So Long, and thanks for all the fish…..

Saturday 16^th June

Last night the errant son played his first 15 a side adult match. He was in the Wooden Spoon charity team who played against a Abbey RFC Select XV ahead of the weekends Fat Blokes 7s. We were both pretty nervous when we turned up at Ice Station Abbey, he was the youngest player by at 3 years, and Abbey fielded a pretty strong side. I shouldn’t really have worried, he played back row for the whole of the second half and didn’t look out of place at all. One piece of muppetry which if it had come off would have been the move of the night! 

The next day we trooped off back up to Ice Station Abbey for the annual Fat Blokes 7s at some ungodly hour. Max was playing for the social Honey Badgers team this week. I’ve been going to FB7s for 10 years now. The first time was pretty damn emotional as it followed a trip over to the Isle of Wight to play in a festival at Vectis when we met Wee Jack Wakefield. I’m not going to go into that story here, but it will be in the book, so watch this space. 

The Badgers fielded two side, one defending their title in the Elite competition, the other entered in the Open Social. The Open side was a mixture of youth and experience, in some cases years and years of experience…….. I’ve always enjoyed watching 7s, especially at the FB7s when it’s not uncommon to see 35 man mauls, or a pair of step ladders brought onto the pitch to help with line outs. The young lads who helped out the older lads were superb. Charlie, Alex and Max provided much needed energy, whilst the other players provided the guile and experience. To cut a long day short both the social & elite sides won their competitions. I believe the saying is #THB4L (The Honey Badgers for life!).

A pretty darn perfect day ended up at our friends “The Cooks” over in Wargrave. A lovely BBQ, plenty of wine, great company……………… but by 11pm Max and I were hanging. A long day in the sun was taking its toll, so we made our excuses and wound our way back home. When I later found out that a rather decent brandy was produced and the other guests left at 2.30am…………….. well, part of me was jealous, the other part was thankful that for once I’d shown restraint.

Anna is now off on her version of InterRailing for the best part of a month with a friend she’s known since she was about 12 or 13 I think. Instead of slumming it in hostels it would appear they’re staying in decent hotels everynight. I’m also not sure that Geneva, Zurich, Saltzburg and Venice are on the usual schedule for most impoverished backpackers. She’s sends a text every couple of days and seems to be having a great time. Whilst you can’t help worrying about what is going on in Europe at the moment you’ve got to trust your kids to be sensible.

Thursday 28^th July, 4.30am…………

Up at an ungodly hour to write the final portion of this blog. Sleep was a real challenge last night for a number of reasons, so rather than lying their tossing ‘n turning and disturbing Carol I thought I’d get up, have a cup of tea and bang away at the keyboard whilst the juices were flowing in my mind.

On Wednesday I rocked back up to RBH for the follow up biopsy, hopefully the final check in the box to ensure everything is ok. I was slightly nervous following my previous experience of a biopsy but there wasn’t much I could really do. Last time I was the final person on the list for the day, today I was second, behind a bloke who just moaned and grumbled his way through his stay in the ward, I felt pretty sorry for the poor student nurse who had to placate his increasingly stupid demands and questions. A quick chat with the anaesthetist confirmed that he was indeed aware of my previous problem with the GA and that they would try not to knock me off this time, oh how I laughed! Cool Dude also came up to explain the procedure he’d be undertaking. If that man was any more laid back he’d have jumped into the bed and had a nap himself! I walked down to the theatre around 1.30pm in my OddBall flip flops, which looked rather fetching next to my compression socks. After a bit of a wait and a bit of confusion as there were two Mr Clark’s in the waiting room, (I still wonder what the other one was having done!) I was eventually led into the pre-op room. The Senior Anaesthetist seemed to recognise me from last time. He went on to explain that the problems last time could have been caused by many different things and not just the GA administered. By this time I was past the point of caring as the cannula had been fitted and I was being gently pumped with a rather pleasant pre-med drug. One, two, three, four……………….. zzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

