I haven’t blogged for a couple of weeks. There are several reasons for this; for one of the weeks I was busy with the chemo thing and for another of those weeks I was busy with the seeing friends thing. I’ve been tussling with myself about this latter one for a while.
I’m off sick from work, obviously I’m off sick from work. There are several reasons for this too; I work in a school (a lovely, happy, local school most parents would bite their own arms off for their children to attend) and I love my job, but my surgeon, nurse and oncologist have insisted in no uncertain terms that I do not put myself in the path of the very many bugs that accompany working in such an environment. As well as this there are the facts that I’m not my usual energetic self, I get tired quickly and I still can’t do any lifting because of my surgery (and the stupid lymphedema risk but I’m not going into that particular can of worms right now).
The thing is though, it’s not like being off sick with a migraine, or scarlet fever or a hideous cold. When you’re off ill with those things you already know the score, the rules you need to adhere to. So you keep a low profile on social media, you stay in bed to make sure you get better, you drink Lemsip, take drugs (good ones) and sound ill when you answer the phone or don’t answer the phone at all because of course you’re far too ill to even reach it. Illness is much easier to get a grip on when it’s tangible, or common.
Now despite my illness being all too common, the rules aren’t quite the same. In fact, I’m not even sure there are any rules yet which might be why I often feel like I’m breaking them!
Up until my hair went I had no physical sign of my illness and let’s face it, proud as I am of the job the surgeon did on my new boob, I’m hardly going to wap it out on the school run am I?! No, the hair is the thing, or indeed the hat is. Or the scarf, or whatever head covering I happen to be using at any given time. My baldy head is the badge which enables my fully paid up member of the highly unglamorous cancer club. I don’t mind really. I’d rather people looked at my hat and thought ‘She’s got cancer,’ than looked at my wig (I haven’t got one by the way) and thought ‘Crap wig!’. Wouldn’t you?
In my chemo weeks I feel ill, really ill. But in the other two weeks of the three (chemo is once every three weeks) I feel pretty OK. Tired, like I said, a bit crotchety maybe, nauseous sometimes, but OK. Certainly OK enough to go to the cinema in the morning with a dear friend, or to visit a local hostelry and imbibe a little vino with another dear chum, or to go into Bath with my mum and have lunch and a wander and buy a new – bigger – swimming costume to accommodate my ever increasing steroid induced girth. Or, even, to go away for a few days with hubby, boys and more dear friends to Croyde, the reason a new swimming costume is required in the first place.
But this is the tricky bit. I am not at work because I’m off sick but I am having a nice time when I don’t feel sick. I hope you grasp what I mean; I’m struggling to get this out today. Chemo fog has got to my brain and before you say that I was always a bit dizzy I can tell you that it actually IS a recognised thing so at least I’ve got an excuse for the poor memory and lack of way with words.
I’m not at home on my deathbed as much as I would be if I had a different illness so I feel like a bit of a fraud.
Take this week for example. I’m on week 2 (chemo week being week 1) and I’ve been for two (tiny) runs, had lunch at Jamie’s Italian, blogged, had a presence on Facebook and supervised eldest in his production of chocolate macaroons for his Great British Bake-Off Marble Treat. I am also going out two nights in a row, which never happens even if I’m in the peak of health!
It’s not like I’m clubbing or anything (not that I’d want to) it’s a couple of meals out to celebrate two very different things. One, a meet up with some of my oldest friends and another a meet up with my work colleagues to say goodbye to someone who is leaving and will be much missed. I have no intention of missing either of these under the guise of looking ill enough to carry on being on long term sick but at the same time it feels weird to be well enough, but I am.
This can’t be specific to me, I’m sure. I expect if I joined cancer groups I’d meet people who feel the same or indeed people who are carrying on just as before and still doing their work as if no diagnosis has ever been made. And those people would make me feel guilty. What gives me the right not to go to work when other people who are living with cancer keep bravely on?
