2007 and beyond

New Years Eve 2006 came and 2007 crept in quietly. It found me hoping,wanting this to be a better year than the last two. Of course both life changing events losing my dad closely followed by bowel cancer had been out of my hands so I had to pick myself up brush myself down and get on with life! I cant remember exactly when I had a CT scan but there were no signs of the cancer returning wahoo but (of course there is a but) my consultant was concerned that I now had an umbilical hernia and would need surgery to repair it . . oh goodie! He explained they would use mesh to close the hole in abdominal wall, simple operation (?). Just into hospital for two nights simples!! So in answer to the question would I be going back to work . . . no not yet.
Now you are probably becoming aware that life has a habit of throwing curve balls my way and here comes another. Date for hernia op arrives June 7th thats ok, yes but (another but) my husband Colin has been taken ill with pneumonia and admitted to hospital the same week!! This ment my poor daughters visiting both parents in different wings of the hospital at the same time. Obviously I was home after a couple of days and as simple as the op might have been my nicely healed scar from original surgery had to be reopened and it was bloody painful. I wish I had taken a picture of the bruise it caused because believe me it was as big as a side plate!
Okay so both 'patients' are home and recovering. You might remember from my first blog post that I was born in 1957 which ment that I, and Colin were coming up 50. Yes I hear you say party time,wrong! Duck here comes another curve ball, Colin went for a follow up chest scan and it revealed a tumour in his left kidney. A few weeks later he had the kidney removed.
Right lets move on a few months and here comes 2008 and again Im wondering if this year will see me back to full strength and back to work. The answer is simple no! A scan in April shows 2 lesions on my right lung have grown but the one on the left has stayed the same. So here we go again after appointments with my oncologist and thoracic consultant it is decided surgery followed by more chemo.June 8th a year after hernia op Im back in for lung re-section or thoracotomy. Now my consultant told me this was a difficult op to recover from (arent they all) he wasnt wrong! To me the worst part was the drain and especially having it removed, as no doubt anyone who has experienced this will tell you. When I went home had to sleep sitting sideways on the sofa as I couldnt lay down, but of course it got easier and in time was up and mobile again just in time to start chemo. Different regime this time Oxaliplatin and Capecitabine. The oxy was an infusion every 3 weeks followed by the cape as tablet at home. The side effects arent good, peripheral neuropathy is horrible tiny electric shocks in fingers,hands,toes and feet especially when touching something cold. It also makes you feel like your throat is closing and makes it difficult to talk, several times my chemo nurse had to give me warm drinks to ease this. I needed a blood transfusion and had to miss chemo a couple of times because blood count was so low. In november my chemo nurse told me to watch my temperatue as she was worried about white cell count and that I should go straight to A&E if it was too high. Guess what two days later found me in an ambulance heading to hosp and subsequently admitted with neutropenia. My white cell count was dangerously low, a very pleasant (not) doctor told me it was lucky I had gone to hosp as it was possible my organs were on the verge of closing down!?! So any visitors had to wear gloves and aprons as I was at risk of infection. Anyway I was home for Christmas and New Years Eve was on its way so third time lusky maybe?
Off course not, little did I know my biggest challenge yet was about to happen!!