8. Results

January 2016, Chorley, Thornton-Cleveleys

“I have this strange feeling none of this is really happening. Like I'm standing far away from myself. Like nothing is real. Have you ever had a feeling like that?” A. Manette Ansay, Sister

Back to Chorley to see the specialist nurse with the wide smile and sparkly eyes who has to deliver the so far bad news. The type of news that is so utterly life changing.

Usual pleasantries exchanged. I'm impatient for the results. No time for cocktail chatter.
Muji notebook and pen in hand. Alert, focused with fear running through me like a stick of Blackpool rock.
"So we can confirm the lump is sarcoma. The type you have is leiomyosarcoma, a soft tissue sarcoma." 
So I've gone from not even knowing what sarcoma is to not being able to pronounce or spell the sub-type.
"The CT scan also revealed that you have simple cysts on your liver and significant diverticulitis." 
That was like someone saying in the midst of carnage, you've run out of tea bags. Important but perhaps not right now.
"It's a high grade tumour. It's fast-growing so we need to act quickly to remove the tumour"
Breathe in. Breathe out.
I asked to see the scan results. She turned the screen so I could read.
I'm feeling hot. I can feel sweat forming on the back of my neck. My tongue is sticking to my teeth.
"So there's no cancer anywhere else?" I asked.
Breathe in. Breathe out.
"No. I thought you'd already been told that it hadn't metastasised" she said.
How would that have happened? Who could have told me if she hadn't?  My surgery were lying low since the referral.
Liverpool. Surgery. Aggressive. Appointment. They'll look after you.
The words drifted my way. The details weren't important. I had the headlines that's all I needed.  Eager to make a run for it and let my family and friends know that it wasn't so bad after all.
Suddenly I was very lucky. Yes I had cancer but it hadn't spread, it wasn't blocking the function of any organs in my body. Joyful. Celebratory in an absurd way.
The emotional seesaw tipped me over the edge. I started sobbing, the tears flowed, I swallowed it all. That's what I've been doing all my life, swallowing the tears. 
I blurted out, "I've got complete mind mash and feel like I need some psychotherapy" The appointment incidentally came through on 15th April - 3 months later.
The wide smile narrowed and compassionate eyes took centre stage. How often had she replayed this scene?
She referred me to Trinity Hospice.
Alarm!!
That's where people die.
Is there something they're not telling me?
Do you see what I mean? 
Complete mind mash.
When did it start this highly charged emotional response to the hint, to the sniff of, to the word, Cancer?
We fear it, we dread it. It strikes at the very primeval core of us.
Is it the Media? The high profile of the Cancer Research organisation? Everywhere you turn Cancer images and words are there. The marketing is prolific. 
Images of wastage. Images of my father. We all have at least one image of our own. Sending love to you all right now.

9. The word's out

Thornton-Cleveleys, January 2016

“Let us be grateful to the people who make us happy; they are the charming gardeners who make our souls blossom.”  Marcel Proust

The word's out.
The grateful wishes come flooding in with cards, flowers, gifts,phone calls, visits. You know it's more than a cough and cold when you have to ask your mum to nip out to buy some more vases. It's like a florists on Piccadilly station.

Cancer evokes such an emotional response in us all. It's like there's no control, and no way to tame it.

Over the last year, I've found that people respond in different ways:

• THE FROZEN. The don't-know-what-to-say people.
• THE INFO-GIVERS. The sending-links-galore people
• THE PRACTICALS. The keen-to-shop-clean-garden-and-mend people. 

 All gripped by fear and motivated by love?

Chris, an good friend from Uni, sent me 'Mum's not having chemo' by Laura Bond.
A book I'd recommend as a great source of information. Sounds gimmicky but it's not. It's well written, resourceful and entertaining and especially if like me you don't know where to start and are feeling a bit overwhelmed. Understatement.

10. Family Funeral

January 2016, Askam-in-Furness

“Happiness is having a large, loving, caring, close-knit family in another city.” 

