Mon 23th June
Taking advantage of our new NT membership we decided to come home via Corfe Castle or maybe Avebury. The decision was made for us when I realised I’d left my camera at the hotel reception when I settled the bill and we had to drive back to pick it up. Luckily we were only about 20 mins into the journey when I discovered it’s loss but it still delayed us long enough to make Corfe castle a step too far so we did Avebury which is the more direct route home.
While we were there we bought a new waterproofed picnic blanket and also a tripod folding stool (like a sort of shooting stick) for me to be able to have a sit down when out shopping or walking.
Sun 22nd June
Our last full day away and happily the forecast was again much worse than the actual weather. As Phil had been doing so much driving and still had the trip home on Monday and then the drive to Marsden on Tuesday we decided to stay a bit closer to the hotel today.
We went to a castle for a wander around (free as we are English Heritage members), there was a nearby Manor House which was National Trust and lots of other local Nat Trust properties so I suggested we find out how much it would cost to become NT members. We prefer the English Heritage but are running out of new castles to visit we often just was a quick look at a place and the cost of entry to NT properties makes that an expensive proposition. Anyway we did sign up so we’ll give them a year and see how it works out.
In the evening we went to a super restaurant called the Olive Tree which was lovely.
Sat 21 June
Phil checked on the net and we found the best beach for fossil hunting, the weather was still forecast to be very bad on Sunday so we decid3ed to try the beach again while it was only light rain. It might have been light but it managed to get us thoroughly wet together with the spray coming off the water. We didn’t find anything on the beach but after a warming cup of tea I found some nice examples in the fossil shop (grin).
Once we’d dried off a little the weather took a turn for the better so we went on to a deserted village further along the coast that Phil wanted to see, it was very interesting if a little sad.
Fri 20th June
We were quite keen to do a bit of fossil hunting so we drove down to the south coast and tried to find a good beach for fossil hunting. The weather wasn’t great but much better than the forecast. Phil found a fragment of fossilised shell but we didn’t have too much luck so we headed north to Bath where we had dinner in one of our favourite eating places (the Walrus and the Carpenter) our very favourite restaurant in Bath used to be the Wife of Bath but that changed hands last year and we still miss it dreadfully.
Thurs 19th June
We stayed in a Premier Inn at Bridgewater just a few steps away for the conference so we were able to sleep in a bit on Thursday, Phil keynote speech seemed to go well and we left shortly after so we had a good part of the day to sightsee. As Thursday was the only day that was forecast to be nice we decided to trot over to Glastonbury to see the Chalice Well and mooch around the shops. We drank lots of water from the Chalice Well and sat in the beautiful peaceful gardens for a while and then bought some bits in the shops; I got a lovely rose quart crystal which sits in my palm like it was designed for me.
Afterwards we drove back to the hotel we had chosen near Bridgewater; it was a lodge hotel which we’ve not used before but it was nice having our own space in a little lodge rather than a conventional hotel.
Wed 18th June
Phil was giving a talk in Cambridge in the morning and then speaking at a conference down at Bridgewater on Thursday so we decided that as I had a bit of a chemo break we’d take advantage and have a long weekend away. While Phil went off to his morning talk I got everything ready to pack so when he got home we just had to have lunch and then throw some stuff into the suitcase to get off.
Thursday, June 26, 2008
Tuesday, June 17, 2008
Tuesday 17th June
We were BADDDDDDD today!!! We went out and bought a WII console and then spent ages trying out the boxing, golf etc. It’s fantastically fun and addictive and hopefully will give us some fun exercise when the weather is too bad for walks.
I’ll let you know how we get on with it as we have time to see if it’s something we really use.
Monday 16th June
Lovely day so we went to Wat Tyler park and wandered around for a couple of hours (with frequent rests I admit). Part of the reason for our wanderings was that we have friends coming down from Scotland in July and we’ve promised to show them the strange little wooden figures they have in Wat Tyler Park so we thought it might be a good idea to make sure we could find them again.
Last year when things were low my friend Gaynor bought me two rose trees one had just bloomed and the roses are beautiful; the rose is called ‘Simply the Best’. I took some pics and I’m going to try to load one so fingers crossed (Phil loaded the last couple for me but I want to try to do it for myself this time).
