cancer

Press The Button and Wait

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Being under the hospital for five years after cancer treatment means getting advice quicker than going through your GP. Which is how I came to be having an appointment at the Lymphoedema Clinic.

When the oncologist said I would have to have lymph nodes removed she said there was a risk of lymphoedema, but I was unlikely to get it. I replied ‘Oh good, I don’t want to wear one of those awful sleeves.’ No doubt she thought there were worse things that could happen and I assumed I would not get it, especially after two years had gone past… until I noticed that my right forearm seemed a bit puffy…

My appointment letter included a map to find the hospice where the clinic was located, the good news was it was just up the road from the bus station, but the instructions didn’t sound very welcoming.

‘There is no waiting room so please don’t arrive early… or late. If it is sunny there is a bench outside. Press the buzzer below the lymphoedema clinic sign and wait for instructions.’

It was a sunny day luckily, but I was sure nobody would answer the buzzer. I arrived just in time to hear a woman announcing she was Janet. She was let in, that was hopeful, but I guessed they would say go up in the lift, even though it was only a two storey building. I hate lifts.

The greeting was friendly and I was told to come up in the lift and turn left, or was it right and sit on a chair in the corridor. The other Janet was sitting waiting and she said ‘Oh I could have kept the door open for you’. Lucky she didn’t as it later transpired that on no account were we to enter if the door was open without ringing the buzzer to announce our arrival!

I was soon called in, by which time the other Janet and I had exchanged the complete medical histories of our families.

All readers need to know about Lymphoedema is it is difficult to spell and not to be confused with Lymphoma. Our lymphatic system is a wondrous thing we don’t take much notice of unless we have swollen glands, or doctors start talking about ‘spreading to the lymph nodes’ in cancer patients. If you are in normal health it is very clever at fighting off infection and cleansing the body of impurities. It works fine if not interfered with by surgery or radiotherapy. The salient point is that your blood is pumped round by your heart, but your lymphatic system has no pump, it relies on the general movement of your body. For the very immobile and the elderly this is why they can have swollen legs as it drains down but can’t drain up.

My diagnosis was done with a tape measure to compare arms, but also a clever high tech thingy the nurse presses at various points that reads how much fluid is lurking and where. The dreaded pressure sleeve doesn’t squash fluid out, it makes your muscles work harder, the better to keep lymph fluid moving. The condition can’t be cured but can be managed. Like all things medical there are dire warnings of what might happen like cellulitis, an infection of the skin. Any sign and you must get antibiotics straight away, so there is a card to carry on holiday in case a doctor doesn’t believe you!

Chocolate Moose is glad he doesn’t have to wear this.

The Four Big Things we have to do are skin care, exercise, pressure and lymphatic drainage which I am learning on my next appointment. In the meantime the sleeve is quite hard to get on and the awful colour makes it look like I have an artificial arm. But compared with all the multitude of medical problems people have I’m not complaining. If people ask what’s wrong with my arm and they do ask, I am tempted to say it got chopped off or I have third degree burns, which sounds much more exciting.

The West Wing

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I usually get lost inside hospitals, but this week I got lost trying to get into a hospital.

I originally opted to have my cancer treatment at Poole hospital because my two local bus companies, three bus choices, all stopped at the main entrance. Since the sudden demise of Yellow Buses ( that’s another story for a bus blog ) my one local frequent bus service stops there. I was additionally relieved to have avoided Royal Bournemouth Hospital when the building work began…

Our three local hospitals now come under University Hospitals Dorset NHS Foundation Trust. Whether this rebranding prompted the building frenzy and swapping round of departments between hospitals or followed the new ideas who can guess. Most patients just want to know which hospital they are supposed to be going to and which door they have to go in.

The original two storey unimposing building was white with blue roofs and recent improvements made it easy to get from the ‘bus hub’ to the main entrance. The main entrance led to a light atrium where the stairs, a café, toilets, information desk, buggy rides, chemist and free taxi phone could all be found. If you stuck to the main corridor that led the length of the hospital, all was well. Of course if you left the main corridor you could easily get lost, you know the scenario…

‘When you come out of the Ladies I’ll be sitting here…’

‘Okay.’

‘Oh dear, I can’t see any seats, let alone a waiting husband…’

I once went out the wrong exit and ended up in the Toby Carvery car park instead of at the bus stops.

