Blood Results

Sh1t. Doesn't look good still. Will have to see what the Doc says later in the week, it is outside of the usual levels for blood glucose tolerance. The limit for my tablets (Creatine) is reached so I guess they will keep on feeding me those.

I'm a bit disappointed with the results - they are nowhere near as bad as before but it looks like something will have to be done I suppose. I hope it isn't all the fruit I've been eating - that will be a turn up for the books.

Well at least I am not as devastated by the news this time. I shall have to call them later in the week to see what they want me to do.

Did I say I was taking charge this week - think again.

Bye Bye Laptop

Oh well that is the end of it. Bye Bye Laptop, happy days banging on the keys in darkened hotel rooms trying to complete impossible targets and PowerPoint presentations, trying to get wireless connectivity and failing as no one had really subscribed to it.

I'm quite sad now that it is all over but then again, I have a lot to go for if I think about it and perhaps it is for the best to move on and forget about it.

Turns the page - tomorrow is another day - sigh!

Time Gentlemen Please

In a few moments that will be the last piece of my past employment severed. I'll meet up with my old colleague and he will pick up my Laptop, bag and all the accessories.

And that will be it. If ever I was destined to be in a particular job - it was that one, I'd got years of experience and have been a fan of the software for years. I knew the people, I knew what customers would be looking for and I knew what I could do to make the difference.

As they say, it is no use crying over spilt milk but I really hadn't thought of anywhere else I'd rather have been. Perhaps there will be something coming along there but I cannot hang on for it in reality. I reckon that they will have to move fast or I will go and sort out something else to do.

Tomorrow - Big Day for me

Last September I had the huge disappointment of having to go into Hospital and being unable to carry out my duties as a Sword Bearer. Strange eh?

Well, I was made an Active Officer of my Masonic Province last year and I carry the Sword ahead of the Provincial Grand Master on special occasions. Last September was to be my first one and the operation coincided. Tomorrow is the Provincial Grand Lodge meeting at Freemasons Hall in Great Queen Street London and I will be leading the PGM into the huge Grand Temple carrying the sword. It will be a culmination of 24 years of Masonry. You only get to do an active office like this for one year and tomorrow is a big day. Having happened to have carried this particular sword once before it is really heavy and so I'm glad that I have been "working out" these past three months or so! There are normally a thousand or more people there.

So - a big deal for me and one I am really proud about. There have been, in our Lodge three Sword Bearers as far as I know in 73 years so not a bad record. Now I just hope that I don't trip up or anything like that.

Unfortunately you don't get to carry the sword around outside. It would be fun carrying it around London? I could be doing my Highlander impersonations "There can be only one Highlander!" and you wouldn't have any problems at all getting a seat on the Underground on the way home!

I also have to wear a tail coat which is good fun. I will not be wearing that up on the train though either.

The start of an interesting week

A lot is due to happen this week. For one, I should hear from the GP today about my Kidney function and whether I stay on these BP tablets. Next I should have an appointment to see the Consultant and find out what lies in store next. After that, I should hear about my potential diabetes or the glucose levels in my blood test. With a bit of luck I have a day or two worth of work to fit in as well and today I lose the last remnant of my previous job.

Tomorrow I am out all day up in London - I'll tell you more about that later and Wednesday evening I am out as well.

In between all of these I have to organise the meal for Wednesday evening and also to work through a pile of things that must be done by Friday and on top of that chase up a load of people who are due to get back to me. The trouble with that is that they think they are the only one who hasn't responded. They don't realise how much hassle they cause me having to ring around after them.

Slowly dawned on me today

That I need to wrestle away the hold that bladder cancer has had on me for the past 9 months. I think it is getting to the point where, given the right sort of news from the Consultant, I can start to take back my life and to start being in charge of my disease rather than it being in charge of me.

I've had to do everything I have been asked to, when I was asked to and it has run my life for me these past 9 months. Everything I have done has been to someone else's calling and timing and now, I feel, it is coming to the next stage. It doesn't mean I've got to be any less respectful of the disease but what I DO need to do is to get my life back and to get on and do things not using the excuse (that probably isn't the right word) that I need to take it easy, I am recovering, I don't know if I will be seen that day and so on. There comes a point in time when you just cannot continue thinking or acting like that.