The next thing I know I’m waking up in the Recovery Suite and being asked how I feel? “Like crap” is probably an answer they get given at least twice a day. My throat felt like I’d been gargling with blunt razor blades, my voice was barely a whisper and very hoarse, but at least there wasn’t a Consultant looking at me with a concerned face this time. It was about 90 minutes before I could have anything to drink, so I did was any self respecting  middle aged man would do in the mid afternoon, I went back to sleep. Cool Dude came back up to the ward a bit later, and now for the good news……………………… 

He could see no further signs of cancer, he’s taken a small biopsy but believes it’ll show up to be totally clear. He actually did a lot more poking around than he'd originally planned, and my throat certainly felt pretty darn painful.  Yes, my throat is extremely swollen still and possibly in a few months time he may operate again to cut out some of the swelling. Yet again it was explained to me that the treatment I’d undertaken earlier this year had knocked the stuffing out of me, both physically and mentally. The upward spike in my health and fitness, followed by the fall off the cliff a couple of months ago was to be entirely expected. I need to be patient. Things will improve eventually. Resting, moderate exercise, a healthy and balanced diet, moderate intake of alcohol, taking care in the sun and sleep will all help in the recovery process. I was discharged around 7pm with a shed load of leaflets to read. One of the leaflets concerned getting over the effects of a GA. It advises rest for 48 hours following the treatment, no driving, working or operating complicated machinery (I think a PC is probably ok). It also said that I would need to be looked after by a responsible adult in the first 48 hours…………….. now Carol’s at work, Anna is somewhere in Europe, that leaves Max, oh dear god……………. 

I know I’ve said this before, but now really is the time to put this blog to bed. Other than monthly check ups with the hospital, there won’t be much action on the health front. A slow and steady improvement isn’t going to make for great reading.

I will post up when the book is ready for publishing, I’m still aiming for some time in September. At the moment I’m writing in “Real Time” with a few back stories being embellished. The aim was always to finish the timeline at the end of July. As previously mentioned it won’t be a “Free” book on Kindle, I want to put all proceeds to MacMillan Cancer Support, so it’ll cost you around £3.00 to read it. Rest assured, it isn’t a word for word copy of this blog. There are revelations that even those who’ve known me for many years will be surprised about. It's got to be worth £3.00 of your earth pounds to read all about it. I'm currently researching how to upload it to Amazon Kindle and trying to finalise a design for the front cover. It will be titled #ShouldertoShoulder.

The last 7 months or so have taught me a lot about myself, my family and my friends. I’ve taken huge encouragement from every comment on the blog, every message on Facebook or Twitter, and every expression of goodwill when I’ve been out and about. Thank you so much for taking the time to read my various ramblings, especially going back to the 8 weeks or so of the end of January through to March when things were really at their darkest. There were a few days when I wasn't sure if I'd get this far. I doubt very much if any of the folk from RBH have been reading this, but if they have well thank you all for the support and kindness I’ve been shown. I’m sure that at times folk were going beyond the call of duty to help Carol and I. So Cool Dude, Frances, Kate, and especially Jo and Scary, cheers guys.

There have been times when I’ve felt extremely emotional whilst writing, I’m sure that has helped me to cope and to not bottle things up as much as I used to do. If in anyway at all my musings have helped anyone else who’s being through a similar treatment, or how is the carer of someone, well then it’s all been worthwhile. Without my family I wouldn't have got through this. I've been a bear with a sore head, I've had very short tempers.

A few “Stats” to finish up on –

This blog has just under 51,500 words. It’s been viewed over 6,800 times in more than 20 different countries around the world. 36% of people who’ve viewed the blog have done so via Chrome, only 5% via Internet Explorer! 30% used Windows, 12% an iPad and 7% on a Mac. The vast majority of traffic, was directed via Facebook. The cost of my treatment to date to the NHS is somewhere around £20,000 and counting. When I can come up with a decent idea I intend to do something to raise funds to pay that sum back. 

14,000 people die each month in the UK from cancer related illness.....  

Again, many thanks folks.

#shouldertoshoulder