The main entrance has now disappeared completely in the building works.

Caner treatment and ongoing medication can lead to other problems, so a recent hospital appointment led to me going off in several directions. Already existing joint problems can be made worse, especially hands for some reason, with perhaps residual nerve damage. At least having bunches of bananas for hands doesn’t stop me writing. The nurse suggested visiting my GP about steroid injections, but he suggested an Xray first.

It has been a long time since I had a face to face with my GP. The wonders of modern technology; he sent my prescription for Ibuprofen gel straight to the chemist and pinged the phone number for X-ray department to my phone. When I rang up I had a choice of Christchurch or Bournemouth; Christchurch not easily accessible by bus, I can at least walk to Bournemouth. The walk is probably an hour, ‘cross country’ past my sports’ centre and then eight lanes of traffic to cross. Not a hike to be taken if the weather is bad or on a very hot sweaty day if you have to strip off for an examination, but a hand X-ray would be fine.

There was a map with the hospital letter and on the phone the receptionist had given me directions from the bus hub… but the reality didn’t make sense. If I had just been told not to go near the hospital, but ‘stay on the road and walk for miles until you find a hole in the hedge’ it would have made sense. I hoped for a bus to arrive and disgorge staff or confident patients I could follow, but the only humans around were waiting for a bus. A board showing departments revealed I needed The West Wing. There was a gate in a fence that said To the West Wing. I opened it, but another sign said No Access to Pedestrians. There did not seem to be any way to get near the hospital. I found signs that pointed to the West Wing and back out of the hospital …and back home? Eventually I realised there were signs at intervals along the hedge and at last a gap… I finally found my way between hoardings and confused motorists to the entrance at the far end of the hospital. Then I walked that long corridor almost back to the main entrance where the X-ray department lies.

GETTING INTO THE HOSPITAL WAS NOT GOING TO BE EASY

Luckily I had planned to arrive early and relax at the coffee shop, no coffee but at least I was in time for my appointment and I was seen straight away. A cheerful young woman took me down the usual maze of corridors, confidently opened one of those doors with skull and crossbones warning of radiation… and quickly backed out saying ‘whoops, sorry’. Obviously that room was occupied and she then found an empty one. It had occurred to me I might have to take my eternity ring off… I never take it off and it won’t come off…

‘Can you just take your ring off.’

‘Well I could run it under this cold tap.’

‘When did you last take it off?’

 ‘Probably over twenty years ago when I had my carpal tunnel done.’

‘Oh dear, I’ll ask my colleague… try using the sanitiser to make it slippery.’

That didn’t work, more consultation, then she came back and said she would just write in the notes about the ring. I would imagine that on an Xray it’s pretty obvious if the skeleton is wearing a ring… all went well after that. For some reason I had imagined putting my hand between two photographic plates, like a sandwich maker, but the rays came from above.

‘Can you find your way out?’

‘Yes, er maybe…’

‘Just follow the red dots on the floor.’

What a simple but effective idea. When I looked at my watch I had spent a very short time actually in X-ray.

Free Range

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You don’t have to be a chicken to go free range. Like chickens, outdoor reared pigs and hill sheep, free range humans are well adapted to life outside and wandering free. They don’t need to be shut in or put in a vehicle if it rains or snows.

Like us with the Covid pandemic, free range chickens recently had their life style cramped with outbreaks of bird ‘flu, but unlike other animals, free range humans don’t usually get eaten.

I have been wandering around by myself since I was seven and set off for the first day at junior school. Freedom was at my disposal, well as long as I didn’t take the short cut through the large park, which was like a rhododendron plantation with lots of hiding places. I was allowed to play there with my friends and had no idea why solo walks were forbidden.

Plenty of drivers enjoy walking and leaving their car at home, but for the dedicated non driver there is the added excitement of knowing you have to walk to get to places and buy your shopping.

Perhaps the three big ‘C’s, Covid, Cancer and Chemotherapy have enhanced the delights of being allowed or able to get out whenever I like. I am also only too aware that plenty of people my age or younger are not so lucky, whether struck down with strokes or waiting for new knees and hips. I don’t take being able to walk far and fast for granted.

