Look into my eyes………….

This is a bit of a mixed update for the week. Up’s, down’s and a bit of pain.

On Wednesday I was reading a blog posting on the MacMillan website from a chap who’d been through a very similar process to me at roughly the same time. He’s been in remission now since May of 2016, again just like me. It was an interesting and thought provoking piece of writing. He was questioning how he was no supposed to be feeling, how he was finding it difficult to get on with “Real Life”, how every ache and pain, cough and cold, made him question whether his cancer was making a reappearance. His friends and family had all been through the wringer with him whilst he was ill and being treated. They heard the words “Remission” and breathed that big shy of relief that it was all over and that things could get back to normal. He did his best to put on the “Normal” face. He went back to work, but struggled to concentrate on even the most menial of tasks. He found himself getting fatigued every day, whether he’d done any exercise or not. He found he became irritated with who he classed as fools far too easily. He became argumentative for no apparent reason. He didn’t want to go out and interact, he didn’t want to stay in and fester. He was 14 months in and still worried, anxious, frightened and was struggling to see any light at the end of the tunnel.

Now I’m not saying that the blog post was written by me, it wasn’t. But I can recognise almost every one of his concerns as something I’ve been through and to a degree I’m still going through in one way, shape or form.

I read the responses to his post and was incredibly relieved to see that the vast majority of replies were along the lines of “You’re not alone”, “That’s how I felt”, “It does get better”, “Talk to people”, “Talk to people”, “Talk to people”……………

Have a look into someone’s eyes, the eyes don’t lie.

 - And the man in the mirror has sad eyes.........

Folk might well be through the worst of the illness, but the road to recovery is long and dotted with pot holes that sometimes are hidden with water, it’s not until you hit them that you realise just how deep some of them can be.

The drawn out saga of my tattoo was completed, well almost, this week. I sat in the chair clenching my teeth as the first inking was made, and to be honest it was nowhere near as bad as I expected. A bit “Sharp” in places but not overly painful. What had been promised to be about half an hour turned into closer to an hour and a half, due to the fact that I’m a “Bleeder”, apparently. You learn something new every day. I’ve got to go back in a couple of weeks to get it finished fully, but it’s looking pretty good from what I’ve seen so far in the mirror.

The fund raising for the Half Marathon is going pretty well, we’re up to a combined total of just over £800 as we speak.. Next week I’ll be tapping up my work contacts and I hope they’re feeling in a generous mood. There’s still two to go before the event so if you haven’t donated yet, and would like to, here’s the link >> https://www.justgiving.com/teams/Shoulder2Shoulder        remember, every penny raised is going straight to the Berkshire Cancer Centre. Hopefully next week we’ll have got over the £1k mark.

A weekend of daughter home from Uni, dinner at Nino’s and a bit of rugby thrown in to look forward to.

As always, thanks for reading.

To be continued…………….

#Shoulder2Shoulder