The Cheque is in the post……

(…… and other lies men tell)

It’s only now that I’ve reread last week’s blog, and the comments and support the words generated that I realise just how low I was feeling. The support from the cyber world was really appreciated and came from some quite surprising sources too. I should also have remembered that the blog is not only read by friends, it’s also read by family too. By my own admission I’m not very good at the spoken word, especially now when it’s quite an effort to make a spoken word come out, but I do write about everything, regardless of how’s likely to read it. So, note to self, when writing a depressing blog it’s probably worth letting the immediate family know what you’ve just published.

One specific piece of advice came from someone who I’ve learned to trust over the past 18 months, it was very simple advice, as the best usually is. It was “Just for today” which makes a huge amount of sense when you think about it. You can’t change the past, you can’t change what’ll happen in the future, so you’re left with today. Look back at the past, don’t stare at it. Have goals for the future, but don’t project. Do what you can today, sleep and repeat.

By my standards Saturday was actually quite productive. I mowed the lawn so that the sodding badgers have something to dig up at night whilst they’re looking for grubs. They always seem to wait until the night after the mow, no idea why. Last summer I was sitting on the patio one summer evening when I heard a noise coming from the lawn. A dirty great big badger was scrubbing around and making its way towards me. I’m guessing that it couldn’t smell me, and as they’ve pretty poor eyesight I stayed stock still to see how close it would come, and whose nerve would break first. In the end it got to within about four feet of me before turning on its tail and making off towards the bushes. What struck me was how big the animal was, I’m guessing from nose to tail it must have been pushing 3 ½ feet. The other abiding memory were the massive yellow teeth it possessed. A few years ago Penny came crawling back in through the cat flap very early one morning with quite bad bite marks on her body. It was touch and go as to whether she’d survive or not, and the vet suggested she’d been in a fight with most likely a badger.

Penny isn’t too happy with us at the moment. She had her annual trip to the vets and as usual she’s been described as overweight, so is now on a fairly strict diet, much to her disgust. She even jumped up on the cooker hob on Friday evening as I was making a simple and nutritious lasagne. We adopted Penny just over 2 years ago from a local rescue centre. Her original name was Tallulah, sorry but there was no way I was going out into the garden calling that name out in the early morning. So, we came up with a cunning plan to rename her. Her adoption coincided with Rams having the biggest game in their history against Exmouth RFC. If Rams won they’d be promoted to National 2 for the first time in the club’s history. The idea was that the cat would be named after the first try scorer for the Rams that day. Most of the players had names that could be shortened or adapted quite well for a cat’s name, I was just praying that Luke Flower wasn’t the scorer. In the end, it was a Penalty Try that saw the Rams get their first points on the board, hence the name Penny.

I digress, as well as mowing the lawn I also gave the car a bloody good hoover as it hadn’t been done for some weeks. I’m not entirely sure of the sense of doing it this weekend as we’re off to Cornwall in a couple of weeks and if the holiday goes to the usual plan I’ll be bringing back half of Portcothan beach back in the boot of the car. How old do children have to be before the lure of making sandcastles on the beach fade? I’m 55 this year, and I still want to do it 😊

Finally, to wear myself out for an afternoon on the sofa I made an industrial sized batch of Spanish Potato cakes to see me through lunch for the next few days.

Sunday was another upward curve day. Max was working early and then disappearing up to Evil Twins house ahead of an early morning flight to Hamburg on Monday morning with his girlfriend. Carol and I took the chance for a leisurely stroll around Reading town as the weather was good. I treated her to a new phone as her iPhone 4 was frankly an embarrassment to be seen with, so she’s now the lessee of a rather snazzy Samsung Galaxy A3 which will hopefully have a much better quality camera on it. We then decided to try and have a spot of lunch. 

The first time I’ve been out to eat since the op, so I was slightly nervous. We tried out The Real Greek on the riverside as mezes type dishes wouldn’t push me too far. Four dishes of calamari, lamb meatballs, salt cod and chicken were ordered, washed down with a bottle of pinot (Carol was driving so I had the lions share!) It went down really well, only one slight case of gagging which I managed to control without embarrassing myself in public. OK, it’s wasn’t Arillas on Corfu, but it wasn’t a bad substitute.  This small win has boosted my confidence ahead of our trip down to Cornwall in a couple of weeks, so on the return home I jumped onto the interweb thingy and booked a table for three at Rick Steins for Carols (55^th 😊 ) birthday on 25^th August.