During covid we were allowed out for a walk and many people discovered walking for the first time, but we weren’t allowed to go anywhere, just back home. The joy of our regained freedom is destinations, meeting your friends for coffee and cake, going to your favourite groups or just going anywhere with people interest.

Whatever the destination the free range human just goes there, no worrying about finding a parking place or nervously looking at the time in case their parking runs out. We just nip down footpaths or cross the river on a ferry. The free ranger is not always on foot, we can jump on a bus if it’s raining or we have shopping to carry. We could jump on any bus and see where we end up. The free range human sees life. The writer certainly sees real life on the bus, but that’s for another blog. The photographer can pause and snap whenever they spot something interesting, which is why I have so many photos in my WordPress gallery.

For our health we don’t need a running machine and step counter, though now I have a smart phone I can’t resist seeing how many kilometres and flights I have done. You can enjoy fresh air, nature and the four seasons or human life and the camaraderie of others ‘on the road.’

Do you like walking or jogging. If so, do you wander locally and walk your dog or are you very adventurous going up mountains and doing marathons?

In The Purple Zone

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Far from people not talking about cancer, I have found people are happy to talk about it if they know you have joined the club.

Someone I don’t know very well asked me to stay behind after a club Zoom meeting, personal not club business. I was puzzled and everyone else felt obliged to leave. I have noticed at paid for Zoom meetings, not the free sort where you get timed out after forty minutes, there are people who just disappear, others who wave goodbye the moment it officially ends and then there are  ‘only the sad and lonely’ left, reluctant to leave, keen to squeeze out a last bit of conversation or gossip about those who have already left…

Anyway, it turned out her husband had been diagnosed with prostate caner and was due to have radiotherapy. The fact that he was having it in a totally different place, body and hospital, did not put her off asking about my experiences.

In the middle of our busy local little Sainsbury on a Saturday morning I bumped into one of my neighbours who had an update. It was only falling off his bike and breaking his pelvis, that resulted in hospital blood tests revealing a rare blood cancer. We had a long chat about chemotherapy between the chocolate biscuits and the food bank.

Apart from the daily tiny anastrozole tablet and the twice daily huge adcal tablets, fortunately chewable, I have to have six infusions at six monthly intervals of Zoledronic acid. A week before is the blood test and booking that is wonderfully efficient at my hospital. Phone up oncology outpatients blood test line. They answer straight away and book you an appointment with no fuss.

The same nurse does blood tests all day long and soon calls you in. I feel like I know her and assume she knows why I’m there…

‘Have you got a blood form.’

’ No, I thought it was all on the computer.’

‘Who’s your consultant?’

My mind goes completely blank.

‘What are your ailments?’

‘Ailments? I haven’t got any ailments.’

‘Where was your cancer?’

‘Oh.. that..  breast.’

She narrowed the choice of consultant down to two and I recognised the name. A quick phone call and she knew what was being tested. We lay people think ‘a blood test’ will miraculously reveal all possible medical problems and presume there are at most three different kinds of tests, because they usually take three phials of blood.

The following week I headed confidently to Yellow Zone A, where I had the previous two infusions, only to find the waiting room in darkness and the desk deserted. There was a note pinned to the window. TIU unit moved to Purple Zone Level Two Cardiology Department. I don’t know what TIU actually stands for or why it would be in cardiology. Back down the corridor, back past Costa coffee, WH Smith and the toilets, down another corridor, up two flights of stairs. There were signs along the way, but once you leave stairwells and main corridors you are confronted with a series of swinging double doors and are not sure how far to go without ending up in an operating theatre or resuscitation room. I found a waiting area that said ‘wait here till called’, but how would they know I was here and what I was here for? I pushed some more doors and found a large room with an island in the middle and a person.