Sunday 15th June
We went to a county type fair at South Wield, there were craft tents as advertised but only very small ones and not much to see. We did walk around and look at the vintage cars and Phil has some brill photos of them that will end up on his Flickr account I’m sure.
Before we went out I bid on some fantastic looking hanks of designer yarn, they were very low starting price and I confidently expected to be outbid on most if not all but I thought “what the hell” and bid on 6 of them. Oops! I won all 6 auctions, luckily they were very reasonably priced, absolutely gorgeous and I’ll save on combined postage. All my family can expect scarves for Christmas this year.
Saturday 14th June
Obviously it’s really Father’s day on Sunday but Dad goes to his Day centre on Sundays so we went down to see him Saturday instead. Richie and Caroline were there too so it was a bit of a family occasion. We always get Dad cards but don’t usually bother with Fathers day presents (he’s hard enough to buy for at Christmas and birthdays) but this year I knitted him a scarf in the great chunky chenille that he’d admired when I showed him the jumper I made with it. (I discovered that chenille makes a lousy jumper cos it doesn’t have any stretch in the fibre but it does make a lovely warm scarf)
Friday 13th June
Weather looked threatening and the forecast was for rain so we decided to have a bit of a wander in Chelmsford instead of walking at the reservoir, of course as soon as we had gone far enough in the direction of Chelmsford to make it a pain to turn back the weather took a dramatic turn for the better and the sun came out!
Anyway we had a great time mooching around the shops and discovered a wonderful strawberry vinegar in the ‘Oil and Vinegar’ shop.
Thursday 12th June
Phil was out training so I ironed a couple of shirts for him so he wouldn’t have to do it when he got home. I was going to iron all the ones that were clean but then my tummy intervened so I only managed 3 shirts but at least that should see him through the next couple of weeks. When he got home we went out to the woods for a bit of an evening walk which was lovely, there is honeysuckle along the easy path and every so often you get this beautiful scent drifting down.
We were BADDDDDDD today!!! We went out and bought a WII console and then spent ages trying out the boxing, golf etc. It’s fantastically fun and addictive and hopefully will give us some fun exercise when the weather is too bad for walks.
I’ll let you know how we get on with it as we have time to see if it’s something we really use.
Monday 16th June
Lovely day so we went to Wat Tyler park and wandered around for a couple of hours (with frequent rests I admit). Part of the reason for our wanderings was that we have friends coming down from Scotland in July and we’ve promised to show them the strange little wooden figures they have in Wat Tyler Park so we thought it might be a good idea to make sure we could find them again.
Last year when things were low my friend Gaynor bought me two rose trees one had just bloomed and the roses are beautiful; the rose is called ‘Simply the Best’. I took some pics and I’m going to try to load one so fingers crossed (Phil loaded the last couple for me but I want to try to do it for myself this time).
Sunday 15th June
We went to a county type fair at South Wield, there were craft tents as advertised but only very small ones and not much to see. We did walk around and look at the vintage cars and Phil has some brill photos of them that will end up on his Flickr account I’m sure.
Before we went out I bid on some fantastic looking hanks of designer yarn, they were very low starting price and I confidently expected to be outbid on most if not all but I thought “what the hell” and bid on 6 of them. Oops! I won all 6 auctions, luckily they were very reasonably priced, absolutely gorgeous and I’ll save on combined postage. All my family can expect scarves for Christmas this year.
Saturday 14th June
Obviously it’s really Father’s day on Sunday but Dad goes to his Day centre on Sundays so we went down to see him Saturday instead. Richie and Caroline were there too so it was a bit of a family occasion. We always get Dad cards but don’t usually bother with Fathers day presents (he’s hard enough to buy for at Christmas and birthdays) but this year I knitted him a scarf in the great chunky chenille that he’d admired when I showed him the jumper I made with it. (I discovered that chenille makes a lousy jumper cos it doesn’t have any stretch in the fibre but it does make a lovely warm scarf)
Friday 13th June
Weather looked threatening and the forecast was for rain so we decided to have a bit of a wander in Chelmsford instead of walking at the reservoir, of course as soon as we had gone far enough in the direction of Chelmsford to make it a pain to turn back the weather took a dramatic turn for the better and the sun came out!
Anyway we had a great time mooching around the shops and discovered a wonderful strawberry vinegar in the ‘Oil and Vinegar’ shop.
