It's been so long since I have been a regular visitor to mac, and the reasons for stopping now seem immaterial. Get yourself in there and see your friends I keep telling myself. After a shuffle around I see so much has happened and I have missed such a lot of good and (sadly) bad news. So to lead me into it steadily I will bring things up to date, quite timely because my next 6 monthly visit to my friendly neighbourhood oncoligist is due on Tuesday.
Over the last months I seem to have spent more time in doctors or hospital than ever before. Another session of being the dartboard while they poked and prodded into my spine has failed and iam left with .... absolutely no change to my permanently numb leg. As well I have had an ever increasing problem with my stomach. Takes me back to the days of home brewing with the constant bubbling coming northwards. I think all of us who have heard the c word and been through treatment have an underlying paranoia at every little thing so I had been pushing this quite firmly with my GP and the consultant he referred me to. After an ultrasound (and there's another tale to laugh about at some point) and a failed attempt to push a camera down my throat I returned to the endoscopy unit to be knocked out with a mallet while they did it. I awoke to the news that I have a double hernia in my stomach which I hope they will attend to very soon. In the meantime I am moving around at the pace of a snail, with no bending or stretching involved.
The girls came over today and we did a little bit of baking, well I say WE what I mean is we all started but Caitlin gravitated to the laptop on the kitchen table watching youtube and Hannah was stood on a chair washing already clean dishes over and over again. The favourite video of the day was Tina Arena singing Oh me Oh my so I suppose there is a saving grace in that. What a beautiful song and done so well.
We (I) eventually made chocolate spider cakes, which are the good old faithful krispie cakes with strawberry laces as legs. They were quick though, one or two of them scuttled under the fridge. Should have made the legs shorter I think. We also went to Tesco and I managed to spend, with their help, 3 times the usual and buy twice as much of things I never use.
(Monday)
The activities of yesterday proved too much for my stomach and I ended up awake from around 4 am, (why does this thing cause me much more intense pain during the nights?) and so I have had a dressing gown day. Fortunate that I do work from home for a lot of the week, it would not be a pretty sight to see me wandering around like that. It brings to mind the saying about not frightening the horses. The enquiries for Christmas time are increasing and I have taken a couple of firm bookings today. Last years big freeze was the start of a very lean time, which lasted until May so I made a conscious decision to absorb the increase in V.A.T that starts in January, I updated my website to let people know and hopefully it will prevent the wolf from knocking the door down. Tonight it's off to the pub quiz, our team is very consistent - we lose every week.
Tomorrow is the day for the 6 monthly viewing of my interior decor, readers of an earlier blog post will recall the nostalgic pinging of the sonar in the Dumbo chapter. For a nice change I am not too worried about it. No indication of any reasons for concern and, as said earlier, other events have overtaken this. So it's off to soak in a nice bath sometime in the next hour. I've reverted to baths rather than showers because of the stomach.
Bren
FormerMember
Hi Bren, Glad you found time to give us an update. I have had to field many queries "does anyone know anything about Bren?" without being able to answer.
Yes there have been many challenges during your absence, it was ever thus.
I trust you will continue and will find many who are wiling and able to offer support for all you are going through.