I was in the right place and had a nice young male nurse, who unfortunately couldn’t get the needle in. That always happens and I feel guilty for putting them under stress, you can’t go away and leave them in peace to concentrate. If you have had all your lymph nodes taken out, you are not allowed to use that arm ever again for anything, needles, even blood pressure band. So I only have one arm for them to use and my hand is the only part they can get into. Eventually he had to ask one of the other nurses who took a few tries. I wonder if it’s universal among the medical profession that patients are always told we will just ‘feel a little prick’ whatever is going in or coming out of our veins. I asked her if they are ever defeated and she said ‘No, well hardly ever…’ I suggested a scenario where the desperate nurse can’t find anywhere to put the needle except… ‘I’m just going to pop the needle into your jugular, just a tiny prick…’

Print Your Own Tablets

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No more trips to the chemist to collect your prescriptions? No more standing in a queue while the beleaguered pharmacist looks for lost medicines and other customers collect paper sacks full of their repeat prescriptions?  Yes, no more trying to say your address and post code, your voice muffled by the masks we are still wearing in a ‘health care setting’. I heard the other day that in future we will use our 3D printers, which we will all have by then, to print out our tablets, probably combining more than one drug. Leave your computer on overnight to calculate the exact dose to suit your body mass and genetic make up. These tablets will be far more efficient, your doctor or consultant will no longer have to guess a dose that will work, but not blast you with bad side effects. Of course there is always the possibility we patients might accidentally give our computer the wrong instructions…

One thing many of us probably know about breast cancer is that you have to take tablets for five years after your main treatment, probably tamoxifen which comes from Yew trees. Looking this up I was rather disappointed to discover that it is taken from the bark of the Pacific Yew from North America. I had always fondly imagined scientists at dead of night picking berries from ancient yews in English churchyards. The early Christians built their churches on Druid sites; the Druids planted Yews as they regarded them as sacred; proven right because the Yew held the magic of healing.

It turned out that I am prescribed Anastrozole and I can’t find any romantic or ancient origins for it. Like tamoxifen it is a hormone inhibitor to protect against the types of breast cancer that love oestrogen. This is a tiny tablet to take once a day and because oestrogen is good for your bones I also have to take a very big tablet twice a day called imaginatively Adcal – D3, full of calcium and vitamin D3! Luckily these big tablets are chewed.

On my final appointment with the oncologist he said five to seven years, funny, he said five years earlier on! Perhaps I will be on Anastrozole long enough to be printing out my own tablets. Every breast cancer patient is under the hospital for five years after the main treatment, with breast care nurses at the Ladybird Suite – at my hospital, presumably other hospitals have other cute names – who can be contacted any time.

With one in seven women getting breast cancer ( six in seven Not getting it! ) at some stage, the system seems to run on very efficiently, with charities like Breast Cancer Now providing a great deal of information and help, from leaflets at the hospital to phone and on line help always available.

Breast Cancer Now | The research and care charity

New Friends and Old

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Covid has not gone away by any means, but officially in England we are back to normal; yesterday was the second anniversary of the day we went into the first lockdown.  I have had my end of treatment visit to the oncologist so officially I am back to normal. For all of us the past two years have been strange. Perhaps because it is spring, or because Ukraine makes us appreciate our mundane lives, but everything seems more vivid, interesting, exciting even. I haven’t been further than a walk round Poole after my hospital visit but every walk, every coffee stop is ‘an experience.’

Poole Twin Sails Bridge

But we do have to face the fact that our town centre shops were already in decline and life is going to be hard and drab for many people with the economic disaster of Covid and Ukraine. Shopping therapy is going to be a thing of the past, though there is still coffee…

Looking on the positive side people have made new on line friends, got to know their neighbours better and become more empathic, helping those who have been isolated and those whose financial struggles were made worse by Covid.

For those of us who have lost partners and loved ones we see the proof that life always does go on, returning more and more to our previous lives doesn’t seem right, but unless we move to a different place or go sailing round the world, it is almost inevitable and a comfort.  Some parts of my life have been rejigged while others miraculously slot back into place. Our writing group has resumed in the library; our tutor and founder is now ninety, recovered from a broken hip and more on the ball than the rest of us!

Tea at Poole Museum.

A few weeks ago my friend was making coffee for the new monthly coffee morning at my local library – one of their activities to welcome real human beings back into the library. I went along for moral support, just as well as only two others turned up, both mature chaps who have just returned to England. We had a really interesting hour and it turned out one of the men, Mike, went to a writers’ group back in the USA.  I told him about our weekly group and he turned up the next week and has really enjoyed his two sessions. Our tutor was glad to have someone else who also remembered the war ( WW2 ) for our new chap was born in 1935 and spent fifty years in the USA after he and his wife emigrated. He is adamant that he is back in England for his ‘last years’ ( he is very spritely so there could be a good few last years), despite leaving all his family behind; a story that is his to tell not mine, but he is obviously making new friends as well, with the philosophy that every day he is going to engage in conversation with a stranger. This week another new bloke turned up at writers’ group, invited along by Mike.