As I’ve mentioned before, we’ve been going to Porthcothan for many, many years, but in all that time we’ve never cycled the Camel Trail which runs from Padstow to way beyond Wadebridge and utilises the old railway line that Beecham decided to get rid of in the 1960s. So, this year we’re going to hire bikes for a day and see how far we can get. I’m hoping there are a couple of pubs along the way to “Rehydrate” in. This will be the first years we haven’t camped under canvas at Carnevas since the kids were tiny. I’m quite looking forward to not having to queue to use the shower (apart from behind Max) and not having to walk across a damp field first thing in the morning for a wee. 

Sunday evening was vaguely amusing as it was spent largely watching Carol trying to work out how to use her new phone. I suspect we’ll have to wait until Max is back on Thursday to get it working completely.

Following the last blog update the total hits since inception went over the 50,000 mark which is hard to believe, and I’ve just gone over 100,000 words too. I initially thought It might get a couple of thousand views and 10,000 words.

I started the week with the plan to not sit on my backside watching TV all week. So, first thing on Monday morning I walked the 15 minutes to the Mad Hatters Coffee Shop in the village for a large cup of wake up juice. It might only be a little thing, but walking for 30 minutes in the fresh air is one of life’s small pleasures and it costs nothing at all. With my caffeine need sated I decided to tackle a job I’ve been putting off for the past couple of weeks. I get all my medical supplies for the stoma via a company called Countrywide Supplies, they seem to be the main supplier of bits and pieces in the UK. They call me each month to take my new order for kit that I need. So, I went through the 4 drawer cabinet I’ve got in the bathroom and made a list of exactly what I’ve actually got and what I’ll probably need in the next month. 

So, to bore you to pieces, here’s the list of kit that I’ve got at the moment –

·         63 HME Filters (I use about 2 or 3 a day)

·         90 Lary Clips (1 set a day on average)

·         1 Torch (For shining up my stoma when clearing the valve)

·         1 Hand Held Mirror (Works wonders for helping me to wipe up the gunk produced out of my new hole)

·         3 Valve Cleaning Brushes (They last about 10 days or so)

·         2 Puncture Dilaters (Hopefully never need to be used – if they are I’m advised to call 999 and ask for an emergency ambulance)

·         1 Shower Aid

·         3 Shower Bibs (Think of a babies feeding bib, but bigger and no giraffes on it)

·         20 other bibs of varying colours / designs (These are used to cover up the stoma from view, but I’ve found them restrictive)

·         43 Optiderm Base Plates (Use for 12 hours tops, and for sensitive skin)

·         4 Flexiderm Base Plates (Better adhesive, can be used for 24 hours – I can’t use these yet)

·         18 Laryngfoam Protectors (Used when you don’t want to wear a HME filter)

·         2 large packs of Wet Wipes

·         2 large tubes of lube to get Lary to slide down easily 😊 (Strawberry flavour)

·         2 spare Larys (Just in case………….)

I’m not going to need to reorder everything, every month. The main consumables are the HMEs, Lary Clips, Base Plates, and Laryfoam protectors. I know that the HMEs cost about £50 for a pack of 10, so you do the math as our American cousins would incorrectly say. I’m costing the NHS a fair bob or two at the moment, and as I’ll get free prescriptions for the rest of my life I’d better come up with some more fund raising ideas in the near future. You’ve been warned, your wallets will be attacked in the not too distant.

My plans to get into shape for cycling in Cornwall were somewhat knackered by it chucking down with rain all afternoon, what a wonderful summer we’re having, so I went to bed for a couple of hours listening to England starting to roll the South Africans over in the final test. The experience was only spoilt by having to suffer Geoffrey Boycott. He really is becoming an embarrassment to the BBC the older he gets. It’s time that he and Peter Allis were put out to pasture and to allow the younger generation to come through.

Monday night was pretty awful, I reacted badly to a dinner of burger, beans and chips and had real problems breathing with the HME in. So an early night followed sleeping without a filter in for the first time.

Tuesday had an interesting start to it. I needed to log on to my work laptop to retrieve an email I’d sent prior to going into hospital. I was slightly concerned when I charged up my work iPhone to see that it wasn’t recognising emails, and all Ap’s relating to work seemed to have disappeared. I then booted up the laptop to find that I couldn’t login to the remote access screens. This meant there was only one thing to do, phone the dreaded “Help Desk” and listen to the 25 different options before speaking to a human. Now in some ways this experience was quite positive as it was the first time I’d had to make any long phone call. It appeared that the operator on the other end of the line could hear me quite easily, even if I did forget to press my filter speak a couple of times. After a number of questions, five minutes on mute, and some head scratching it would appear that I’ve been processed as a leaver, hence not being able to logon. Oh well, I presume my redundancy cheque is in the post!

