Back down to Earth with a bump

So once again there has been a gap in postings and I am sorry to say that this is all due to rather unpleasant goings in my world. To some extent the human body is an amazing thing as mine seemed to hold off from being really sick until after we had turned on an 11 hour flight from the Maldives to go into melt down. I had been a bit sick whilst we were away and could not keep much food down, but generally felt under control. About an hour after getting home though was a different story; lots of vomiting, could not keep anything down no matter how plain and in the end even water was causing issues. By about 3.30am I had had enough and so we called the emergency line at the Harley street clinic as I felt being admitted so that the medical professionals, could do their jobs was the only way forward . However, the doctor in the end if the phone had other ideas and insisted I went to my nearest A&E as it sounded like it was not nothing to do with my treatment with them or the disease and I would have seen a doctor quicker at A&E than at the Harley street Clinic  where I would have to wait until 9am to see a consultant even though they had all my notes and records.   Hmmm...

So we trundled off to Kings A&E at 4am complete with emergency sick bucket just in case of any incidents in the car, a pair of pjs and that was pretty much all. What an experience that was. Although I was processed through triage and into a treatment room fairly promptly the process was very slow moving. A junior doctor tried to find my veins but to no avail. In the end they tracked down a registrar who was a bit more nifty with a needle to get the canula in so I could have blood tests, drugs and so on. By 6.30am I was being given a small dose of anti sickness and morphine which was enough to brewing back the last remaining crumbs of rich tea biscuit which I had been training to nibble on at 2am. The rest was just water and bile. Nice.

I finally saw a registrar at 8.45am who went through all the same questions I had been through with every other nurse and the junior doctor, but at least it was a step in the right direction as she prescribed a more suitable level of pain killers and then came back around 10.45am with a consultant, who again asked all the same questions prodded and poked a bit and came to no further conclusion other than that I needed to be admitted and prodded and poked a bit more until they could find out what was going on.  

Mr Man had to leave just before 8.30am as in true London style the parking attendants patrole the roads round the hospital and you either have to have a permit or pay through the nose on a metre, and so the car had to be moved, plus  Barney Rubble was due home around 10.30am from his own holidays and so someone had to be there to let him in.   I was the left to my own devices with sporadic visits from nurses whilst they tried to find me a bed on a ward which proved rather difficult given I needed a side room as I've recently under gone chemo. Even when I told them I could go private and explained once again in full about the Harley Street option this did not move things along much, and it was 3.30pm that I was finally moved off A&E after waiting outside X-ray for an hour for an X-ray that never happened, onto a haematology ward of all places. Fortunately by this point my consultant oncologist had been contacted and he wanted me transferred to a hospital which he works at and so has the right oncology facilities, and so an ambulance was dispatched and I was taken to the london bridge  hospital with the sirens and blue lights and everything; it only took 10 mins. Just goes to show how bad traffic in london can be as that journey would be normally be closer to half an hour. 

Anyway, on arrival there were more questions, more prodding and poking but at lease by people who knew the back ground, and I finally got the X-ray that never happened at kings, and was booked in for CT scan on Saturday morning, a whole 24 hours later than if I had come here or to. Harley street in the first place. Hmmmm.

So I have been here for a week now during which time there have been more scans, blood tests, pain relief attempts, repeated questions, tummy pain and nausea. I had an ascitic drain for 2 days which removed 5 litres of fluid from my abdominal cavity. I've seen a dietician, an occupational therapist, a physiotherapist and a pharmacist to name but a few. In a weird way the time has gone quite quickly. Now though I have a partial answer and so have a feeling of great relief even though the treatment for the problem is not going to be pleasant. It turns out that even though many of the bad cells which the chemo was successfully shrinking and stabilising, a few are lodged against my small intestine causing a blockage, which means it is not working properly. This explains why I could not keep anything down as well as the chronic abdominal pain I have been experiencing, the treatment  is to rest the bowels along with a course of steroids to reduce the swelling in the Hope that bowels begin to work of their own accord again. You get the gist. This means I cannot eat or drink properly for the time being, and can only have tiny sips of water  or suck on an nice cube until things start moving. If I were to eat or drink then it would just get stuck in my tummy and I would be sick, and if I am sick I have to have a rather nasty sounding tube put down my throat via my nose in order to clear it from the top as well. So all in all it is not brilliant and until this gastric blockage is cleared I cannot have any more chemo or radio therapy to treat the main problem which is a little frustrating but I remain optimistic that once I overcome this hurdle we can crack on and get things moving forward. 