It has been a strange few weeks. I received an email from my old high school friend in Australia who I have not seen or heard from since we were teenagers at college; fifty years of having no idea how both our lives panned out. She is helping with a research project on founder members of the college and with some difficulty ( as with all the girls who had married and changed their names ) managed to track down this website and found my email address on the contact page; I think that is the first time someone has used the contact page! It was really interesting catching up, though I have no idea what she looks like now!

If you walk dogs, walk or cycle everywhere and work in your front garden, you see familiar faces and smile or chat. Since Covid people seem even more likely to engage, with the silent sub text ‘Isn’t it nice not to be wearing masks and be out and about?’

A lady often passes by on her bicycle with a sweet poodly dog attached alongside, ears flying in the wind. I can’t help but smile and she gives a cheery nod. The other day she was on foot as I arrived back at my front gate and stopped to admire my front garden. It is hardly worthy of Gardeners’ World, but has burst into colour with bulbs out and the addition of the ubiquitous primula to fill in gaps in my tubs.

‘Are you a friend of Carolyn?’

I was pretty sure I didn’t know a Carolyn.

‘Carolyn and Amos round the corner?’

‘No, I definitely don’t know a Carolyn and Amos.’

‘Oh, you would certainly remember if you did know them. You look like one of Carolyn’s friends.’

I am still pondering if I have met Carolyn and Amos, perhaps anonymous faces I pass by often. And did she mean I am a twin of a particular friend or just look like the sort of person who would be a friend of Carolyn’s? Has the lady with the bouncy auburn curly coated dog only been greeting me for several years because she thought I was a friend of Carolyn’s?

Do you feel your life is back to normal, have you made new friends or found old ones during Covid?

Farewell to Varian

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My last radiotherapy session was on Tuesday. On Monday there was a phone call from the radiotherapy department; I wondered if they were ringing to say there had been a terrible mistake that morning and I had been given ten times the right dose. Not just double; it’s more likely a decimal point or zero might get misplaced… actually they just wanted to ask if I would mind coming in later as the engineer was coming to fix the machine… hmm wonder if it WAS working properly in the morning?

It was rather sad saying farewell to the lovely staff, though on the previous Friday I thought I might stay there forever. I had breezed out of the main waiting room after my treatment, yay it’s the weekend ( Not that there was anything special happening at the weekend except not going to radiotherapy ) saying farewell to the chaps drinking water getting ready for their prostate treatment. I sauntered up the corridor only to find the double doors closed and locked. This had happened to me once before. That time I had been relieved to hear voices behind me; some of the staff were going for their coffee break and swiped a card on a box. This time there was not a soul in sight or sound.

The welcome sight of open doors.

I returned to the waiting room, but there was nobody on the desk. Who to ask, who to find? One can hardly go barging into treatment rooms, or disturb radiologists in the control room when their patient is being irradiated. I could only hover by the changing cubicles hoping to catch someone collecting their patient. Fortunately, from another set of double doors that said Staff Only emerged a chap in plain clothes, one of the numerous persons, with lanyards and ID cards to distinguish them from patients, who stride purposefully up and down corridors and stairs. I alerted him to my plight.

‘This always happens on Fridays when they test the fire alarms.’

He went into detail about magnetic doors as we marched up the corridor. As we reached the doors he said

‘Hmm, let’s hope this works.’

I had assumed it would. Luckily it did.

Meanwhile back to my last session… The third zap above my collar bone, targeting lymph nodes, has been the only one where I can look up and see the square screen through which invisible rays are emitted. Strange shutters above the glass move in and out, up and down, but it is usually quick. This time things seemed to come to a halt. I waited for the familiar buzz, wondering if the machine had broken down and when no one spoke over the intercom, fearing they had all gone home. I was tempted to move my arm as my shoulder felt sore and I began to imagine the horrors of the rack or crucifixion. Then the buzzing started.