I spoke to my boss who eventually managed to get through to HR who advised that as I’d been off for more than 30 days my account was suspended until I was signed back. So, it seems I’m unable help out with anything until such time as I return to work. On that subject, I had an appointment with my Dr. on Tuesday evening as my current sick note had expired. He’s signed me off until 12^th September, however as I’m seeing the Consultant at RBH next week we can discuss in more detail the possibility of an earlier, managed, return if he thinks I’m up for it. He was also quite keen for me to explain how the Lary worked and how I was able to actually speak, not the easiest thing to actually explain to be honest, but I gave it my best shot. 

A rather pleasant diversion on Tuesday afternoon came in the form of a good mate dropping by for a coffee for an hour or so. I was good to just sit back and have a chat for a while, especially with the weather being so poor that I couldn’t really go out anywhere.

Wednesday was even worse as far as the Great British Summertime was concerned, rain, wind, more rain, more wind……. I feel genuinely sorry for any families who are holidaying in the UK at the moment, it must be miserable, not to mention expensive too. Last year when we were down in Cornwall just for four days we ate out most days, and it was rare to get change from £50.00 for a simple pub lunch for the three of us. At least this year we’ll not be staying in a tent which really limits your options if the weather is rubbish. In the past we’ve had some spectacular weather when camping in Cornwall, but we’ve also had our fair share of god awful stuff. There was year, prior to having kids, when we were at Carnevas in a small two man tent, that wasn’t overly waterproof, when the tale end of a hurricane hit the country. We ended up spending the night in my Fiat Strada whilst watching the tent flap around in the gale like a rag doll. The next day the tent was well and truly broken so we checked into the nearest pub and continued our holiday. This was the same pub as the infamous “Sink” incident which I descried in the book, but for those of you who haven’t read it, it’s worth another airing.

We’d used the Farmers Arms in St Merryn regularly over a number of years. It was a friendly pub with a good choice of ales and decent food. We were in there one evening enjoying a pie and a pint when I needed to use the facilities. On entering the gents I noticed the lights weren’t working, it appeared that the bulb had gone. Not a problem I thought, I know where the urinals are, so I unzipped, performed, zipped up, washed up and went back to join Carol in the bar. It was about 10 minutes later that someone came out from the direction of the gents and announced in a loud voice that “Someone had pissed in the sink……..” We left quite quickly.

I think I’d mentioned that Jo from the hospital had asked if I’d be prepared to talk to folk who’d either had or were about to have a Lary Op. I of course was happy to agree. On Wednesday I got a text from a chap we’ll call Don, who’s about the same age as me and had his Op. a few days before me, also in the Churchill. We were on Blenheim ward at the same time, however as I tended to keep myself to myself we can’t recall bumping into each other. Don has had a bit more of a tough time than me I think. Whilst he’s had the Lary Op and is now cancer free, he’s had far more Lymph Nodes removed than me which effects movement of the arms and he’s still to face the delights of Chemo and RT. He’ll be having 30 sessions of RT and 6 of Chemo, the same as I had early in 2016. It seems we may have a bit more in common than just happening to have had the same invasive surgical procedure carried out on us within days of each other. With this in mind we’re going to meet up next week for a coffee over in Twyford. If I’m able to give anyone a degree of comfort or answer any questions about what they may be going through or about to go through then I’ll be more than happy share my experiences.

Wednesday evening was frustrating to say the least. Max was still in Hamburg and Carol was due home about 6pm, so I’d planned a nice dinner, bottle of wine, touch of romance…….. well, when I say romance I mean I’d promised to stay awake beyond 9pm. The best laid plans were shagged out by the NHS! Carol eventually got home at 8.45pm. She’d been waiting with a patient for hospital transport to take him home. One “booked” transport refused to take him as he needed oxygen transported with him. Roll on when Carol can retire, the NHS will miss staff who regularly stay way beyond their contracted hours, do home visits without being paid for it, and go the extra mile every single day. So instead of a night of romance it turned into a “Knock the wine back quickly” type of night. The sea bass, pasta and mushroom sauce still went down quite well though. I suspect Carol was probably secretly pleased 😉

Thursday is now the new Monday in the Clark household as Carol has changed her day off in the week from Monday, to, you’ve guessed it, Thursday. The poor cat, who is still getting used to her new diet, was most miffed when one of us wasn’t up at 6.30am to feed her. She eventually barged her way into the bedroom around 9am, promptly jumped on the bed and made herself a pain in the backside until I persuaded Carol to get up and make me a cup of tea. It wasn’t the most productive day I’ve ever had if I’m honest, a bit of photo editing, a bit of writing, a bit of TV and a bit of reading.

