Just getting ready for my Wednesday appointment when Irene took the phonecall that it was cancelled. LINAC 1 has broken down. Irene says that’s two machines I have busted. I think it’s probably the girls want a rest from my derriere, n’est pas? How’s the song go – Two Out of Three Ain’t Bad.
Back on Thursday to LINAC 1 – the servicing of LINAC 2 had been delayed when LINAC 1 broke down. Mr. Seventeen o’clock was there again with his raucous laugh. Appointments were running forty five minutes late due to the LINAC problems. Seventeen o’clock and his friend and his wife were in waiting room two yet he could still be heard in waiting room one. While I was called in for treatment, he came into room 1 to frighten the other inmates. My treatment was about 45 minutes late – not bad considering all of the problems they have had to overcome.
The journey home took over two hours with the snow and roadworks – a journey that should take 35 minutes.
Had a massive “weight” in the evening when I messed myself. Totally unexpected and definitely out of character. I tried as best as I could to get on the pan before the next contraction but it was to no avail. For the first time Roland had beaten me. Since I have started treatment, my motions have been exemplary – and this was the first bout of the di-holyho hayes I have had since starting treatment but it soon cleared up with some of their anti-diahorrea pills.
Friday 13th February and Tim took me because I was a bit late getting ready – I was on the Dead Horse Morris Dancers website. Dead Horse was started by an old mate, Andy “Stomp” Henderson who died from a massive heart attack a couple of weeks ago. I had lost contact with him many years ago but looking at the website I could see that he evolved into one of life’s great characters.
Amazing scenes at the hospital today. Tim dropped me off and got parked next to the entrance. When I got to waiting room one there was one inmate in the zapping room – his wife waiting and another couple waiting to go in. Less than half an hour waiting and treatment. The two wives were still moaning about how long it all took and how inconvenient the machine breakdowns were. One wife said they turned up and the machine has just broken down so they got sent home. True it’s unfortunate but these things can’t be helped. She then said that if it happened again he was going to stop coming. That’d show them!
I don’t really want Irene coming with me although I know she feels I am freezing her out but currently there is very little she can do other than offer moral support – which she does anyway in the privacy of our own home. Or the publicly of our own club. She was very upset when one of her so called friends told her that she wouldn’t allow HER husband to go through it on his own. I told her that if there was anything she could do I would tell her. Sitting around for hours on end with a load of grumpy old gits is not a very laudable past time. Another one keeps telling her that “she must be strong!” whatever that means. This bloody illness throws up enough heartache in many different ways and if you want to collapse in a heap then by all means do it – if it helps. I know from experience. My father had his first heart attack when he was 37. At the same time my mother was diagnosed with tuberculosis of the bowel and spent 13 months in hospital. We were shoved from pillar to post with a series of fosterings that would not be allowed today. An experience like that is an excellent grounding in the school of hard knocks. Make the most of what you’ve got – and ALWAYS look on the bright side of life. – There really is no alternative.
Was then told that I needed a blood test on Monday as they are going to try and do Chemo and radio consultation together which will eliminate the need for Friday’s consultation.
One major complaint which I am struggling to overcome. TAKE THAT on the CD player. I have only just got over the last time they broke up!
FormerMember
Got back home and a very apologetic radiographer phoned up – could she change my appointment? Not a problem – she offered me a choice of three. It appears that LINAC 2 is still out of action. Irene says I must have broke it proper!
Can’t find anything about toothache and radio and chemo but you can’t have any dentistry work done while you are on chemo because an infection can be devastating – chemo interferes with white blood cells and lowers resistance to infection but I had 2 crowns replaced just before I started chemo and my jaw is aching where they were both replaced – first one and then the other – after I started radiotherapy. Might be nothing to do with the treatment. Bloody Quality Street toffees at Christmas and seventy quid to get them glued back in!
Just sussed it. The pain in my gob is the reaction to the chemo they all talked about. Here’s me thinking that it is a tooth problem and now I have realised it is a chemo reaction. I was expecting mouth ulcers and the like – been dowsing myself with salt water for a month! Bloody hell!
Went on the usual Morrison’s trip on Saturday with Jonathan – another son and got three parts of the way round when the weight was on. Not trusting my anal sphincter any longer I rushed into the toilets – well rushed was an exaggeration – Irene says I haven’t got a rush in me – but trying to get past all the old grannies with their trolleys was a nightmare. Anyway I got there before the next contraction and dropped my britches and got my arse on the pan only to find it was a false alarm. Just a bugle call and not even a couple of rabbit droppings for my trouble. But after the other night when my clacker couldn’t hold I am still reluctant to trust it.
I have bought myself some pyjamas – the first I have had since my mother discovered Brentford Nylons in the sixties and we had nylon shirts, nylon sheets and many other nylon articles. Bloody near impossible to keep still in bed with all the sliding and then the whack! of static electricity and the blue flash when you earthed yourself on something. Happy days. I bought them ready for when I have surgery down the line – not wanting to appear with new ones. I already have a Guinness dressing gown and slippers and could have bought Guinness pyjamas as well but I didn’t want to create the wrong impression. I got them from ASDA and when I got them home they have got beer cans and wine bottles printed on them. So much for creating a good impression.
Went out last night – Saturday – and there is a woman in our club whose husband died from bowel cancer last year. It’s not the first time that she asked me how I am followed by asking Irene “How is he then?” Well he is sat here and he can speak. It reminds me of when I was working in the welfare and a cerebral palsy lad was in running a fundraising evening. He was totally paralysed and communicated with a stick attached to his head to work a computer that moved his wheelchair and spoke for him. I asked him what he wanted the club to do for him – how he wanted the PA system and the stage setting up. At the end of the night he thanked me for talking to him like a human being. It wasn’t hard – he was running the show and all I did was give him credit for that. He may have been severely physically handicapped but he had a very bright mind and a wicked sense of humour. It is very easy to be insensitive.