George Burns

I've noticed that I interact with so much more love and tenderness and acceptance these days.
Some veils have lifted. I never knew they were there. Or was it the tears I'd shed that had washed my eyes?

Early February, I headed to Askam-in-Furness for my Uncle John's funeral. 
What's going on in our family this year?
It was such a shock. He died of a heart attack. So vibrant so active.
My Auntie Eileen, my mum's sister was so brave yet deep pain poured from her eyes more poignantly than her tears.
A wonderful couple now snapped in two.

I saw relatives who I only see at funerals, weddings, and christenings.
I felt a sadness that a whole generation was passing and we had hardly any contact with each other.
We hadn't got to know each other's children. The next generation in our family.
Who had been the lynch pin that held us all together? Did they forget to pass on the baton? Did we all just get lazy and content ourselves with our parochial lives?
I spoke with Auntie Amy and cousin June for quite some time. I felt we really connected this time rather than exchange platitudes and pleasantries.
Is it me who has changed?  Is it their sympathy for me that has opened up all our hearts?
Who knows. 
One thing feels clear, it felt very good. I loved being with them all. It took me away from the illness that had become my obsession. 

And then... Surgery on the horizon.

11. Be Happy

January 2016, Chorley, Thornton-Cleveleys

“You will never be happy if you continue to search for what happiness consists of. You will never live if you are looking for the meaning of life.”  Albert Camus

My youngest came home from London for the weekend.  Full of sunshine.
I woke early and went to the beach. I love it down there especially when the tide is out and I can walk barefoot along the water's edge.

A burst water pipe behind the boiler. 
Garage and laundry flooded.
Happy that Mike was home to help. My partner was away working that weekend.
No water. No heating. No shower. No bath.
First world problems.

The British Gas engineer said, " This boiler's cost us over £600 in parts! It'd take us years to get our money back from you. It's costing us too much to keep you on contract." Blah blah blah blah blah.
Be happy.
There's more to life than service contracts.

Whilst on the subject of service contracts, 
I hereby declare that I will never default on my new contract in caring for, nurturing,checking, putting my amazing body number one every time.

It's been through a lot and I didn't realise it was struggling so much.
I just took my health for granted. 
It generally bounces back so graciously and effortlessly or so I thought.
Just as when injured physically or emotionally, we bear the scars, so too does our internal cellular and visceral mechanics. Scar upon scar with choice upon choice. Neglect after neglect.
Then we are surprised when illness emerges. Or perhaps I should say I was surprised.
The sarcoma nurse told me the leiomyosarcoma was nothing to do with me.
" Just bad luck" 
I don't agree. I had played a part, albeit unwittingly and it hadn't been that obvious to me that I was putting my body under great stress for a long time.
I had felt more fatigued than usual but surely that was because I'd been working ridiculously long hours doing what I love doing. Helping others with their wellbeing.
And there lies the irony. Miss Wellbeing has cancer. 
Days, weeks, months, years advising, guiding, and being totally outward focusing.
I was so intent on making a difference to people's lives. I forgot about my own health. Never having time for anything. Losing the work/life balance that I so often talked about. Being so busy I would forget to eat and then suddenly feel so hungry I'd grab the first available filler. 

Generally my diet was good. When people discovered I had cancer, they said but you eat so heathily, how is it possible? Diet is massively important but many other factors play a part in this illness. I'm no expert but subjecting your body to long term stress is one of them. Ignoring warning signs like irritability in the gut, crash and burn phases, etc. 
Oh and I'm not sure if one can be genetically pre-disposed to developing sarcoma, but there's been a lot of other different types of cancer in our family on both sides. 
There's a lot of uncertainty and mystery surrounding sarcoma because there hasn't been enough research due to it's rarity. 
Oddball me? Never.

12. Take Control

January 2016, Chorley, Thornton-Cleveleys

"The most common way people give up their power is by thinking they don't have any"   Alice Walker

Shit. 
Feeling really disempowered with all these whirlwind hospital appointments and tests.