As it was our last night to ourselves before Max returns from Germany it would have been good to go out for dinner, however I had another appointment at OBR with Vicki and her magic fingers. The shoulder is feeling a lot better, but another couple of weeks of manipulation will hopefully get it well and truly back on track so I can use it fully. When I first went to see Vicki two weeks ago I had pretty limited movement in my right shoulder. Tonight she was impressed by the improvement as I’m up to close on 90% movement which possibly isn’t far off as good as I’m going to get. Blimey, she gave me a good old working over tonight, explaining that as I’d improved so much she could really get to work on the muscles. I doubt very much that Vicki has ever had a Lary wearer as a customer before, but she’s known me for probably six or seven years now and was really supportive of all of us last year when I was first diagnosed. She saw me at my very lowest point when I was taken via ambulance from OBR to RBH before a 1^st XV match in April 2016 after I succumbed to the after effects of Chemo and RT, I’ll never forget the support I received from everyone at the club that horrible day. We have a simple system for these torture sessions, if it hurts too much then I double tap the massage table, to date I’ve not had to do it, been close a couple of times, but I’ve been a very brave boy. I’m sure I’ve mentioned before that I’m lucky to be able to access the Physio’s services at Rams. I’m pretty sure the NHS do offer some sort of service, but it won’t be anywhere near as comprehensive as Rams offer.

A slight concern that both Carol and Vicki have identified is that the scaring on my lower chin has started to “Lump” and become very solid. It could well be that it just needs draining as I’d been warned this could happen. Vicki and Don suggested that I mail the CNS Nurses for their opinion as to whether I need to go into clinic before my appointment next Thursday, hopefully it’s not anything to be too worried about. (At the time of publishing I've not had a reply from the hospital - guess it's holiday time!) 

Late Thursday night was traumatic. I was lying in bed reading a book and I got to the end of it, rather a good book too (Mud, Sweat and Gears by Ellie Bennett) I flicked back to the menu in my Kindle and had the stark realisation that I had no more new books to read! Perhaps for the first time in about 4 years my Kindle was empty. I read almost every night before turning the light off, it may only be for 10 minutes or so, but it’s part of my routine. I was given a couple of “Real” books to read when I was in hospital so I’ll read those before downloading my next batch of Kindle books. Any recommendations gratefully received.

I finally got the bike out on Friday as it was quite a nice day and not too blowy, after messing about with the front derailleur for a while to get the damn thing working it was off for a jolly ride around Tilehurst. Not sure how far I went, but I was pretty knackered when I got back, but another step in the right direction, my first bike ride with Lary in place. 

Max eventually arrived home from his jaunt to Hamburg on Friday, seems a good time was had by all. No sooner was he home than he was off out again staying at Laura's and dog sitting for the night. 

Max is the one in the blue suede shoes (and that is a dog, not Laura!) 

It's quite amusing as I've been seriously thinking of getting a dog from the rescue centre. One way or another when I go back to work I'll still be based at home so it wouldn't be by itself all day. My only concern would be how would Penny react to having another four legged animal in the house? Perhaps a bit more thinking is required on the subject and it's certainly not something I'd do as an impulse. It was fun to play around with the mutt for a while, but I didn't have to pick up any mess, or take it for a walk in the park. I did try to bowl a tennis ball at him. He totally ignored the ball and I forgot that my shoulder is still knackered, a big "Ouchy" from me, of course done silently! This may mean I'll have to rethink the beach cricket planned for Porthcothan next weekend and stick to French cricket only. 

I’m not really sure what this weekend will holds for me. If the weather is good I’m going to try and do a bit of photography of something that isn’t rugby related for a change. It’s also the 4^th Birthday of Nino’s in Pangbourne, they’re holding an open afternoon with pizza and wine on offer, so it would be rude not to pay them a visit I guess. Other than that it’ll be playing it by ear and not overdoing things.

As always, thanks for reading.

To be continued……..

#Shoulder2Shoulder