Thursday 12th June
Phil was out training so I ironed a couple of shirts for him so he wouldn’t have to do it when he got home. I was going to iron all the ones that were clean but then my tummy intervened so I only managed 3 shirts but at least that should see him through the next couple of weeks. When he got home we went out to the woods for a bit of an evening walk which was lovely, there is honeysuckle along the easy path and every so often you get this beautiful scent drifting down.
Thursday, June 12, 2008
Wednesday 11th June 2008
Wednesday 11th June
Still suffering with the runs but we had promised to go over and see Dad so we did that and watched a film with him. He’s still got the cat for a little while in case we want to go away for a day or two when I’m feeling a bit better.
Tuesday 10th June
Not much but a bit of shopping again, the diarrhoea is still bad and that’s wearing me down a bit. Still my fingers are good enough to let me knit which is at least something.
Monday 9th June
Still feeling fairly grotty so didn’t do much but a bit of shopping and watched telly. Phil drove to St Albans to get the car window fixed but we agreed that I wasn’t really well enough to go too. Jill sulks in a most childish manner!
Sunday 8th June
Feeling pretty grotty which is expected cos this is usually my worse day. The good news was that it didn’t seem quite as bad as usual and we did a bit of shopping and a short walk in the woods. Apart from that I just lazed around while Phil did some gardening. I hate that I can’t help with things and that I have to sit around and just watch him doing stuff, specially when I know he’s tried and frazzled.
I realised that I just was going to be able to adjust to sleeping in the wrong side of the bed so we’ve changed back, we may need to do it while I’m connected to the pump but we’ll see how it goes next cycle.
Saturday 7th June
Out for a quick shop then my friend Sam came to visit, we haven’t see her for a few weeks so it was really good to see her. Then there was a very happy surprise! The phone rang and some very close friends who moved to New Zealand were calling they were back here for a visit and decided to surprise us and they came over about ½ an hour later. It was fantastic to see Mark and Julia and we just picked up as though we’d seen then a couple of weeks ago instead of more than a year. It was quite touched and flattered that they came to see us because they had a very busy schedule trying to fit in visits to their families and stuff.
I am quite torn about Mark and Julia, while most of me wants them to be happy and make a success of the move to New Zealand (they are!) there is a selfish bit which wanted them to hate is so they would come back to the UK.
Anyway they are loving it over there so I’ll just have to keep my baser half in check.
Friday 6th June
Tired due to the problems sleeping, we are trying sleeping on the ‘wrong’ sides of the bed now that my PICC has changed arms.
I felt bad cos we were supposed to be going over to visit Dad but I felt much too grotty and Phil had a raging headache too (I think it was the long day in Thursday and also that he was worrying about me all day which he was teaching). We did manage a 20 min walk on the easy path of our wood in the cooler evening though so that helped.
Thursday 5th June
They had to put the new PICC in my right arm at the elbow crook which is a pain but it went in fairly easily. It was a shame because apparently the only person who can use the special machine for putting the PICC line higher up your arm was away on that day.
As the tingling and numbness in my fingers and feet has been getting worse they dropped the dose of one of my drugs by 20% (Oxiplatin) and also gave my some B6 vitamins (Pyridoxine Hydrochloride) to add to my growing drug list J
It was a rather late day and as usual I slept very badly due to the steroids and also I think a reaction the B6 tablet which I took very late just before going to bed
Wednesday 4th June
Hospital on Thursday and Phil is training in London so we went over and stayed whih our friends Gaye and Paul, I’d been keen to out at least once during my chemo break so we treated then to dinner in and excellent Italian place near their house.
I was a bit worried bout having the new PICC put in so I didn’t sleep very well and Phil was therefore worried about me so he had a stressful as well as a very long day on Thursday.
Tuesday 3th June
Weather pretty grotty so we did that indulgent thing and went to the cinema in the afternoon. We saw the new Indiana Jones movie and it was good fun, exactly what you expect from an Indie movie; we reckoned it was a couple of car chase sequences too long and they could easily have cut the FBI stuff at the start which didn’t seem to go anywhere but that’s probably being a bit picky for what was a fun film.
Monday 2nd June
We wanted to do a little more castle visiting so we drove to Kent and went to see Upnor Castle. It was very good except for the horrible screaming kids who seemed determined to ruin the place for anybody else. To be fair (not sure why I feel obliged to be fair though) it was the adults fault because the kids were far to young to appreciate the castle and the adults seemed quite happy to let the all run about and scream for the whole visit with no concern for anybody else. I noticed that they went to sit a fair way away from where the kids were playing!
