Eight years and counting

I almost missed the anniversary of my surgery. Well, actually I did. It was two days ago.  Eight years previously on this day I was in hospital with chest drains and an epidural recovering from the removal of the lower two lobes of my right lung.

Today I'm hale and hearty, a little overweight and very glad to be here. I and my best beloved have six grandchildren, the oldest about to finish an apprenticeship, the youngest just one year old. We see them all often. Life is good and we'll celebrate our golden wedding later this year.

If you're reading this because you've been following my story you'll have heard about the damage that chemo did to nerves in my feet and to a certain extent in my fingers.  Well, I was thinking the other day that I can't be sure that some recovery hasn't taken place. Put it this way, my feet feel normal now. Maybe I've just got used to it.  Apart from that (it's called peripheral neuropathy by the way), I think I'm much as I was before the whole adventure started. I still get a bit short of breath walking uphill, but then at my age (approaching 70 fast now) that's hardly surprising and it's no different to how I was before my brush with cancer.

I posted here some years ago ago an x-ray image of my chest, at my last check-up I think it was, My right remaining lung lobe did its best to fill the void, and my diaphragm was moving up. I suspect it moved even further, because these days I can't help feeling that my oesophagus is probably veering slightly to my right (because it can!)  So I looked the image out the other day and it rather confirms the feeling I have when I eat.. Fascinating isn't it? 

Isn't science just wonderful!  The fact that my surgeon could reach inside and cut away the bad bit, stitch me up, and here I am eight years later.  

And talking of eight, a good friend of mine, introducing me to someone the other day and telling of my little excursion into the realms of lung cancer, recounted how I'd only had an 8% chance of survival.  That was news to me, but my friend was a nurse, so she obviously knew what she was talking about.  I was gobsmacked.  I knew my chances were small but at least I thought it was 10%!  It's unbelievable that I'm still here and I'm so grateful that I am.  

A simple bread ingredient

Well, that's what they'd have you believe - but look it up and you'll find that calcium proprionate is a fungicide ingredient of some bread and other manufactured foods.  It stops them going mouldy.

I stated to investigate what caused my IBS after consuming a couple - or was it three? - hot cross buns last year, days - maybe even weeks after they should have grown legs and walked out of the bread bin.  I stuck them in the oven for a couple of minutes, lavished butter on them and consumed them eagerly and gratefully. 

The sense of them passing along the lower reaches of my alimentary canal was intense and I was able to track them most of the way or so it felt.  I was only free of discomfort when they had left me entirely.

The penny didn't drop until some weeks later when a fruit loaf was presented to me.  It was only after eating that and having a similar experience that I looked at the label.  And so began my practice of avoiding calcium proprionate. I can tell you that I'm convinced that when it comes to the chemical being "well-tolerated", that it isn't by me!

Some bread contains it, some biscuits, some other manufactured foodstuffs.  A lot of bread doesn't include it (so why is it necessary at all?!) and as a general rule (useful when presented with a buffet) French sticks are a safe bet. 

Of course it makes sense. You have a gut full of lovely bacteria and into that you put a fungicide. Is it any surprise there are resulting problems? 

Hair cut bonus

I decided that my hair had become far too long.  Because of that chemo curl - remember that? - the slightly tendency to bend which the end of my hair exhibited for a while I'd let it grow longer and longer. I'd been wearing it in a bun a great deal especially during the hot summer.

So yesterday I went to a fabulous local salon where my grandson's girlfriend is training, and offered her the opportunity to chop it off.  She immediately told me that the length that it was would make the excess suitable for the Little Princess Trust  which uses cut hair to make wigs for children and young people who have lost theirs through illness. I gather that I'm in good company as the Duchess of Cambridge has also sent some of hers.

So here 's what will get sent; the plaits.

And here's the finished result.

So not only did I get a free haircut, but hopefully someone will be wearing some strands of my hair in the future and loving their new look too.

Wishing you and yours a very happy Christmas

I didn't expect to be here with you now and further into 2019 - and it's just amazing that I am.  So to all my local followers and to those who stumble on this blog, I wish you a very happy time this season of LED lights and excessive eating.

Seven years and counting ......

Tonight I will raise a glass of red wine and drink to the health and long life of the main who ultimately saved my life by embarking on the surgery to remove two lobes of my lungs. 

For all his study, his skill, his devotion to a career that few would wish for, his experience and his undoubted expertise, I give grateful thanks to Good (and that's not a typo).

"Here's to you and our time together ...."

Cheers!

Not only, but also

I've just read on Facebook a post from someone I know who was told her cancer would kill her and in the not too distant future - in other words to use the phrase that is bandied about far to freely these days: terminal cancer.

Refusing to accept the terminal bit, she begged the oncologists to give her as much treatment as her body could stand. She's had countless rounds of chemo, three occasions of surgery, some radiotherapy; other treatments too numerous to mention and is about to start imunotherapy to be sure to be sure.  Today she posted that her onologist has told her that she is cured unless proved otherwise!

We must never say "terminal" - it's a ridiculous word given that we are all "terminal" from the moment we're born.  In my experience there are two types of people: those who when told their cancer is terminal surrender themselves to the arms of the oncologists without questioning, without querying, without learning, without taking responsibility; basically without hope.  Then there are the others, like this friend of mine, who regard the news as a personal challenge, a mountain to be climbed, a project to be carried out, an education to be acquired and a life to be regained.  No prizes for guessing who survives.

So, would it just not be sensible, instead of focusing on a worst case, to deluge newly diagnosed patients with tales of all those who have successfully conquered their afflictions and lived to tell the tale?  Methinks outcome statistics could be greatly improved by just that culture change.

It looks like an epidemic

When I was a child my mother could barely bring herself to say the word "cancer". Instead, adults would whisper about it - or talk about the "big C". I suppose it was because such a diagnosis was then almost invariably a death sentence. My family should have known better, as my aunt survived for at least twenty five years after her mastectomy.

Now we say the word right out loud and almost every week someone I know gets in touch with me wanting to know what it was that I did to help my outcome. It is either for them or for a member of their family, or perhaps a close friends. I always suggest they check out the CancerActive web site where Chris Woollams reviews all the latest research.  And I tell them about Journey Therapy and changing my diet radically.

What amazes me is the frequency with which these requests occur.  It seems to me that cancer is now an epidemic, yet officialdom does not seem to be curious about the reasons why.  Maybe it's because deep down we all know the reasons: the toxic mix of stress, nutrition-less products that pass for food, our obsession with sugar, and the background of pollution which we compound by smearing on ourselves a whole concoction of chemical products.  When you add to that the dozens of radio and other electro-magnetic frequencies which invade every space we occupy, is it any surprise that our bodies are going wrong?

And of course it's big business - cancer - that is.  Big chemical and pharmaceutical industries are dependent upon the non-stop consumption of vast quantities of their products and chemotherapy for cancer is a big money spinner. One could be forgiven for asking whether they actually want to cure cancer.  Or do they want to continue to make mega-profits from treating it?  It is an unpalatable proposition I'll admit. 

I will leave you with that thought. Just think about it the next time you're contemplating taking part in some stunt  or other, supposedly to support a major cancer charity.  Are you really helping the cause or are you just paying for more research into how to make more money out of cancer?