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Strange this time last year I was thinking Christmas 08 was my last and yet here I still am, poor hubby more thoughts on what to buy for Christmas presents! ￂﾠ So why is it that I have started a total hatred campaign for Christmas ￂﾠ I tell myself maybe because I went through Chemo twice over the Christmas periods, or is it always wondering whether this one will be the last ￂﾠ Whatever it is I really have gone off the festive season ￂﾠ I went shopping with Lorraine today to get me in the spirit, it didn't help although I did pick up a couple of things ￂﾠ Remember when shops use to only sell certain things and department stores were full of interest with wonderful ideas ￂﾠ These days nearly all the shops are filled with clothes and more clothes, statues, nice home wares seem to have disappeared, the age of either electronic gadgets and clothes fill every shop and there is hardly any room for anything else ￂﾠ M

Back 3 days and already the aches begin, is it the warmth on the bones or the fact that I don't do anything on holiday that affects it ￂﾠ I still felt stomach yak (But again not so bad, even though we didn't eat till 8 30 each night) It was good to be in the heat, although I know I jinxed the weather again as 2 1/2 days in the clouds came and we had storms ￂﾠ The temperature was still in the early 20's though so walking around was ok ￂﾠ It is pretty flat around all the popular resort areas so for breathing and walking Kos is ideal Why I have been away an appointment has come for my next CT Scan, 1st November, and a Breast Cancer screening appointment ￂﾠ That is going to be fun due to the lump I have - Iￂﾠam wondering whether they will just do my right and forget about the left! I should count my lucky stars that I am still here and able to do the things I pretty much want to and after catching up on my fellow meso's blogs it made that point ...

We have heard of the guidelines to dealing with Mesothelioma and patients, yesterday Chris Knighton emailed over the following report and has asked us for comments ÿ Â

Although my nights have still be interrupted by this rotten, no lets be honest here, nasty hateful cough, I did wake up feeling much brighter, although Gary again let me over sleep and it was District Nurse Day ￂﾠ All hands to the deck because then it was rush rush rush ￂﾠ Ok, slow rush for me, faster than the snail I have become but still extremely slow in anyone else's book ￂﾠ I decided to ask one of my work colleagues to come to the house and do some bits with me, stuff that I know she can do and keep the job ticking over nicely while I am still stuck at home on my sick leave ￂﾠ Will I ever get back into the office I ask myself, but as germs keep piling up, my cough doesn't improve and my energy is pretty crap somehow I can't see me returning before Christmas, as Chemo is looming and we all know what chemo does! ￂﾠ Heather brought another nurse with her, the last time I saw this nurse was 30th September when I thought I was going to die and they had ra...

It's Sunday and again I woke up feeling sickly, had a few dizzy turns again yesterday and Friday and not sure whether BP is going down again I'm putting the sickly feeling down to the hernia after the operation, how envious I feel of people waking up each day and not having an ache or feel sick etc I know I shouldn't complain as after all I am alive and once I get the first 2 hours over I seem to feel a lot better The couple of days before radiotherapy I had 3 mornings of feeling normalish - I say normalish because the bones still ached and my kidney area was tender but I felt good I think I said I smiled for those few mornings which gave my hubby a near heart attack A few of my meso cirlce are going to submit stories for the website and I am so pleased at some of the responses I have had I suffered worst case scenario (apart from dying that is) and I am sure many of you will not have had such a rotten deal, at least I hope you didn't It's been agr eed...

After another early dawn with Bear I was both over the moon and annoyed to find him crashed out at lunchtime in his favourite place (the downstairs shower), snoring his head off making up for all the lost sleep ￂﾠ Yesterday we finally had breakthrough and I was able to groom most of his body, the minute I moved to his shoulders he took off leaving me holding the comb ￂﾠ We also decided to go tablet free yesterday apart from his antibiotics, I am sure that the tramadol didn't do him any good at all apart from putting him in more distress ￂﾠ Everyone I know who has taken them have all experienced dizziness or feeling strange ￂﾠ He has also managed to scratch his chin with his paw and made quite a few scabs bleed but at least the majority of the green puss ones have gone I must admit with running on empty I have felt a lot better, my mood isn't so hot - rather on the if I had something in my hand I could throw it at you phase but physically I don't feel so achy and tig...

Yesterday morning I woke up soaked with sweat and felt a little out of sorts, the rain was lashing down and the sky was grey so it was a good day to work from home ￂﾠ I only ever updated the blog once or twice a week but during the course of these changes in my body it seems the blog is getting more and more updates than ever before ￂﾠ Maybe my last journals ofￂﾠ my life that for not other reason I want to share ￂﾠ Joyce came over about 2 15 and I had an aromatherapy massage, I just had my legs and shoulders done, the worry of the last time close in my mind ￂﾠ I don't want that bile back ￂﾠ Luckily it hasn't come, not sure whether drinking so much milk is helping ￂﾠ A glass or two while I watch tv from 8 till 10 then I take a small glass to bed with me ￂﾠ I do wake up with a very mouth, I think this is due to the water tablets, and milk doesn't quench it but then it has worked so far with the bile ￂﾠ I did have the sweats quite a lot during the da...

