Well, it’s been about a week and a bit since I got the good news and have had time to process it all. It’s one of the reasons I’ve been so silent of recent. I had a blog ready to publish and it was just me ranting, I chose to delete the original blog and concentrate on a whole new blog. I wasn’t happy with the content so bugger it, re-write.
Kerry had her engineering all hands meeting in Toronto last week. It meant a week without her. She’s only away twice a year for work, I think I was away with work about half a dozen times this year so I have no room to complain. I knew that I had some friends checking in on me.
Sadly, right before Kerry went away, I ran out of cannabis resin, I don’t drive myself, so I suppose I could have gone on an epic public transport journey but I decided against it and I went without.
I lost my appetite completely and barely ate, again, having friends checking in on me and making me eat. It wasn’t so bad, but it was a really short week but enough to know that I need Kerry a lot.
She’s glad to be home, (Me moreso) she gets to work her hours again and doesn’t have to eat out Every. Single. Night!
She also got the wolf back so she’s happy. In her words:-
“Canada’s a nice place, a lot warmer than people make out. Although the temperature is lower on numbers, Newcastle feels a lot LOT colder. Yet another country I have been to but I don’t get to see, I saw the inside of a hotel complex”
She also got to try Axe throwing and turns out, was actually really good at it. She’s going to take me one time as we have one locally, I’ll look forwards to that.
Yesterday, I had to have a review with my complementary treatment people in London (The Oncology Clinic London) It was all hanging in the balance as yet again I have to chase my oncology team for their updates to be passed along to them, they cannot book in a meeting with their consultant if he has no results to work with.
I actually got p*ssed off with them again, they had an email address on record using their domain, e.g. oncologyclinic.com, I asked them to send an email to a different @oncologyclinic.com email and I was refused saying that they cannot send emails to non NHS email addresses.
Don’t get me started! but seriously cannot deal with ineptitude like that.
Anyways, the good news is that I had them snail mail the oncology clinic and they called me day before yesterday to let me know I could have the update with their consultant. That 8 minute meeting was a staggering £200.
The meeting went like this:-
- Although I’m damn near Anemic my kidney and liver function is fine and we can progress with the treatment.
- As I have had no issues or side effects I have a green light to continue.
- The treatment will still continue with the same 4 drugs. Different doses. The maximum doses possible now.
- As I am not feeling pain with either the primary tumour or the mets I am going to attempt to wean myself off tramadol. (What’s the point in taking it if I am not in pain?)
I then got the email the following day with the wonderful news that due to Brexit and the F.M.D. or Falsified Medicines Directive they have had to increase the costs of my prescription from £80 to £120
I hate that I have to pay to save my own life but as I am broke at the moment, I’ve had to put it on credit card for now.
Of course, with Christmas and Kerry’s birthday in January I was rolling in money anyways.
I have recently applied for the Personal Independence Payment (PIP)
I have always been knocked back for every benefit I have ever applied for, I hadn’t bothered applying for it, hopefully if I am entitled to this, the payment will cover it.
If not, then I’ll just have to pay off the £300 slowly.
Kerry’s birthday isn’t until January, but it is her 30th Birthday and you have to have something special. Kerry has known for a long time that she wanted a tattoo, she’s done her research and she decided that Triple Six Studios in Sunderland was the right place, we called up a couple months ago, went in to scope the place out and discuss the tattoo, what’s cool about Triple Six is that they match the artist to your art style. Kerry described the Norse theme, the fact she wanted the birds to be lifelike and this was drawn up.
So I had originally planned to pay for the whole thing, I had been squirrelling money away for this but with Triple Six Studios, it’s a case of you work around their diary, not vise versa. Kerry could get booked in the middle of November so we just booked it in.
Here's what Kerry had to say about it all.
My First tattoo ✅ Took about 6 hours of actual tattoo time.
The ravens are Odin’s ravens – Huginn and Muninn – who, according to Norse mythology, would fly all over Midgard and bring information to Odin. The background symbol is the Icelandic vegvísir – a “magical stave intended to help the bearer find their way through rough weather”.
This was the concept / theme I wanted to run with *before* finding out it had been done to death in the tattoo world. There are no truly unique tattoos in my opinion though, so that wasn’t going to put me off.
It has a lot of meaning to me (cliché eh 😂) and I love it.
Top class artists over at @triplesixstudios, can’t recommend them enough.
Kerry Gallagher 2019
So, how am I doing all in all?
I’m still messed up that things are going my way for a change. I still can’t quite get over it. I have officially watched everything that is remotely good on netflix. I don’t struggle with sitting at my computer anymore and I am getting better day by day now.
I totally understand that the reason there is a break between chemotherapy and surgery is to make sure that I am as well as I can be before major surgery. I get that! but I am sick of all of the waiting around. I am bored as bored can be.
I still don’t have the energy levels I once had. I am tired walking the dog, I overheat badly afterwards.
I’m really fucking bored of being skint all the time too. But the reason I hadn’t posted the previous blog as it turned into more of a rant than a blog so I’ll leave it at that for now.
On the upside, I am weaning slowly off the opiate pain killers. If I need them again after my operations then we will cross that bridge when we come to it.
Today being the 15th November, I have 7 days until I see my surgery consultant, 7 more days till the plan is formulated. It kinda sucks, just the not knowing. I have two plans in December, a trip to Edinburgh for christmas shopping and Star Wars tickets booked. If my operations screw these plans I won’t be very happy.
Mind, removing all the cancer out of my body WILL make me very happy.
Let’s just see eh?
Mood: Bored, Miffed,
Pain: Kidney Pain through the night 6/10, pain in bowel area, non existent
Appetite: I can eat so long as the cannabis oil is about. If I am reminded I will eat.
Weight: 200 lbs 90 KG 14 St
An honest blog about a guy's journey through cancer and chemotherapy 