Thursday 27th November

There are all those wonderful sayings like, “Be careful what you wish for, because you may just get it” and the like. Then there is the idea of be careful of what you say, because you may just tempt fate.

Well, today is not such a good day following chemo. Perhaps, the effects take longer to kick in after the second bout…

Hopefully it won’t be to bad, or last too long.

The thing I find the most debilitating and upsetting is not being to do normal things. I want to be able to sit at the computer and work as necessary, but sitting and feeling nauseous don’t always go together. Also, concentrating on work while feeling nauseous is not that easy to do.

Anyway, one step at a time and do what I can manage. 🙂

I keep complaining that I feel like a wus – simply because I have been unable to do what I would normally do for too long now. The family gets variously upset with me for sharing this opinion, because they do not agree. I suppose it’s just how I see myself 🙂  It was interesting to hear the Oncology sister say that anyone who sits in the chair and has the chemo drugs put into their system is definitely not a wus.

Good to hear, but I still don’t like being the patient / victim – or wus!

When they took my blood to test my white cell count before chemo on Tuesday, I found out that I am just so tired of being on the receiving end of needles and the like. I think that’s the cumulative effect of this whole cancer thing for me: there just seems to have been so much done to me that I just have to take so that I can get better – from something that never made me sick in the first place!

It’s that paradox that makes it all the more difficult, I think.

Cancer is a silent, insidious disease /condition (still haven’t worked out the correct term) that can change so much for you, literally overnight.

To have cancer is also a situation that can teach so much about people and about life. Another paradox: it seems to be so life-affirming just as it is, in many ways, life-changing and even threatening.

I am not thankful I have had cancer. Who could be?

I am thankful, though, for everything I have learnt and for the many wonderful people I have had  – and found – to help me along the journey up my own personal mountain.

It may be my journey, but I am never alone.