As we lest we were chatting to the two people at the shop and when I mentioned the screaming little animals (I was kinda pissed that they had spoilt our visit) the lady in the shop laughed and said to the bloke “so it isn’t only us!” she then said that they could hear then the whole length of the high street.
We had intended to go on to see Rochester Castle but when we got there is was raining, there was nowhere near to park, it looked huge and we were both feling a bit tired so we just drove home.
Sun 1st June
We were a bit tired after our Saturday expedition so we slept in quite late then pottered about in the house. We went off to buy a hanging basket stand which tasks 4 baskets and went we get around to it we’ll plant it up with baby tomato plants.
The stand went together much better than I expected; weeeellllll… to be fair it went together after we drove back to the shop to get all the fittings they hadn’t given us first time around.
Still suffering with the runs but we had promised to go over and see Dad so we did that and watched a film with him. He’s still got the cat for a little while in case we want to go away for a day or two when I’m feeling a bit better.
Tuesday 10th June
Not much but a bit of shopping again, the diarrhoea is still bad and that’s wearing me down a bit. Still my fingers are good enough to let me knit which is at least something.
Monday 9th June
Still feeling fairly grotty so didn’t do much but a bit of shopping and watched telly. Phil drove to St Albans to get the car window fixed but we agreed that I wasn’t really well enough to go too. Jill sulks in a most childish manner!
Sunday 8th June
Feeling pretty grotty which is expected cos this is usually my worse day. The good news was that it didn’t seem quite as bad as usual and we did a bit of shopping and a short walk in the woods. Apart from that I just lazed around while Phil did some gardening. I hate that I can’t help with things and that I have to sit around and just watch him doing stuff, specially when I know he’s tried and frazzled.
I realised that I just was going to be able to adjust to sleeping in the wrong side of the bed so we’ve changed back, we may need to do it while I’m connected to the pump but we’ll see how it goes next cycle.
Saturday 7th June
Out for a quick shop then my friend Sam came to visit, we haven’t see her for a few weeks so it was really good to see her. Then there was a very happy surprise! The phone rang and some very close friends who moved to New Zealand were calling they were back here for a visit and decided to surprise us and they came over about ½ an hour later. It was fantastic to see Mark and Julia and we just picked up as though we’d seen then a couple of weeks ago instead of more than a year. It was quite touched and flattered that they came to see us because they had a very busy schedule trying to fit in visits to their families and stuff.
I am quite torn about Mark and Julia, while most of me wants them to be happy and make a success of the move to New Zealand (they are!) there is a selfish bit which wanted them to hate is so they would come back to the UK.
Anyway they are loving it over there so I’ll just have to keep my baser half in check.
Friday 6th June
Tired due to the problems sleeping, we are trying sleeping on the ‘wrong’ sides of the bed now that my PICC has changed arms.
I felt bad cos we were supposed to be going over to visit Dad but I felt much too grotty and Phil had a raging headache too (I think it was the long day in Thursday and also that he was worrying about me all day which he was teaching). We did manage a 20 min walk on the easy path of our wood in the cooler evening though so that helped.
Thursday 5th June
They had to put the new PICC in my right arm at the elbow crook which is a pain but it went in fairly easily. It was a shame because apparently the only person who can use the special machine for putting the PICC line higher up your arm was away on that day.
As the tingling and numbness in my fingers and feet has been getting worse they dropped the dose of one of my drugs by 20% (Oxiplatin) and also gave my some B6 vitamins (Pyridoxine Hydrochloride) to add to my growing drug list J
It was a rather late day and as usual I slept very badly due to the steroids and also I think a reaction the B6 tablet which I took very late just before going to bed
Wednesday 4th June
Hospital on Thursday and Phil is training in London so we went over and stayed whih our friends Gaye and Paul, I’d been keen to out at least once during my chemo break so we treated then to dinner in and excellent Italian place near their house.
I was a bit worried bout having the new PICC put in so I didn’t sleep very well and Phil was therefore worried about me so he had a stressful as well as a very long day on Thursday.