The other day there was a story in the news about a nurse who had lied about having cancer. She told her colleagues she had cancer and was afforded time off here and there but mostly went into work, consequently gaining a reputation for being a trooper and an awful lot of sympathy to boot. When I read the story I wondered if one of the reasons I’ve been so public about my own cancer was for sympathy and I think probably, in a way, it was. But then my cancer is real so does that make it more forgivable to seek sympathy? I don’t know. All this contemplation is evidence that perhaps I have too much time on my hands. That nurse has been fired now so she doesn’t have a job, but she doesn’t have cancer either. Which is preferable, I wonder?
One of the girls who was coming tonight isn’t coming because she’s got a cold. My dear friend Em was meant to be coming for a cuppa today but she’s got a cold too so I couldn’t see her. I haven’t seen my step sister for six seeks because she hasn’t been bug free in that time, no matter who you are I won’t let you over my threshold or anywhere near me if you’ve got even a little sniffle.
And this is the crux of it. Your cold could be my pneumonia. Your sore throat could be my scarlet fever. Your dicky tummy could be my full on sickness bug and your cough could be my chest infection. My defences are down, my white cells low and my risk of getting ill is far too great for my liking. This is what chemo does. It’s not the cancer that’s the problem; it’s the chemo.
So what happens if I get ill? My treatment is delayed and I have to wait longer to get better, longer to go back to work and longer to grow my hair again. I’ve tentatively booked things in for my ‘good’ weeks, hence two nights out in a row and lunch at Jamie’s, but none of this is set in stone. There’s a wedding I hope to go to, my youngest’s birthday party, my wedding anniversary, other parties, a rugby match and countless other things I dearly want to do, none of which I can guarantee. I can only attempt to safeguard by not putting myself knowingly in the path of bugs either at work or socially.
So if you’ve been one of my dear chums to whom I’ve had to say no, or if you are one of my dear chums to whom I shall say it in the future, please forgive me. Please listen to the song and I shall make it up to you when I am better. Promise.
https://www.justgiving.com/baldys-buddies/
I’m off sick from work, obviously I’m off sick from work. There are several reasons for this too; I work in a school (a lovely, happy, local school most parents would bite their own arms off for their children to attend) and I love my job, but my surgeon, nurse and oncologist have insisted in no uncertain terms that I do not put myself in the path of the very many bugs that accompany working in such an environment. As well as this there are the facts that I’m not my usual energetic self, I get tired quickly and I still can’t do any lifting because of my surgery (and the stupid lymphedema risk but I’m not going into that particular can of worms right now).
The thing is though, it’s not like being off sick with a migraine, or scarlet fever or a hideous cold. When you’re off ill with those things you already know the score, the rules you need to adhere to. So you keep a low profile on social media, you stay in bed to make sure you get better, you drink Lemsip, take drugs (good ones) and sound ill when you answer the phone or don’t answer the phone at all because of course you’re far too ill to even reach it. Illness is much easier to get a grip on when it’s tangible, or common.
Now despite my illness being all too common, the rules aren’t quite the same. In fact, I’m not even sure there are any rules yet which might be why I often feel like I’m breaking them!
Up until my hair went I had no physical sign of my illness and let’s face it, proud as I am of the job the surgeon did on my new boob, I’m hardly going to wap it out on the school run am I?! No, the hair is the thing, or indeed the hat is. Or the scarf, or whatever head covering I happen to be using at any given time. My baldy head is the badge which enables my fully paid up member of the highly unglamorous cancer club. I don’t mind really. I’d rather people looked at my hat and thought ‘She’s got cancer,’ than looked at my wig (I haven’t got one by the way) and thought ‘Crap wig!’. Wouldn’t you?