I was given a help sheet to add to my collection. The effects of the accumulated radiation carry on for another couple of weeks, not that I had had any bad effects.  I do now have a big square and a smaller square that look like sunburn. I had imagined the target areas being round. I was told to keep the area protected from the sun. ‘For how long?’ I asked. ‘Forever’ was the reply.

Remember to keep covered up at the beach hut.

Return to the Pink Zone

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I was back in the Pink Zone for my Radiotherapy planning. Despite the long instructions in the letter for finding radiotherapy I was flummoxed when I found myself back in the familiar Oncology Outpatients. As it is on floor minus 2 and has a low ceiling I assumed this area was a dead end; unfortunate choice of words perhaps…

Luckily a lady in grey ( one of the health care assistants who pop up helpfully everywhere ) asked if I was lost and took me through a door that hadn’t been there before. Then she asked if I wanted Chesil, Furzey or Varian. I had no idea what she was talking about so produced my appointment letter ( always take your hospital letter with you ) and she took me to reception. I was soon given a gown and taken to get changed in a cubicle with the fatal words ‘Just come back to reception when you are ready’ assuming you are going to remember the way back…

I did find my way back and was soon in a room having a CT scan and lots of measurements taken. They give you four tiny tattoos as guide lines, apologising that they will be permanent. I am hardly likely to worry about that when I have a long scar and no breast, but at least they are acknowledging you still own your body. I asked for a butterfly tattoo, but they said they don’t have the artistic skills.

When I arrived for the start of my fifteen daily treatments ( weekends not included ) a couple of weeks later, I smugly assumed I knew where I was going, but at reception she asked if I was Chesil, Furzey or Varian.  No idea, but she soon returned with the answer. I had to find Varian 2 and was directed to turn and follow and turn down several corridors. Every time you go through a double door a whole new hospital seems to unfold before your eyes…

Chesil and Furzey are local place names, but who, what or where was Varian? Lord Varian, the famous Dorset benefactor or Planet Varian from Star Trek… ‘Captain, the Varians are attacking.’

Varian is the manufacturer of the machines under which we patients lie in treatment rooms Varian 1 and 2. We arrive at the pleasant Varian waiting room from where we are called to the sub waiting room on the intercom. There we change into the gowns with three armholes which we are allowed to keep for all our sessions. From here you can see the lighted red warning signs when the radioactivity is active and staff must leave. The radiologist soon comes to fetch you and take you round the curving corridor. The actual zapping with rays is brief, most of the time is spent adjusting you to exactly the right position with the two radiologists talking numbers and degrees. They take a three year degree to learn all this. The weird grey machine makes various beeps and noises, but all we have to do is keep our arms raised holding on to the bars and stay completely still. When out of the room the staff are watching you on closed circuit TV and you can wave to them if there is a problem… All the staff are very friendly and reassuring.

 After a few sessions I thought I was getting the hang of the routine; three buzzes and staff must leave the room. I have three zaps from three different directions and in between, the Great Varian grinds and moves. A long buzzy beep is the actual dose of rays. One time it had just started when the room lights suddenly came on. Over the intercom a voice said ‘Don’t worry, we have an interlock, we just have to wait five minutes before we can restart.’

This was definitely out of Star Trek… ‘Captain we have an interlock with the Varian ship.’  I was about to go through a time shift or into another dimension. After what seemed like twenty minutes the voice said ‘Only two more minutes to go.’ The staff returned and so did normality.

All my appointments have been quite early and very specific times. 9.06am, 9.18am 9.03. I have usually been called in on time or early, but one morning I was sitting by myself, no one on the reception desk and the screen said Varian Two On Time.  Time passed, other patients came in and we compared appointment times. I was first, what was going on? After the interlock incident of the day before I wondered if the machine had broken down, but why had no one come to tell us? Had Varian Two taken all the staff through a time shift or zapped them all with a mega dose of radiation… more time passed and at last I was called. The explanation was more prosaic than my imaginings. They were busy, short staffed and had no time to update the screen in the waiting room.

Strangely, my trips down the corridors have got shorter with familiarity.  The route is lined with paintings and the area is bright and pleasant. The shiny wooden floor squeaks when anyone walks, it is not just my new shoes.  A look at the health ap on my phone shows I have walked less than a kilometre from the hospital main entrance and back again, not the miles it seemed.