I decided to try to take back some control. 
After reading Laura Bond's book, "Mum's not having chemo", I started researching how I could help myself.

Two days virtually non-stop research. So much to wade through. Conflicting advice. Miracle cures with bicarbonate of soda, with turmeric, with apricot kernels with with with with... it was sending me bonkers.
Completely overwhelming. I cried oceans of salty tears.
Take action now girl.

I decided that I would start by boosting nutrition levels.
I had stopped having any sugary foods at New Year when I suspected that the lump on my leg was malignant. I knew that cancer was an insatiably hungry sugar monster.

Prior to my diagnosis on 12th January 2016, I had also started looking at how easy it was to get a wide range of organic foods.  I chose Ocado which proved to be a godsend after surgery. I knew it was better for me to have organic because I had read a lot about the effects of pesticides, insecticides on the nutrients and cause of soil depletion. 

I wrote another list. It was all organic and included items like turmeric root, salt deodorant, flax seeds, herbal teas, apricot kernels, vitamin d/k2, niacin, spirulina, wheatgrass, sodium bicarbonate... the list was endless and expensive but much healthier than my Christmas list. Not as much fun.
I also started to ditch beauty products full of chemicals and to replace with organic. Well actually my friends were happy to have them.

I wanted to start with a green juice fast or feast whichever way you'd like to look at it.
I discovered that I needed to step up the nutritional quality of my juices and not only use organics but also buy a really good juicer. 
I already had a nutribullet which I had used for juicing for some time, but research told me that now I was sick, my body needed much higher levels of nutrition.

I chose a Green Star, twin-gear masticating, juicer. Great juicing, the machine regurgitates the pulp which comes out really dry which is a good sign for a juicer, but I wouldn't choose it again. It is so fiddly to clean, especially when you're juicing at least once a day.

I started my juice fast/feast for 8 days in pursuit of a super detox.

The first couple of days were the most difficult and then after that it was plain sailing. In a weird way I actually enjoyed it. I noticed increased vibrancy that shone through my skin, hair, nails, and eyes. Well maybe not so much my eyes.
Actually my eyes are bright but there are huge dark shadows underneath. Toxicity? Shock/stress? Both?

13. Bye bye chubster

February 2016, Thornton-Cleveleys

 

“Pull up a chair. Take a taste. Come join us. Life is so endlessly delicious.” 

Ruth Reichl

The hardest part for me was to end the juice fast.
Are you bonkers? Yes I probably am.
It was Sunday.
I made a roast dinner for all of us.

I served their dinners and then brought my green juice to the table. It was as if I had placed a knife to my throat.
A sea of shocked faces.
"You can't just have that, mum!"
"Don't you think it's time you ate something?"
I tried to reassure them it's full of nutrients.

None were happy and the next thing Mike returned from the kitchen with a plate with oatcakes and hummus for me.
Surely the juice was more nutritious? Was it the absence of a plate that caused a ripple of unease around the table? Social mores.

In that moment I realised I had lost a lot of weight after 8 consecutive days of green juices. Perhaps it was that that had caused the ripple of concern?
At this point, my goddaughter Alex called round. She wears her heart on her sleeve. There was a look of shock on her face.
"You're looking really skinny Auntie Doo!"
Others nodded some pursed their lips in silent agreement. She was unwittingly the spokesman for the group. It made me smile.

I don't want to lose any more weight. It doesn't feel like my body. I've always been a chubster.  However, I'm having difficulty eating. Not in an anorexic way. I'm simply highly anxious in a foods-that-cancer-doesn't-like-way. I'm worried that I might slip up and help this lump to grow.

That night I cried a lot in my partner's strong protective arms. He said he'd care for me forever. I felt safe. So much warm love between us.
I realised that I hadn't really cried since my diagnosis three weeks earlier. I'd had a couple of very brief outbursts but had swallowed them before they broke the floodgates.