Somehow, today is day *one hundred* since I finished chemotherapy and rang the bell.
One hundred days. How on earth did we get here?
Never has anything felt simultaneously like yesterday and like five years ago. So with that being said, getting to +100 days is something that I'm struggling to get my head around a little bit. I'm sure I'll get to it eventually, but the whole experience is already beginning to feel like a bad dream. There are genuinely some occasions when it dawns on me that I actually had cancer.
Oh yeh, that was fun.
As I am sure the many long time readers (is 'fans' too egotistical a term at this juncture?) of this blog will have clocked, I haven't written anything for ages! Not since the immediate few days after my last round of chemo actually. Now, this sabbatical could be down to two things. It could be because 1) I can actually sleep now and no longer have time to kill between 3 and 5am most nights. So that's a big win. Or it could be that 2) I've subconsciously just began to take it all in for the first time.
I feel it is important to continue to speak of my experience even though the cancer is in remission. I barely go a day without hearing or reading about someone who has just been diagnosed and I remember how mind bendingly awful those initial days are. And don't forget, I had a treatable form of the disease. I read an update on LinkedIn a few days a go where a thirty-something father of two had been diagnosed with terminal, inoperable cancer. The weeks before he had been playing golf and running half marathons (significantly quicker than me, may I add!), and then with a click of the fingers he was on a countdown to the end of his life.
It shook me up. Whether it was the similarities (how can I be ill? I've just ran a half marathon!) or just the sheer realisation that this is happening everywhere, everyday. Actually, it isn't a 'realisation', it's a reinforcement of what I already know - this shit isn't going anywhere. It WILL affect you or someone you love in your lifetime. That is just a cold hard fact.
(As slight aside - I've found myself getting irrationally annoyed by the adverts on TV where it leads with the 'one-in-two of us will get cancer' line. What about once you've already had it? I feel like once you've ticked that particular box, you should get a free ride from it for the rest of your life. Alas not, I'm just as likely if not more likely to get it as everyone else. It doesn't strike me as very fair.)
But that's it, isn't it? None of this is fair.
So yeh, it is important to keep writing, sharing photos, and talking about it. Who knows who it could help?
With that said though, and whilst I feel like I have a lot to talk about, I am struggling to get it down in words at the moment (he says, mid-3000 word essay...!). So apologies for the meandering nature of this blog... I expect it will form the first in a mini series of entries where I gradually get everything out.
One thing I remember being particularly concerned about at the start of all this was not looking like a chemo patient. Well, I got to about the end of January (so about half way) looking relatively ok all things considered. Then I very much looked like a chemo patient.
This was taken 10 days after treatment finished and, if I'm being honest, is a photo I simply couldn't look at afterwards (despite how much of a lovely photo of Evie it is!). I had no hair, my eyebrows had made a run for the hills and my face must have weighed about 10kg on its own such was the effect of the steroids.
This was the first time I hadn't worn my hat in public and I felt like everyone was staring at me. The chemo patient. Of course, they probably weren't, and even if they were, who cares?
But at the time, it was tough.
Despite hating how I looked, I posted this on my Instagram because I wanted to be able to look back at it one day in the future and be proud of myself for doing it.
Since then, I gradually started to look a little like myself each day. One thing I spent my previous 32 and a bit years literally not giving a shit about were my eyebrows. Turns out you really miss them when they're gone! Who knew they did such a fundamental job of framing your entire face? They got to about the stage below where there was maybe six or seven hairs on each brow - it was thoroughly depressing. I looked like a blob of yoghurt that had fallen off a spoon.
But as the old saying goes, what gets blitzed by chemo will one day eventually come back...!
I'm genuinely more proud of my eyebrow regrowth than anything I've ever done. I really wish I could have done one of those clever photography things where it could have shown them coming back over a few weeks in thirty seconds. It probably would have required me to sit still in front of a camera for days on end so it probably wasn't ever that feasible, but it would have been cool all the same.
Combined with my eyebrows, my hair has given it a good old go too! I've gone from being horrible chemo-bald to a full head of hair in about six weeks - I've even got some pretty inexplicable blonde highlights in there now too! But no curls. Not yet at least, perm fans.
So for the thousandth time - the human body is incredible.
One of the biggest issues post-treatment was always going to be the 'Chemo-to-Marathon-Six-Month-Challenge' which for some reason doesn't get spoken about anywhere near as much as Couch to 5k...
A week after chemo finished, I was keen to see what my body could manage and set a base line. I'm not sure what I expected (I've walked loads so I'll be fineee *Pinocchio emoji*), but it was absolutely horrific and I nearly died.
Which would have been wildly ironic.
It felt like I had no kneecaps and my lungs had been removed but I dragged myself round 1.8 miles of utter misery. What was very clear then was that I would have to suck it up, ignore the fact that I've ran thousands of miles and start at the very bottom with a run/walk programme. Which is tough when your brain is used to being able to run a marathon.
By the 20th April, twelve runs later I could run 5km without stopping.
And then three weeks ago I ran the 34th and last in my series of 'Comeback' runs around the Carsington Water Reservoir.
Anything is possible.
(And apparently a damn sight easier without a 9cm mass in my chest...!)
As I sit here today, I have just finished my third week of the Chicago Training Plan, running five times a week as I look to gradually get back in to shape and, more importantly, capable of running the sort of distances that I used to be able to do.
By Tuesday next week I will have clocked up 200 miles since the comeback began which is pretty good going I reckon and solid foundations for what is to come.
Earlier this week I had my first check up following the all clear at the end of April and, despite being 99% sure I was absolutely fine, I began to fret a little that maybe the bloods might show the first signs of the body fighting something again. Scanxiety and bloodxiety are absolutely a thing, but thankfully everything was fine and looking good!
We were fortunate enough to see Dr Lala for the first time in a long time and she was thrilled to see me looking well - "look at your legs!" she said as I walked through the door. I KNOW! She said I was a totally different person now compared to when we last spoke and couldn't be happier with the outcome.
She's the best. I'm going to try and get her to come to the event in September as a special guest!
(P.S. get in touch to book your tickets!)
A couple of quick things before I tie this one up - firstly, the amazing people at Lymphoma Action have very kindly nominated my blog and fundraising since the diagnosis in the Outstanding Commitment category of the JustGiving awards which is extremely humbling, so thank you to them.
And finally, I wanted to thank my very best friend who we lost earlier this month. Indy kept me company a lot during the post-chemo days and always made me smile even when everything else was difficult. She was the very best.
Thank you for reading, I hope it hasn't been too much of a slog! Until next time, LFG.
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