Some of the questions I have been tempted to ask as a writer, but haven’t yet…

‘Do you get many patients who panic?’

‘Has anyone accidentally been given a mega dose or forgotten about?’

‘Have you ever had a rogue/insane radiologist who tampered with the machine?’

As a patient I don’t think I will ask as they are all very professional and sane and nice…

Idle Thoughts of a Tidalscribe

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Why Omicron, what happened to the other letters before that. I keep forgetting what it’s called… Omicrom, onicrom, Covicrom… What is your favourite Greek letter? I rather like Epsilon.

For ordinary folk everyday chit chat is banal, but the life blood of family, friends and hum drum jobs; the antidote to World Crisis, disasters and politics. It means nothing to outsiders and sounds very dreary.

Six boxes short on the crisps and they haven’t delivered the sandwiches!

Hardly a Global Crisis, but to the three workers on the team it is a big drama.

I saw Phil when I was in Aldis!

A remark full of significance when you relate your shopping trip to your friend, in fact you messaged her before you even left the store.

Our regular banal conversations are now littered with remarks that meant nothing two years ago, testing positive would probably have referred to pregnancy.

Sharon’s tested positive. Have you had your results yet? Evie’s going back to school on Friday. No she can’t think where she got it from and her friend had to come and collect the dog.

Covid, Christmas, Chemotherapy and restricted lives bring vivid dreams as our brains take themselves on holiday. Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley camera club in the church hall – in my dressing gown and pyjamas. Next minute a fellow blogger ( who doesn’t even blog about cooking ) was concocting the most delicious recipe, deep frying rich wraps of hidden delights. The food fantasy is understandable when chemo and sore tongue make food tasteless or vile. I am obviously missing an ideal opportunity to ascend to a higher spiritual state in which food is no longer important, or even vital. I do not have what it takes to go into the wilderness and live on leaves, but at least I have found that out now before going up a mountain or into the desert. The fact that millions of people do not have enough food does not stop me being filled with lowly envy when people drop remarks like

‘No, we’re fine, we stopped off at MacDonalds on the way.’

I hardly ever have MacDonald’s and have certainly never ordered a cooked breakfast from Tesco to be delivered to my door, but these are now things on my wish list for 2022. I have learnt a few things though. Expensive and fad diets are pointless, if you eat less you lose weight. If you want to try this without chemo, just picture honestly what you have eaten and drunk at the end of each day and cut out the sneaky biscuits, fizzy drinks, crisps, chocolate ( insert your favourite treats ) the next day. I do now have an insight into young children at meal times, or people with eating disorders; putting something into your mouth when you have no idea what it will taste like or cannot bear the idea of anything passing your lips. We glibly tell our children they are going to like strange textures and flavours with no notion what their tongue is telling their brain.

Your body in good health is a marvellous machine that repairs itself, with your skin and nerves protecting you from the outside world and your internal organs function efficiently without having to be programmed by a computer. You do not need expensive moisturisers or exotic food supplements. But there are the odd benefits to chemo interfering with your system. After decades of barefoot and sandal wear resulting in as many decades of pumicing and moisturising my heels ( in fairness to our bodies, the feet naturally grow tough soles to walk barefoot, much healthier than wearing shoes ) my heels just fell off, revealing the feet I had not had since I was  baby…

Tuesday Tale – Questioning

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Emelda Forsyte had little experience of hospitals until her diagnosis, so she looked upon her first chemotherapy session as an ideal opportunity for research for her next novel. Her diagnosis was treatable and curable, positive and hopeful, but she would give her heroine, Jolie Jansen, a very likely terminal prognosis. It would add a cutting edge to the fifteenth book in the series.

Jolie had not been nervous about her first chemotherapy session until the lady in the reclining chair opposite died.

‘Good morning.’ A nurse’s voice startled her out of the opening chapter forming in her head. What did that nurse say her name was? They all looked the same in their uniforms and masks.

‘Name and date of birth please.’

‘Emelda Forsyte, 5th July 1964.’

Even with a mask on the nurse looked very puzzled.

‘Oh sorry , I must have the wrong patient. I have you down as Jane Brown.’

‘No, I apologise, Emelda Forsyte is my nom de plume.’

The nurse looked even more confused.