Tuesday 3th June
Weather pretty grotty so we did that indulgent thing and went to the cinema in the afternoon. We saw the new Indiana Jones movie and it was good fun, exactly what you expect from an Indie movie; we reckoned it was a couple of car chase sequences too long and they could easily have cut the FBI stuff at the start which didn’t seem to go anywhere but that’s probably being a bit picky for what was a fun film.
Monday 2nd June
We wanted to do a little more castle visiting so we drove to Kent and went to see Upnor Castle. It was very good except for the horrible screaming kids who seemed determined to ruin the place for anybody else. To be fair (not sure why I feel obliged to be fair though) it was the adults fault because the kids were far to young to appreciate the castle and the adults seemed quite happy to let the all run about and scream for the whole visit with no concern for anybody else. I noticed that they went to sit a fair way away from where the kids were playing!
As we lest we were chatting to the two people at the shop and when I mentioned the screaming little animals (I was kinda pissed that they had spoilt our visit) the lady in the shop laughed and said to the bloke “so it isn’t only us!” she then said that they could hear then the whole length of the high street.
We had intended to go on to see Rochester Castle but when we got there is was raining, there was nowhere near to park, it looked huge and we were both feling a bit tired so we just drove home.
Sun 1st June
We were a bit tired after our Saturday expedition so we slept in quite late then pottered about in the house. We went off to buy a hanging basket stand which tasks 4 baskets and went we get around to it we’ll plant it up with baby tomato plants.
The stand went together much better than I expected; weeeellllll… to be fair it went together after we drove back to the shop to get all the fittings they hadn’t given us first time around.
Sunday, June 1, 2008
Saturday 31st May 2008
Sat 31st May
We drove up to Suffolk and visited Framlingham Castle, as it turned out we had been there before but it’s such a wonderful castle it was well worth a second visit. One of the advantages of being English Heritage members is that you can just pop into places without feeling that you have to stay long enough to get your moneys worth. The previous visit had been on a very rainy day so seeing the castle in the beautiful sunlight was lovely.
We had a nice picnic lunch of bread and cheese with super vine tomatoes all of which we bought locally then we took a look at an abandoned industrial site nearby. It was so tempting because there was a loose door which we could have got through if we’d been just a little bit thinner and braver but Phil got some good pictures anyway.
We had packed the car in case we decided to stay away overnight but by 4ish I was feeling tired so we came home instead and watched the fantastic Dr Who episode which made for a splendid end to the day.
We drove up to Suffolk and visited Framlingham Castle, as it turned out we had been there before but it’s such a wonderful castle it was well worth a second visit. One of the advantages of being English Heritage members is that you can just pop into places without feeling that you have to stay long enough to get your moneys worth. The previous visit had been on a very rainy day so seeing the castle in the beautiful sunlight was lovely.
We had a nice picnic lunch of bread and cheese with super vine tomatoes all of which we bought locally then we took a look at an abandoned industrial site nearby. It was so tempting because there was a loose door which we could have got through if we’d been just a little bit thinner and braver but Phil got some good pictures anyway.
We had packed the car in case we decided to stay away overnight but by 4ish I was feeling tired so we came home instead and watched the fantastic Dr Who episode which made for a splendid end to the day.
Saturday, May 31, 2008
Friday 30th May 2008
Friday 30th May
Last time we went to the reservoir I noticed a windmill on the way, we’ve seen it several times but this was closer so we got out the map and located it’s position and then today we went to visit it. Apparently it’s open on the 2nd Sunday of the month so we may try to see if they have it in action those days (the board said it had been restored to working order).
Afterwards we did a walk at the reservoir and then visited Dad, he’s going to look after the cat for a week or so; I’m not sure that we will be going away as we have some appointments but we will go out for days if the weather is nice so that we can take advantage of my chemo break.
BTW my arm looks lots better so fingers crossed that the antibiotics continue to work.
Last time we went to the reservoir I noticed a windmill on the way, we’ve seen it several times but this was closer so we got out the map and located it’s position and then today we went to visit it. Apparently it’s open on the 2nd Sunday of the month so we may try to see if they have it in action those days (the board said it had been restored to working order).
Afterwards we did a walk at the reservoir and then visited Dad, he’s going to look after the cat for a week or so; I’m not sure that we will be going away as we have some appointments but we will go out for days if the weather is nice so that we can take advantage of my chemo break.