On the plus side of all of this is that the London Bridge Hospital as an inpatient is a much nicer place than Harley street. The nurses here are all lovely and I have a river  view on the 5th floor which you could describe as the penthouse! It is also much more accessible and so I have had lots of visits from friends and family who are able to pop in at lunch times or on their way home from work, which has helped to pass the time. I even had the BF and the old goat taking tIme off work to come and spend time with me which was very generous of them, so thank you to both of you.   I'm also really touched by the number of messages and phone calls I have received from others, and whilst I would love to reply to each one separately I just cannot brIng myself to keep repeating myself hence I thought it doubly important to update the blog so that everyone in Team Nicola could be fully up to date on what is going on.

I promise I won't leave it so long until next time.

The great escape

The Maldives are a beautiful group of hundreds of islands off the southwest coast of India, and they are stunning. Well I say that, we've only actually been to one (two if you could the one where the airport is) but if Cocoa Island is anything to go by then yes stunning is a good word to describe them. We have white sand and turquoise sea in abundance and aside from a brief inclement interlude on day 2 the weather has been lovely. 

This is my reward. My treat for getting through 6 gruelling courses of chemotherapy. Almost as a way to signify the end of the treatment my hair has all but fallen out and I am still suffering from sickness to various degrees but I am determined not to let that get get in the way of a lovely holiday. We chose cocoa island because it was reviewed as a romantic get away, a tranquil spa treat and a luxurious escape from reality. It is indeed all of those things. So, it is a little confusing to try to comprehend why anyone would bring their kids here. Yes, they can snorkel but other than that it must be pretty dull for the kids and very expensive for the grown ups. There may only be 2 young families here but their presence is significantly noticeable when they are nearby. And even when they are not nearby, in fact, as despite arriving a,t the pool very early this morning many of the sun loungers had already been coveted by invisible people who had left their shoes, hats or even life jackets on them.  Not only do I find this very rude but I am also disappointed that the resort staff do no stop it, as others were turning up actively trying to settle onto beds that weren't available.

Anyway, rant over as the big positive of the presence of these families was the existence of a children's menu in the restaurant which meant I could at least get some plain food and in a smaller format, thus reducing the amount of wasted food as well. Whilst I still couldn't eat much, it was a relief to be faced with a bowl of pasta and tomato sauce or a plain margarita pizza than something too rich and fancy. Mr Man didn't go without though which again was a big plus point. After all the way to a mans heart is invariably through his stomach.

It's all a bit of an anticlimax really...

It has been a bit of a strange day, today. I woke up early for me with a strange desire to get up and go to cafe mon petit chou in East Dulwich for breakfast. Most specifically, for some grilled hallumi cheese. This is odd in that I normally don't fancy food in he mornings and also it was a very specific want. So, off I went and since my visit to the wig shop on Monday I have been sporting one of my two new hats which I have now decided are a necessity with the current rate of decline in volume and the excessive cold temperatures we are experiencing at present. The hat thing has shown me though that when it comes to short hair less is more in some cases, as even though it is mostly covered the few bits that tick out at the bottom look terrible and in fact draw attention to the fact I am having follicle issues. So, at some point over breakfast I decided to have it all chopped off and styled short , like a boy. This is a major break though mentally after an incident as a child when my sister had very short hair (although not as short as mine is now) and a particularly cruel neighbour knocked on the or and asked my mum who his little boy was, referring to my devastated younger sister who must only have been about 6 or 7 at the time. For many, many reasons I hope Lil Sis never has to experience even a fraction of what I've been through in the last 6 months, or anyone else for that matter, but due to the one comment alone, the cutting off of all her hair would be the hardest thing to take, and for this reason I doubt she will ever have her hair cut above the jawline again.  I was only a witness to this episode but it has scarred me enough to still recall it some 26 or so years later.

So, I found myself walking into a fairly newly opened hair dressers which is marketed as the clipper for women and children, so I figured that since I wanted a short cut but not really a style as it will be mostly under hats,  and have had all my hair cut off to try and minimise the psychological impacts of it thinning every time I touch it.  It wasn't until I got into bed just now however that I first had a proper good look at it. It doesn't look too bad. It is a bit flattened from having been under hats all day, but as that is where it will stay that is not an issue. And I feel surprisingly ok about it. My new order of cotton hats arrived today with accessories to jazz them up so I have some choice in what to wear,  and Mr Man didn't look too horrified when I revealed my new look this evening on his arrival home from work. 

The plan is that I can manage with hats until after the maldives and when I have an appointment with the wig lady who is sorting me out with a couple of wig options to alternate with the hats until everything gets back follicularly on track. Bonanza! 

So, from cheese to hair to hats its been quite a day.Even if it does feel a little underwhelming to have made such a big decision and action regarding my hair. The positives are that I had enough appetite to eat breakfast, and made an assertive decision, as much as they were that I had such a big chop and lived to tell the tale.  Bring on tomorrow which is holiday packing, and a snowy lunch. 

Sweet dreams!