Sunday 30th March 2008

Wednesday 26^th through Sunday 30^th March
Wednesday we visited Dad and picked up the cat which he’d been looking after for us.

Thursday Phil was working so I lazed around; I did get around to booking my OU course for May so you will soon know more then you wanted about fossils!

Friday I went into the office to have lunch with Dave and Gulshan; Dave is my boss and he’s been fantastic throughout my illness (he was pretty good before I got ill too), Gulshan joined us a few months before I got ill and he’s been a complete star managing to get stuff done without me being able to pitch in.

In the afternoon I had a wander around and saw a few people the had a coffe and cake with my friend Su. I had a great time although I was pretty tired by the time I got home.

Saturday and Sunday we did a few household thing but mostly just rested because we are both still a bit knocked out by the Flu bug we had. Phil is still much worse than me but then he did have it very badly indeed.

I made one of my monster soups for freezing and we did buy a rotary deep fat fryer so that we can have proper chips, brill!!!.

We also managed to get a couple of walks in as the weather seems to be a bit better. Whats scary is that after only 4 weeks when we haven't been able to get out for walks we were both exhausted after a normal hours tramp at the reservoir ("I'm thinking it might still be the after effects of the flu bug" she said hopefully).

Eastercon – Friday 21^st through Tuesday 25^th March
Every year at eater the national Science Fiction Convention is held somewhere in the UK, it’s called Eastercon for obvious reasons and we’ve only missed one in the last 21 years.

This year it was held at a hotel near Heathrow which made it a very short trip for us (next year it will be at Bradford which will take a little more organising). At Eastercon con there are panel discussions, author readings, art show and auction and loads of other fun stuff. Also once you’ve been going for a few years you tend to skip most of the panels and it becomes more of a 4 day party in the bar with friends you see once a year,

Phil did several panels, I did a massage workshop and we did a talk on Urban Exploring together but apart from that we mostly slept; we went to bed early, slept late and then had naps. It was pretty much what we needed I think.

Wednesday 19^th and Thursday 20^th March
Phil was working on the Wednesday so I did a little housework and started to get stuff together for packing as we are going to Eastercon over the Easter break (I’ll explain more about what Eastercon is in a later post).

Thursday we took the cat over to Dads, we were both still feeling pretty grotty but didn’t think we would be contagious any more (while we were at my sister’s house my niece Carole caught the bug from us – Oppps). In theory we were due at the com as we had booked Thursday night through Monday night but we stayed at home in bed instead. We did have the sense to get most of the packing done so that we could get off reasonably early on Friday.

Latest CT scan results - Tuesday 18th March

Latest CT scan results - Tuesday 18^th March
Results were good!!!!!

The tumors in both my lungs and liver have shrunk and my blood tumor markers are down to 21. It’s very good news.

Monday 17^th March
Went to the hospital for my latest CT scan, I also had my bloods done so that we could find out if they were okay for chemo on Tuesday. As it happened my bloods were fine but I still had the cold and some diarrhea so the doctor decieded that I should have a two week break. Although he agreed for my to keep taking the trial drug so long as I was feeling okay and the diarrhea cleared up.

Obviously I didn’t want to wait for two weeks for my CT results so they said I could call in on Tuesday.

Saturday 15^th and Sunday 16^th March
Phil and I were both pretty ill so we did the odd bit of shopping we absolutely had to do and apart from that we stayed home and watched lots of videos in bed.

Visting Wales - Tuesday 11^th through Friday 14^th March
Tuesday Phil was feeling a little better and decided that he would be okay to drive us all up to Wales. In retrospect I should have stopped him but I wanted to see my sister so I took his word for it that he’d be okay.

It took 8 hours to do the drive and by the end of it he was so ill I was getting really worried about him, luckily I didn’t realise his temp was so bad that he was way out of it but st least we did get there okay. Phil didn’t really enjoy the visit at all as he was really ill the whole time. I got a really bad cold which started more or less as we arrived but nothing like as bad as Phil.

It was good to see Anne my sister and Carole, then David and Sandra flew over from Italy to join us and on the last morning My niece Helen came down from Liverpool. We came home a day early as Phil was worried about us both being fit to get to the Hospital on Monday.

Sunday 9^th through Monday 10^th March
On Sunday my niece Carole was arriving at Heathrow as she was visiting from USA. Phil went off to collect her and I stayed at home a I was at the low point of my cycle.

By the time Phil and Carole got back Phil was showing all the classic symptoms of flu, fever and chills and aching all over so I put him to bed. He must have been ill because he never agrees to go to bed but he stayed there for two days. Wouldn’t let me get the doctor though!

Thursday 6^th through Sat 8^th March
Phil was working late both Thursday and Friday, luckily my side effects were pretty easy this cycle so I was able to get supper for him when he got home in the evening.

I did a bit around the house but mostly rested up while he was out at work and as he was exhausted in the evenings we had pretty early nights too.

Wednesday 5th March 2008

Wednesday
Phil out working all day so I did a very short walk to the local shops and then did some useful stuff in the house while I feel like it. The pussy cat is a bit unwell again so I took her to the vet which luckily is very close. She is a little mare and as soon as she heard me getting the cat box she went and hid as far under the bed as possible I spent 10 minutes trying to drag her out and was exhausted by the end of it.

Still the vet thinks we caught the problem really early this time and she should be fine with a few antibiotics and anti-inflammatory capsules he gave me.