BTW my arm looks lots better so fingers crossed that the antibiotics continue to work.
Friday, May 30, 2008
Thursday 29th May 2008
Thursday 29th May
Pottered around the house while Phil was working and did some of my OU homework. I’ve started the short course about Fossils and I’m finding it fun. My arm does seem to be getting better albeit rather slower than I’d like.
Wednesday 28th May
Phil was training in London for the afternoon so I cooked dinner and then did lots of tidying. As I’m having a chemo break for a week or so I’m full of enery and feeling better.
The big event of the day was that he got trapped on the train; you may have seen the news about the bridge collapsing just outside Liverpool station. Well Phil was on one of the trains, eventually he was able to exit the train and walk back along the tracks and he finally got home just before 10pm. He was very tired especially as he was training again on Thursday morning but unharmed so I’m just glad he’s safe.
Tuesday 27th May
Feeling better and my foot was good enough so that I could put my boots on for the first time. We went out for a walk at the reservoir which we haven’t visited for ages, did about 40 mins which was enough, it’s surprising how quickly you lose I when you don’t go out for a few weeks.
The other thing is that I got a new computer today. My old one has been playing up for a while and so we finally snapped and went put and bought a new one. It’s lovely and I’m typing on it now!
Monday 26th May
Went to visit dad, my arm was still very sore and quite fatigued so mostly slept while I was there. Oops! But he seemed to enjoy the company even if it was mostly comatose.
Sunday 25th May
We were both fairly tired following the ‘lost in the woods’ scenario so we did a bit of shopping but mostly just lazed around.
Saturday 24th May
Went to visit our friend Lisa and went for a walk in Epping Forest. It’s a lovely forest but the walk was a bit longer than we expected cos we got lost and spent hours wandering around. Still I managed it which means that my foot is heaps better.
Friday 23rd May
Just as the diarrhoea and stuff started to get better the PICC line which is plumbed into my left arm got infected. We rushed off to the hospital which was just as well because it was scary just how fast it got worse. Anyway they had to remove the line and put me on some powerful antibiotics.
Obviously I can’t have my treatment on Tuesday; I couldn’t have it while I’m infected and I’ll need to have another PICC line inserted before they can give me chemo again.
Currently I have an appointment for Thursday 5th June to have PICC done and also chemo but it will depend on how the infections gets on.
Wed 14th to Thursday 22nd May
Not much to report for this week, it was a bad cycle with more pain than usual and the fact that my sore foot made it impossible to go out for walks added to both the pain factor and my depression. Feeling sorry for myself which is one of the reasons I didn’t post for such a long time.
At the to[ of this post is a picture of my foot on Thursday which is 10 days after I first did the damage.
Tuesday 13th May
Hospital for chemo, also got scan results which were good. They couldn’t see if there was any reduction in size (I can’t have iodine so my scan are fairly blurry), but there wasn’t any growth. I was a bit disappointed at first but then the Dr explained that as the tumours got smaller it becomes difficult to compare sizes from one scan to the next so in a way it’s positive that they have got small enough to be difficult to check.
Monday 12th May
Went to hospital for scan.
Sunday 11th May
My sunburn had got really red and mottled looking (still not painful but it looks ghastly); it was at this point that I remembered that some booklet we read at the start of treatment said not to sunbathe. Now this makes me look stupid in the extreme but in my own defence we read the booklet in November and it didn’t seem very relevant at the time.
Phil and Mike went off to do some Urban exploring while Shan stayed in to revise, I pottered. I was just getting lunch when I cut my finger; only a little cut but bleeding so I went upstairs to clean it and put on a plaster. Now the next bit of this reads like an Ealing comedy; I washed it under the tap then decided to go into the bedroom to get the Teatree oil so it wouldn’t get infected, on the way rushing so I wouldn’t bleed on the carpet I managed to bash the top of my foot on a raised bit of wood (don’t ask what it was doing on the bedroom floor cos the story would just be toooooooo long and convoluted). Anyway got the oil and went back to the bathroom (that’s when I noticed that there was another bottle of Teatree already in the bathroom) cleaned finger and put on plaster then looked down to see how my foot was!
Ahhhhh! there was this swelling that looked like a huge blister growing larger as I watched, put it in the bath under the cold tap at which time Shan had started to get worried so there was this little voice from the bottom of the stairs “are you okay Jill”.