In my chemo weeks I feel ill, really ill. But in the other two weeks of the three (chemo is once every three weeks) I feel pretty OK. Tired, like I said, a bit crotchety maybe, nauseous sometimes, but OK. Certainly OK enough to go to the cinema in the morning with a dear friend, or to visit a local hostelry and imbibe a little vino with another dear chum, or to go into Bath with my mum and have lunch and a wander and buy a new – bigger – swimming costume to accommodate my ever increasing steroid induced girth. Or, even, to go away for a few days with hubby, boys and more dear friends to Croyde, the reason a new swimming costume is required in the first place.
But this is the tricky bit. I am not at work because I’m off sick but I am having a nice time when I don’t feel sick. I hope you grasp what I mean; I’m struggling to get this out today. Chemo fog has got to my brain and before you say that I was always a bit dizzy I can tell you that it actually IS a recognised thing so at least I’ve got an excuse for the poor memory and lack of way with words.
I’m not at home on my deathbed as much as I would be if I had a different illness so I feel like a bit of a fraud.
Take this week for example. I’m on week 2 (chemo week being week 1) and I’ve been for two (tiny) runs, had lunch at Jamie’s Italian, blogged, had a presence on Facebook and supervised eldest in his production of chocolate macaroons for his Great British Bake-Off Marble Treat. I am also going out two nights in a row, which never happens even if I’m in the peak of health!
It’s not like I’m clubbing or anything (not that I’d want to) it’s a couple of meals out to celebrate two very different things. One, a meet up with some of my oldest friends and another a meet up with my work colleagues to say goodbye to someone who is leaving and will be much missed. I have no intention of missing either of these under the guise of looking ill enough to carry on being on long term sick but at the same time it feels weird to be well enough, but I am.
This can’t be specific to me, I’m sure. I expect if I joined cancer groups I’d meet people who feel the same or indeed people who are carrying on just as before and still doing their work as if no diagnosis has ever been made. And those people would make me feel guilty. What gives me the right not to go to work when other people who are living with cancer keep bravely on?
The other day there was a story in the news about a nurse who had lied about having cancer. She told her colleagues she had cancer and was afforded time off here and there but mostly went into work, consequently gaining a reputation for being a trooper and an awful lot of sympathy to boot. When I read the story I wondered if one of the reasons I’ve been so public about my own cancer was for sympathy and I think probably, in a way, it was. But then my cancer is real so does that make it more forgivable to seek sympathy? I don’t know. All this contemplation is evidence that perhaps I have too much time on my hands. That nurse has been fired now so she doesn’t have a job, but she doesn’t have cancer either. Which is preferable, I wonder?
One of the girls who was coming tonight isn’t coming because she’s got a cold. My dear friend Em was meant to be coming for a cuppa today but she’s got a cold too so I couldn’t see her. I haven’t seen my step sister for six seeks because she hasn’t been bug free in that time, no matter who you are I won’t let you over my threshold or anywhere near me if you’ve got even a little sniffle.
And this is the crux of it. Your cold could be my pneumonia. Your sore throat could be my scarlet fever. Your dicky tummy could be my full on sickness bug and your cough could be my chest infection. My defences are down, my white cells low and my risk of getting ill is far too great for my liking. This is what chemo does. It’s not the cancer that’s the problem; it’s the chemo.
So what happens if I get ill? My treatment is delayed and I have to wait longer to get better, longer to go back to work and longer to grow my hair again. I’ve tentatively booked things in for my ‘good’ weeks, hence two nights out in a row and lunch at Jamie’s, but none of this is set in stone. There’s a wedding I hope to go to, my youngest’s birthday party, my wedding anniversary, other parties, a rugby match and countless other things I dearly want to do, none of which I can guarantee. I can only attempt to safeguard by not putting myself knowingly in the path of bugs either at work or socially.
So if you’ve been one of my dear chums to whom I’ve had to say no, or if you are one of my dear chums to whom I shall say it in the future, please forgive me. Please listen to the song and I shall make it up to you when I am better. Promise.
https://www.justgiving.com/baldys-buddies/