Tuesday 4^th Mar
Chemo today; the transport arrived on time and was very quick so I got to the hospital at 8am which gave me time to get breakfast before I went to the ward.

Dr Alex talked to me about the trial; apparently there have been some problems with the drug I’m on with another trial but that was a higher dose and with different chemo drugs. We discussed my case and as I’m having so few side effects, my side effects are primarily from the conventional chemo drugs not the trial drugs and as my CT scan and latest blood results were so good I’ve decided to stay on the trial.

I have my next CT scan in a couple of weeks so we’ll see then how things are going.

The horrendously expensive honey I’m taking does seem to have helped with my white blood cell counts as they have been back up in the normal range for the last 2 visits.

Monday 3rd Mar
Last day before my next chemo so it’s my best day, we did a long 45 minute walk at the reservoir and then did some shopping and housework. In addition to my chemo on Tuesday Phil has a horrendous working week ahead of him; he’s training all day in London on Wed, Brussels on Thurs and the London again on Friday. He’s going to be exhausted and as it will be my bad week there isn’t a lot I can do to help.

I did get the hospital to arrange for me to get transport tomorrow so that Phil can stay at home as I’m worried about him having four very long, tiring days in a row.

Sunday 2^nd Mar
Bit cold for a walk so we did some shopping and then visited Dad. We bought a new telly, flat screen and 37 inches of viewing pleasure, we moved the old one upstairs to the bedroom so that we can watch videos and DVDs in bed. We’ve just started re-watching the West Wing series and I must say that it’s as good as I remember from the first time around.

Now when we go to bed it’s a toss up if we watch an episode of West Wing, or Phil reads me from our latest book (The Enchanted Castle by E Nesbit). We are finding the Enchanted Castle harder to get into than her previous books but are persevering and I think it’s just starting to get good. This means that we usually watch an episode and then also read a bit of book; we are bad bunnies!

Saturday 1^st Mar
It was a lovely day; Suzee had to travel back at about lunchtime so in the afternoon we did a good 40 minute walk at the reservoir it was beautiful. Then I cooked a huge pot of chilli. It had to be quite mild as I can’t take hot food at the moment but it was very tasty and lasted us for about 3 days Yum Yum!

Friday 29^th Feb
Went and did a bit of shopping, it was a bit cold for a walk and Suzee our quest had bad knees so we made do with a Pub lunch. Mostly it wasn’t bad but Suzee had to send back her tuna as it was so overdone it was like rubber and covered in really hot and raw chilli sauce. We thought back to the lovely pub in Norfolk with some regret!

Thursday 28^th Feb
As Phil was away I cooked a big pot of pasta sauce and then I had visitors in the evening, as I wanted to wait and eat with Phil I did nibbles for the 3 of us but I think Pat and Julie had a good time anyway. They left about 9ish just before Phil got home then we had a weekend visitor arrive from up North.

Wednesday 27^{th Feb}
Feeling really good today, we did a 25 minute walk and then later I did a 40 minute massage for Phil as he had a bad neck. He also has a trip to Brussels again on Thursday so the fact it helped him to get to sleep was a bonus.

I do so miss being able to do massages so it was great to practice my skills a little.

Tuesday 26^th Feb
Feeling better as I move through the cycle, this isn’t unexpected as we are getting to know how the cycle works but irritating as I was so ill while we were away.

Just as an aside I won’t tend to write in the blog that we are going away until after we get back. It’s not that I don’t trust any of the regular readers but there are unscrupulous people out there who are perfectly capable of searching across blogs for keywords like holiday or away and then targeting houses.

It was a beautiful day so we did a walk then some shopping and I still had the energy to go with Phil to visit Dad and pick up the cat.

Friday 22^nd Feb through Monday 25th
Off to Norfolk for the weekend, we’ve hired a cottage for the weekend with 3 other friends and we’ve all been looking forward to it. It’s a shame that it has fallen on my bad weekend but sometimes you just have to go with the flow and hope for the best.

Phil took the pussy cat over to Dads place as he’s cat sitting for us and then we packed and set off. Phil wanted to leave it until Friday as I was feeling quite unwell but I though it best to get the journey done on Friday and get settled in to the cottage.

We got there late but Sam had got food ready for us all and the fire going so it was all warm and welcoming.

Saturday I was till feeling pretty naff we did go and do a bit of shopping in the local town but then I got the trots again so needed to go back to the cottage. I had more naps and then just lazed about.

Sunday Phil and I went off to look at a castle then had both lunch and dinner in a local pub with the others. It was very good food and Phil became besotted with the locally caught smoked sprats.

Monday we packed for home, it was a good weekend but I think it could have gone better. In retrospect all 5 of us have been under immense pressure for the last year or so and we’d all been building the weekend up in our minds until it was going to relax us and make everything okay. Obviously if you get 5 stressed individuals all with high expectations together in a small cottage there are going to be tensions and some tears before bedtime. Still our friendships have survived and I think while not being the cure-all we’d hoped for it did provide some relaxation for us.

Thursday 21^st Feb
I went to the hairdresser in the morning and had a wash, cut and blow-dry, it made me feel much better to have clean hair and I had a fairly god day until the evening when the inevitable runs started up. Managed to get supper for Phil when he came home exhausted but lazed around other than that.

Wednesday 20^th Feb
We didn’t do much but did manage a 15 minute walk and did some shopping because Phil was working in Brussels on Thursday which means leaving the house at 4am and getting home about 9.30 pm.