After hobbling downstairs I put my foot up above my heart level and
Shan got me a bag of peas wrapped in a teatowel which did start to bring the swelling down.
Then we discussed which one of us Phil was going to be most cross with when he got home (it was me) the first thing he said was “are you okay?” swiftly followed by an explosive “I can’t leave you alone for 2 minutes”.
Sat 10th May
Our friends Shan and Mike came for a visit from Oxfordshire, Shan is just finishing her accountancy exams so she revised at home for the early part of the day and they drove down to us to arrive in the early evening.
Our friend Sam was going to come over on Saturday too and go to the farmers market with me in the morning, do some beading/metal work and then stay and see Shan and Mike in the evening and have dinner with us all. Unfortunately she was very unwell so she couldn’t make it (partly cos she felt awful but mainly cos she was terrified of what Phil would do to her if she passed the bug on to me
Phil cooked proper chips, Quorn sausages and fried eggs which suited us all.
Wednesday, May 14, 2008
Friday 9th May 2008
I know I'm still behind with my Weblog but I'll try to catch up over the next couple of days.
Everything is fine; I had chemo yesterday and my scan on Monday was okay too but I'll write in more detail shortly.
Friday 9th May
Feeling much better today so the antibiotics are doing their job okay ( I never used to take them but now I realise that my body needs the extra help to fight off infections and I’m getting better at distinguishing between chemo diarrhoea and the tummy bug kind so I don’t have to take them too often).
Phil was working up in
After that I had lunch in the garden and then I had the energy to do some washing hang it up and then clean the kitchen floor (I never thought I’d be ecstatic about mopping the kitchen floor but it felt great!).
The only downside of the day (apart from Phil being away) was that I picked up a tiny bit of sunburn in a few inched of arm and the bits of my feet which were exposed by my sandals. It been years since I got sunburn! I’m very fair skinned and I’m fanatically careful about it. However I’d forgotten that there was a warning in the literature about staying out of the sun when you are on chemo (this was back in November as didn’t seem very relevant at the time). I was only out for 15-20 mins and was very mildly pink without any pain at all so I though I’d be fine – big mistake as I found out over the next few days!
Thursday 8th May
Woo Hoo! Looks like I was right about the bug as I was feeling a bit better already by late morning after only two doses. We went to shop in the Costco at
Wednesday 7th May
We were determined to take advantage of the good weather and went out for a picnic in Wat Tyler Park. It was lovely and the only fly in the picnic was that my tum was still really bad which meant we had to cut it short to go off to find a loo. This persuaded me that it was a bug so I started with the antibiotics Wednesday evening (the hospital gives me a supply to keep at home and the freedom to decide when they are needed although I can always phone them for advice, this saves me from trying to get a GP appointment or having to travel all the way to Sutton)
Tuesday 6th May
I should have been a lot better today as Sunday and Monday were good for the cycle time. I did have more energy and we went for a 45 minute walk in the woods (I posted the Bluebell pics a few days ago. However the diarrhoea suddenly got much, much worse and I had tummy cramps and stuff too; we weren’t sure if it was cos I’d eaten too much cream on Monday or if I’d picked up a bit of a tummy bug.
Monday 5th May
Monday bank holiday we went to visit Dad and so did Richie and Caroline; it was a very emotional and fraught visit as Dad has just put the house on the market and is looking at various sheltered accommodation. Phil and Richie intended to start clearing out stuff for the move as there is masses and masses (Mum and Dad lived there for more than 50 years).
don’t think Dad has realised how upsetting he would find the process and he certainly didn’t realise how long and draw out it is going to be. Phil and Richie found it quite difficult because they were sorting some of Mum’s hobby stuff and I was upset when I realised that I wasn’t going to be well enough to help with the sorting at all. Phil used to do most of the household work when I was working in London so it hasn’t been so strange for me that he is still doing that but I’m not used to sitting on my bum while he’s doing major sorting type stuff we usually work as a team so that hit me kinda hard.
Caroline was less affected than the rest of us and she kept busy getting lunch ready for everyone which was amazingly helpful; I realised that the best way I could help was to try to keep Dad occupied and in the house as he was getting very tearful and also trying to stop them throwing anything away. They spent a reasonably proportion of the day and didn’t even manage to clear one of the three sheds (it’s going to be a long long job!).
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