we need to. So for now I am feeling pretty resigned and don't really feel much about it right now.

Wednesday 17th October;

Limbo......

That's how I feel right now. I have spent the last few days feeling sick in my stomach. It's just nerves and that gives me butterflies... which reminds me I have something big to worry about and that gets me more nervous and sick. It's a viscous circle. I have tried to go into work and throw my mind onto that and that has worked OK. I haven't told anyone, and for that I am sorry, but telling people makes it real and I don't want it to be real.

I went to see a counsellor on Monday too. It was totally coincidence that I had this appointment. My breast care nurse had made this appointment for me some time ago to coincide with my return to work. She said that the time when people feel most down and struggle can be the getting back to normal time, when you are expected to bounce back but it doesn't quite work like that. So she referred me to clinical psychology. I went for an assessment 2 weeks ago and basically went through my case and told her how on top of the world I was feeling, enthusiastic to get back to work and normality and how I didn't really feel like I would need these sessions. However, we made a second appointment for this week to complete the assessment where I could decide if I wanted to continue. This weeks appointment couldn't be further from how I went in last time. I needed it, I just needed to voice to someone how scared I was. My biggest fear is that I don't know how I am going to bounce back from this. My whole return to work had been arranged on an optimistic timescale with occupational health because I felt so up for it. It hinged on me being able to happily throw myself into it. Now I am scared I have lost that enthusiasm and excitement and the want to get on with everything. I feel so tired now. I don't know if , all things being OK, I will be able to pick myself back up to the sheer happiness I felt around the time of my party and holiday. But I guess I will do. I hope I get the chance to find out if I can put a little blip of a scare behind me. I hope it is just a scare, although in my heart right now on the night before the results I am not so sure. I will know tomorrow. Tomorrow will be a very long day.

Thursday 18th October;
Its clear! The brain scan looks normal and does not show any tumour masses in my brain.
That's all I need to hear. Relief floods over me. OK so we need to work out what is causing the pressure on my optic nerve and so I will be referred to an eye doctor. But compared to a brain tumour other causes are just so not my problem right now. I can stop the steroids. Yippeeee I hate steroids 7 days of 8mg/day of steroids had left me puffy and flushed, made me have a funny taste in my mouth and eat like there is no tomorrow. I will stop them right now.
I can also have my life back again. James and I had switched right back into the limbo world of not knowing whether we could book anything or do anything because I may have to start treatment again. We wanted to book flights to go to San Fransisco but just couldn't be sure we could go. So now I can start thinking of life again and make some plans. I am going to try and put this all behind me. Although right now I am feeling a little overwhelmed and spaced out. I will just let the news sink in for a little while this evening and perhaps book those flights afterall.

Spoilt Rotten

I have just got back from a Divine weekend being pampered at Ragdale Hall Health Hydro in Leicestershire! Another wonderful charity called the Willow Foundation splashed out for a special day (actually weekend) out with my two close friends Josie and Marie. I wanted to say thanks to them both for being such fab friends from the very moment I found out I had breast cancer, for being there to support me and for understanding that going through chemo can mean being cut off from the outside world and rather than being given space and time to just get on with it, they understood the importance of keeping me in touch with girlie trips out and phone calls. So we all took ourselves off to be pampered for the weekend, and boy, what a weekend....



We arrive Friday afternoon to get ourselves straight into snuggly robes and off for a pedicure to prepare our toenails for a weekend on show. Then it was off for fabulous 3 course meal followed by coffee relaxing in a secluded corner. The next morning it was up for a lovely breakfast in our room and off out for a dip in the pool and chill out before I pootled off to get an pampering hand treatment followed by manicure to match my "Rampant Rose" toes.

More fabulous food followed for lunch and the afternoon was passed having a leg and thigh massage. But I didnt stop there.... Sat night was Champagne with dinner night and sunday was a 50 minute Clarins facial and also a quick eyebrow tidy up. As a result of the facial I happened to come home with a little goody bag of lovely creams, lotions and potions. Oh it felt so divine to be in such luxury - it really was a cut above. I cannot begin to tell you how much I needed it right now... mmmmmmm