Now I'm not a perfect person and I don't expect anybody to be perfect. But as many of you know I have just been given an all clear at 3 months post operation where I had my bladder and prostate removed to get rid of an aggressive bladder cancer.
This all clear was given to me late on Friday afternoon and it is, if I'm being honest, sinking in. Now I know that my survival odds are still probably about the same but it is great to get past this first milestone. But I do need to record the fact that I am a firm believer in the benefit of the positive support that I have got from this site.
I am lucky in that I feel pretty good most of the time. On average I'd say that 23 hours out of every 24 I feel good and only that small amount left is when I feel... well you all know those feelings don't you, I don't need to explain. The result of my state of mind is that I cry a little every time I read on here about people having it tough. I know how it feels and my heart bleeds for those who have long days and nights feeling down.
I'm also not the most intelligent person in this world but I have to say that I have become a wiser person since getting cancer. Now that is a strange side effect isn't it! I now no much clearer, what is important to me. I'm tougher on some family and friends but I'm also much better at seeing things for many different perspectives.
I now will tell you a brief story of a girl I know. When this girl was in her late teens she started to have some emotional problems and started small scale self harm with cutting on her arms, legs and stomach. Yes, I know it was probably a lot to do with attention and yes, self harm in the form of cutting was so some strange reason "in vogue" for teenage girls.
Time went on and this girls problems slowly developed further with a number of suicide attempts with her ending up in hospital. At this point the "system" got involved and tried to help. Success? Not really because this teenage girl had got stuck in her own version of reality. She had decided that this "illness" was not in her control and consequently no matter what support she got from her friends and family or the authorities she kept on being "ill". Yes I put the word in inverted commas as nobody was sure what her illness was. Was she clinically depressed? Was she suffering from an emotional complication to the IBS she swore she was suffering from?
What her friends and family did know was that the on line internet community of young girls who self harm was very bad for her. It fed her desire to understand her sadness and all her new virtual friends explained their similar sadness. Nobody understood them. Certainly not their parents.
Now this girl became pregnant and married the father before the baby arrived. All was better for a while and then the self harm problems started again. The new husband also had his own young man problems and the family soon became worried for their child.
But they seemed good parents in that the child was soon growing up to be a wonderful addition to this world. However it wasn't long before the problems with the new mother got worse again with new suicide attempts and self harm.
A second child came along soon and things again got better for a while.
But you wouldn't be surprised that it wasn't too long before the situation got really bad again and the children were put on the "at risk" register.
The young mother seemed to take this all in her stride to start with and, it seemed, buoyed up by her many internet friends in specialist self harm websites, that she wasn't worried. She even seemed to be happy at the attention.
Then someone sat her down and said "Get real, you are in danger of loosing your children. Do you want that?"
And slowly there was a slight change. But she couldn't suddenly be a happy and contented mother. But she did start to take the first steps advised by her medical and support team. There was an improvement but very very slight and very very slowly. Did she have the best of all worlds? The attention she craved (medical or just mentally) plus the system now saying she was improving so could keep her children.
As you can image the life for her parents and family had been very difficult but they kept their fingers crossed that she would slowly become their daughter and sister again.
And then the world turns 360 degrees again as she walks out on her husband claiming many bad things about him. Turmoil again.
And then it got bad. The father started to claim custody of the children because she was "an unfit mother".
This part of the story ran and ran through detailed social worker and medical examinations and even ended up in court as the battle was fought. But the girl made the right progress in the eyes of the system and she kept the children.
She is now close to being a happy and contented mother. She still has her emotional problems and craves the attention of all those around her in a "woe is me" sort of way all the time. But she is a lot better. More real or at least at a point where she can function most of the time.
Now my thoughts on this young lady. Was she ill or just attention seeking? Mostly I think attention seeking but...
It doesn't really matter. I know she p****d lots of people off with her attitude but I believe she was/is a poorly child. It can't be a happy place to be if you have this sort of life. My thoughts were with her then and still are. Even when she p****d me off!
Let's face it, it's not only cancer that can screw up your life and with some people this can manifest itself in, quite frankly, silly stupid hurtful behavior. But they are in their own dark place and need help and support like the rest of us.
Well that's my thoughts for a Sunday morning after reading the many blog comments last night.
Peace, calm and hugs to everyone who just need a little bit of help.
Andrew xx