‘I’m a writer, you know, my private detective novels, Jolie Janson, third series on ITV Sunday Drama set in the wilds of Bedfordshire.’

The top half of the nurse’s face still looked blank.

‘Ah, I’m not into all that crime stuff… so you are Jane Brown and your date of birth is?’

Emelda looked at the patients in the other three bays to check if they might be listening in, no doubt they were if they had heard there was a famous author on the ward. She removed her mask and mouthed something.

‘Sorry, I didn’t hear.’

‘10th May 1949’ Emelda whispered.

Emelda watched carefully as a needle was inserted into her hand, more than the slight prick she was told to expect, but hey, Jolie would not flinch, that was nothing compared to the injuries she had experienced. At least the blood being drawn out looked a good colour.

‘I suppose even those tiny phials of blood would be enough to clone me’ Emelda joked.

‘Oh no, they just go to the lab for testing, make sure you are well.’

‘Hmm, but if someone stole them from the lab I could be cloned.’

The nurse chose not to hear and slipped away.

In a short while she reappeared with a bag for the drip and another nurse who asked her name and date of birth.

‘I already answered that.’

‘We double check each time, just making sure the right patient is getting the right drug. This has just come up from the pharmacy with your name and details on it.’

‘That is reassuring, but have you ever had a rogue pharmacist, I mean there could be a fatal dose or a deadly poison in that bag.’

The two nurses exchanged glances.

‘Now dear, it’s quite natural to be nervous your first time, but you are in very safe hands, no need to worry.’

‘I am not nervous, just thinking about research for my next novel.’

‘Okay so let’s go through the prescriptions you have to take home. Now these injections must go in the fridge and on Friday the district nurse will start coming round to give you one injection each day.’

‘District nurses, do they still have them, she won’t be in uniform will she?’

‘Could be a he and they will be in uniform and PPE, you will be perfectly safe.’

All Emelda was worried about was the neighbours seeing, district nurses were what old people had visiting them. Hopefully they would have to park round the corner and not draw any attention. Then she had an idea.

‘How would I know they were real, could be an assassin in disguise with a lethal injection, like that chap who pretended to be doing Covid vaccinations.’

‘Just ring your surgery if you have any worries…’

Emelda examined the contents of the paper bag from the pharmacy and withdrew a box of tablets to read the instructions.

‘Read the leaflet inside carefully when you get home, you must take those tablets as instructed.’

‘So what would happen if you made a mistake, or your husband or daughter were in charge and intentionally gave you too many… or perhaps a wife might look at her husband lying in a drunken stupor and stick all those needles in him at once.’

‘Any mistakes and you must ring the hot line straight away or even dial 999. Who is at home with you?’

‘Oh I live alone, ditched Mr. Brown years ago and became Emelda Forsyte.’

‘I am sure you will manage your tablets fine, just remember to lock all your medication out of reach of you have grandchildren visiting.’

‘None of those thank God, humans under the age of twelve are to be avoided at all costs.’

Emelda was glad to be up and feeling fine, calling for a taxi and bidding farewell to the nurses who looked relieved to see her leaving.

‘Now take it easy and be prepared for the effects to kick in tomorrow.’

‘Oh I shall be fine, see you all in three weeks’ time.’

Before Emelda arrived back at the main entrance she was surprised to be stopped by a man in a suit who quickly produced a warrant card.

‘Mrs. Jane Brown?’

‘You would probably know me better as Emelda Forsyte, crime writer, is that why you stopped me?’

‘Never heard of her, I am only interested in Jane Brown; security gave us a call, your nurse rang the patient alert hot line about some inappropriate conversations and questions. Can you confirm you have just had a session of chemotherapy?’

‘Yes, it went very well, lovely staff, I don’t understand what you are saying.’

‘Hospitals have to be very careful that medication is not taken away to be misused, if we could go somewhere private to have a little discussion?’

‘No, you misunderstand, I was merely doing research, anyway I must go, taxi arriving any minute.’

‘I could invite you to come to the police station to help with our enquiries.’

For a moment Emelda was most offended, more because he had not recognised her as a famous crime writer than that he might think her a criminal. But this could be a research opportunity. Jolie Janson had more than her fair share of run ins with Bedfordshire Police, but Emelda had never actually been inside a police station…