That time is rapidly approaching I think. The GP I hope will have come to a decision about me, my tablets, my possible diabetic readings and the Hospital will pronounce their findings and my next batch of treatments. That I hope will be this week. I will then have a very good idea about the upcoming treatments and I can then go and plan accordingly. I hope/expect 6 BCGs again but they'll tell me about that and then I really hope that I get 6 months rest rather than 3 months before they need to do a peek and poke - if they do then I hope it is a flexible rather than a rigid cystoscopy (local rather than general anaesthetic).

There are lots of other things that need to be picked up and done and I haven't done them and that is also catching up on me too.

Paying for it now though

It is just gone midnight and I'm wide awake and there is probably something going on. I don't feel unwell or anything in fact I feel fine. I can't quite get the shift in time zone I appear to have gone through :-) Perhaps a space portal? Probably not!

It is strange - wide awake at this time of night, happy to sleep late, catching up or just something unexplained.

Later today (as it now is) my old work colleague is coming around to see me and we will have a beer and a chat and then he will take away my laptop and all the bits that came with it. It will be sad to see it go but perhaps another thing I can draw a line under and move on?

Sleeping

Which I can presently do for England - either it is something to do with the healing process or I'm just a lazy so and so.

It is 11:30 and I got an early night and so a good 11/12 hours sleep plus a bit of lying in time. It is strange that I could do that sort of thing occasionally but now I could happily do it every day.

It is strange I have to say, I'd prefer to be up and doing something.

Time for a barbecue

At least it gets everyone together these days. Daughter 2 seems to spend a lot of time contemplating the inside of her room these days. Daughter 1 has grown out of that. In fact she went out driving with her mum today. You don't want to know how much the insurance costs for a learner driver these days.

We have made a deal that I don't get involved in this sort of driving experience thing. I'd be screaming "Watch out for that car", "Careful of that pedestrian" and my daughter would probably be saying "We haven't actually got off the drive yet Dad!"

So we have insured the little car. Mine stays where it is and is driven by me!

Did the Earth move for you?

It did for us apparently this morning. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/6602677.stm

Mind you we are a fair few miles away from the epicentre and at that time in the morning it could easily have been passed off as wind :-)

Despatched in Mentions

Well kind of.

Young Suze had her procedure this week. She is a brave lass as this blog will testify http://cancercomicstrip.blogspot.com/2007/04/this-wont-hurt-honest-arrggghh.html I have to say that I am not particularly able to take an epidural for this sort of procedure being a little sensitive.
Suze has linked to one of the funnier moments of one of my visits here http://my-bladder-cancer-journey.blogspot.com/2006/11/flying-catheter.html

Have a read of more of Suze's anecdotes - there can be a funnier side - it just take you a few weeks after the events to realise it sometimes!

A Few Pints Later

And I am feeling back to my old self again. The Sun has come out and it is quite warm - time to go and sit in the garden and chill out for the rest of the day.

Blood Taking by Professionals

It must be me but these guys are great at the Hospital. I hardly had a bruise last time and this time I hardly felt anything at all. I suppose that if you do this for a living (a strange job if you think about what you would be doing every day) then you'd be good at it.

I've had some good and bad experiences with this in the past and yet so far, both times have been good. I have to say I don't fancy making a habit of this though.

The BEST Bacon Sandwich - EVER

MMmm!

Well that worked I got seen inside 25 minutes, nice lad and was surprised I'd starved as long as I had but I did say to him about the wait last time and the fear of getting trampled to death by the geriatric sprint to the seats. He told me that they actually start picking numbers up at 7:30! I got there at about 10:45 and was seen by 11:10 - I think I was actually walking out at that time.

I went past the Cafe but it was packed there was only a seat outside on the pavement which I didn't really fancy. So I then walked past the pub - I know - good temptation control for me and then got home.

I have just had a double bacon sandwich with white bread and HP Sauce. I realised that I haven't had a Bacon Sandwich for more than a year!! It was absolutely brilliant - ahhhhhhhh.

Also today my Bladder Cancer Awareness wrist bands arrived from the USA. you can get them at www.bcan.org or I have a small supply if you want one. They are a rather fetching dayglo orange colour.

So far so good

I'm just getting ready to go to the Hospital and just doing some final messing about and then I'll go and see if my cunning plan has worked. I'm not hopeful but you never know.

Here we go again then! This time drink something dummy!

I have made sure that my liquid intake today has been up as the results showed I was dehydrated. I hadn't quite got it right and thought I was allowed sips of water not to drink as I wanted to. I suppose I am so used to the procedures where with BCG you don't drink for 2 or 4 hours before (I forget which now) and of course on the operations - whilst you can have sips of water I tend not to.

