Post 428: Steroid Start Simply Stunning.
Within two hours of taking three little pills first thing this morning I had a response I could only dream about.
The walking stick was forgotten in place of a normal amount of energy and strength that went on till lunchtime and, after a short spell sitting down, I went back to doing all the things I needed to finish off from this morning.
When my Darling snuck past the kitchen windows she must have smelt the beetroot boiling on the stove on a pretty warm summer’s day and, after she let herself in, she could only say, “Wow!”
Yes, that’s what it was like f’me every half hour upstairs this morning when everything I did, with care but maximum effort, was followed by a quick check that I was still not in pain and didn’t need extra help from Vintage ’25 (Oramorph).
My Darling went to bed and escaped the cooler air from the kitchen and the beet fumes I love so much — thanks to the gift from Big Sis yesterday.
As she gave me a big hug, whispering something like, “I’m glad you’re back”, it was a long hug that you know is as much relief as love, but a lot of love I hope.
She left more relaxed that I was back as me, the untiring guy doing whatever he could to help his Darling and help himself.
I stayed by the stove knowing that’ll be it for now after I had cooled, topped and tailed, and peeled the now super-shiny purple wonders of the garden and pink pinkies looking like I had murdered someone, ha ha.
They will be on my dinner plate tonight.
I should now admit that, apart from the palatial five-course meal last Sunday, I’ve not eaten well for a couple of weeks during a torrid time mentally and physically, so to be at all interested in my dinner was amazing.
The appetite is back — is that the steroids, I wonder?
During that time I’ve needed to weigh myself each week because I knew I was losing weight and it wasn’t like I didn’t already have a house full of birthday treats and Big-Sister treats to devour at some stage. Chocolates and cookies everywhere, I needed help where I’d normally be smuggling them in my mouth every waking hour (and perhaps my sleep too) that’s what I normally me, I am not normal me, yet.
I knew that the only thing that led me astray was some crunchy chickpea crisps, whatever the flavour the really big bags. Yummy.
But it was a bad time for my weight as I had lost three-quarters of a stone without wanting to these last three weeks. It was simply that I had no interest in food, and my weight of 11st 2lbs was now lighter than I was even during the dark days of chemo last year.
My alarm bells will ring in my head if I ever see a 10st-anything staring back at me, hopefully not any time soon.
Will the new fancy suit look loose or can I maintain and head back up to where my normal weight should be? The weight I was when I bought it 12 lbs heavier ago.
I looked in the fridge and thought about dinner tonight again and grabbed the sardines in olive oil that just needed eating up.
If only they had a bit of colour?
So, with a squirt or two of tomato sauce and a vigorous forking around, I left them to get to room temperature for later, together with a slice of that forever pizza from last week I grabbed out of the freezer.
A beetroot and fishy pizza meal. Probably not a very well-named dish, but it had some new fruits of the earth and some protein too.
Then I set off to watch the TV if I could.
In this fired-up mood I’m on the modst, my usual “do till I drop” mentality was not going to help the game plan for tomorrow and, for that, there was only one more thing to do.
But a short break wouldn’t hurt, with a banana after the apple I snuck in earlier for breakfast some time ago.
I woke from watching TV 20 minutes later, judging by the schedule on the episode I was not watching but had tried to be an avid watcher of — The Pursuit of Jade.
A Chinese fiction set back in the days of spears and arrows and land takeovers, similar to what continues in the east of Europe currently.
It’s lovely in a place and time where superimposed cities down amazing vast snowy Asian valleys were despoiled by the action that was to be fought out inside them, while the kings stand their ground with birds singing on the mountain tops behind them overseeing the carnage.
The only thing left to prepare for tomorrow’s visit with G, G, B and, most of all, the 16-week-old baby. I was to draw up a list of what I’d like youngest son G and Dad-to-be, to do for me; a few jobs that I’m not allowed to do but that he could manage without much effort on his part.
Starting with a trim of my bush.
The front door is now engulfed by the ball-shaped variegated laurel standing in the way of waving off departing visitors while standing under the little porch roof above the door.
But as important as that is, getting the Mini back into the garage now there’s space in it, it’s even more important now.
Before I could write that plan out I needed to get off this seat, turn the TV off that I was ignoring and head outside to evaluate.
Lo and behold, as I went out in slippers and light housewear — my Darling would call it bedwear — anyway, who cares?
I could hear my neighbour cutting the grass out the front of his house and I thought it was about time I chatted to him.
He and his lovely wife are due a baby at the end of August and I just had to tell him about our good news.
So, on the pretext of a chat about babies, where all I really wanted was a cheeky ask as to whether he could rummage under the Mini and unclip the winter cover to expose dead spiders, rust and the boot lid I dearly wanted to get to, he obliged, as is his way.
As is the way of all the neighbours, to be honest. They all help when they can.
With that done, and his nearly seven-year-old at his thigh trying hard not to look up at me (the strange neighbour), we ended our chats and I headed into the garage for the battery charger and, to open that boot were was lying not blinded spiders but more probably a flat battery.
Flat?
Bloody dead, more like.
That means only one thing and that was to buy a new one.
With the shops all shut for the day I had to wait for the morning, but I had a new plan.
But that’s for tomorrow.
Phew, what a great day of steroid-pill fortification and nerve-pain removal.
I’m in heaven again.
It’s so good to get a quick fix.
Even my texting thumbs are working without the bad twitches of late.
Perhaps you’ve noticed how the writing changes with the preponderance of tiredness, twitchy fingers and brain fog, all of which disappeared with three little pills.
Good night.
Take care.