This time I will get that right. I've eaten well today and ensured that I have had plenty of variety, I've not touched alcohol since Tuesday and so I am hoping that my results actually show some blood in my alcohol stream this time.

All this blood letting - if he mentions leeches next week I'm running for the hills :-)

And so to bed!

Time is almost up

I have to go on to the fasting regime in less than an hour. I shall mark that with a drink of some sort (not alcoholic unfortuantely). Then it will be water only until 11 or so tomorrow. As I will have to walk back past the cafe and the pub I could be tempted to eat, drink and be merry on the way home!

Next Blood Test

I look forward to these as some people look forward to having a limb amputated without anaesthetic.

Tomorrow I intend to get up a little later, do my exercises and then to have a slow wander up to the Hospital to get there about 11 or just after. I am hoping that the crush of people having their fasting blood test (which this one is) will have died down and that I can get my test done a little quicker than last time. We live in hope.

As I haven't been eating sugar sandwiches (all the rage when I was a kid) and I haven't been drinking alcohol or anything else silly, I hope that the results will be back in the normal level and I can move on from this. I certainly do not want to be doing this every week.

I go back to one of my earlier posts about whether or not people realise that with all this time off and testing and prodding and poking that somewhere in the time left I need to find a job and to actually do some work. I have some work next week but I have a feeling that it is going to get disrupted through appointments and the like.

All OK this morning

Apart from the Internet being down - I can get to this site but I cannot get to most of my main web sites and I have no e-mail either.

I will have to wait for it to come back I suppose. Certainly I've not had the lightheadedness of yesterday. That was peculiar but I'm sure it is just settling into these tablets and also other factors like when I take them, whether I have eaten or not before and so on.

Suddenly this lot popped out

I was doodling around and started to jot this lot down. I hope that it makes sense.


My Bladder Cancer Journey


My Bladder Cancer Journey
Has only just begun
Yet like a West End blockbuster
It’s set to run and run.

My Symptoms, like many others
Start disturbingly, passing blood
In between the waves of panic
The stress hit me like a flood.

My GP reviewed the evidence
My guess is that he knew
An urgent request to refer me
Gave an appointment and review.

A Local procedure frightened me
A device that checks you bladder
Inserted where you can’t believe
Diagnosed cancer that made me sadder.

I think I knew that all along
The Consultant then told me so
You have a bladder tumour
It must be operated, removed and go.

What do I tell my children?
What do I tell my wife?
I have a dangerous illness
It may well cost me my life.

Within days I was in Hospital
So scared and so afraid
The worst was almost over
My family and friends all prayed.

How poorly I felt and helpless too
I lay wounded, wasted, tired, upset
As the scars healed within me
I researched and searched the Net.

The day came when half healed
After starving and laxatives left me weak
An IVU X-Ray procedure
Made me stressed and made me weep.

I’d never felt so wretched
So unloved, alone and bled
I’d have taken up any offer
I knew I didn’t want to end up dead.

Results of biopsies and X-rays
Consultations and knowledge provided
Another operation required
To check out what they'd decided.

Waking from this operation number 2
Something wasn’t right I knew
Spasms and pain racked my body
To keep my senses was all I could do.

Results this time were much better
Reviewed and checked and defined
BCG Treatment directly instilled
It sure played a lot on my mind.

Six instillation, rough times heading
It was meant to be so, of course
Renewing the bladder’s lining
Then limiting the cancer at its source.

The waiting is so stressful
Has the treatment worked or perhaps not?
These delays they are upsetting
A letter arrives and your stomach contracts in a knot.

In quiet moments I cried
Too proud to let you see
The trauma and the pain
That racked my mind and my body

My bladder cancer journey
Has only just begun
Now I’m past the first few stages
I'm sure I can overcome.

This poem, the first of many
I hope will put into rhyme
That hope it springs eternal
It happens all the time.

Calling on unforeseen depths
Your body can depend
A positive mental attitude
Will help you in the end.

Keep faith and love and rely upon
The help you get from others
If you are in a similar state
We all are sisters and brothers.

Your consultant and your nurses
Are there to set you right
And once that you recover
You sleep well again at night.

Somewhere, someone else is suffering
And I’d like to let you know
Yes – It’s personal and it's frightening
But you’ve got to reap what you sow.

My poems almost ended
I hope that you’ll discover
Cancer is mainly treatable
And chances are that you’ll recover.

Keep your spirits high
As high as you possibly can do
Lean on family and friends
And see the whole thing through.

I wish you well
I hope that you will find that it is so
That on your own journey
Your travels will help you grow.