I woke up Friday morning feeling crap ￂﾠ My overloaded, heavy stomach, and chest breaking ribs were painful ￂﾠ I had had sweats too ￂﾠ I pulled myself round and off we set for Darlington and the Woodlands private hospital ￂﾠ I was nervous, to say the least ￂﾠ I was taken into the Ultra Sound room and put a gown on, I asked if hubby could come, she said no, not at the moment ￂﾠ I told her I would need him to hold his hand ￂﾠ She actually seemed a little unfriendly at first, so I went and got changed ￂﾠ The ultra sound started once Dr Dean came in, he remembered doing my stomach test and asked how I was doing ￂﾠ I told him about the ascites ￂﾠ He told me he hadn't been told he was supposed to be removing any fluid and wasn't organised to do it ￂﾠ I was gutted, although I felt terrible I knew it was the fluid that is making me feel this way ￂﾠ He showed me a picture of the fluid, my liver has moved away from where it should be and a large black pool stoo...

I feel quite lucky that I have a couple of professionals interested in how I am doing, infact I would say I am very lucky ￂﾠ I sent my scan off to the usual crowd and was pleased to receive a very early reply from Dr Andy Owens ￂﾠ He does make me laugh with some of his comments and I find that a real comfort and a more enjoyable read ￂﾠ It's good to know that my right lung is looking normal, if a little expanded to take over some of the work from the left, but at least it is doing it and no trace of that ugly meso in their ￂﾠ The left he is also pleased with, although my air leak shrinkage has nothing to do with me taking deep breaths its shrinking due to more fluid!!ￂﾠ I was pleased to read he likes the new grouping of my ribcage, I wrote back and told him it will be a new form of fashion in years to come and everyone will want to have their ribcage re-aligned ￂﾠ It was good to know that he feels this is why I still have so much pain and discomfort but alas that will not i...

Just got the report and it is good and a little bad ￂﾠ Progressive growth but slow on previous noted recurrence ￂﾠ Unfortunately the blighter has created another tumour in the right lung and a few new ones in the left ￂﾠ No sizes were given so will wait to receive a copy and do a little measuring myself I must be the only person who doesn't know what staging I have been throughout this journey ￂﾠ When I visit my oncologist next week I am going to try and find out what I was marked down as, if at all, after surgery in 04, before surgery in 09 and now ￂﾠ I would think now I am a T1 if that but it would be interesting to know about 09 ￂﾠ I know when I look back at the photo's it looks a lot but that question remains could I have held back ￂﾠ When a surgeon tells you that maybe in 4 months you won't be around, and he is a good surgeon, you have to go with their knowledge and to be fair I did feel rotten at the time ￂﾠ Also UCLA told me the same in August and November, tha...

I have been asked to be a judge for a essay competition on Mesothelioma, if anyone is still wanting to apply forￂﾠa school scholarship in the USAￂﾠyou can reach it here ￂﾠ So yesterday I sat and read through the essays that have been submitted to date, better start now before the competition finishes ￂﾠ This will give me an idea of what to look for and if I have to re-read the ones I have alreadyￂﾠread it doesn't matter as with my memory I will think I am reading them again for the first time ￂﾠ Yesterday I had a really bright day, what with Gary and I flying solo with the draining then Liz came over on the afternoon and we finally, yes finally, finished editing The Vial of Darkness ￂﾠ I just need Lauren to do the final art work for the cover and hey I will publish book 2 ￂﾠ I am not sure whether to bother with Kindle as I only sold 16 and am still waiting for the USA funds to be paid ￂﾠ I must get sorted and send a cheque to Chris for the sale of the boo...

What a week, the warmth has really cheered me up and I do feel better for it ￂﾠ Yesterday was carer's day but with so much going on I knew I won't have the energy left to get to it and be ready for hols on Tuesday, that is one of the things that annoys me now, not being able to run from one thing to another without thinking about it ￂﾠ I hope it was a good and informative day for those who attended I also received my scan on Thursday, the password came Friday so last night I had a quick look ￂﾠ I look so deformed, my heart is somewhere over my left, my right lung being so big ￂﾠ I can see the singular lumps but not sure what is thickening and what isn't ￂﾠ Could that top arrow point to the mass now outside my body (I did the arrows but they didn't come out right)ￂﾠ or is it that lighter grey underneath andￂﾠmy three arrows below point to small raised lumps ￂﾠￂﾠ This lump has really grown, but overall I don't think to my inexperienced eye that the mes...

We are all coming up to the time of scans again, the 3 or 4 months fly past ￂﾠ I still can't believe some still only get an x ray every 3 months, which we all know doesn't actually show much, especially with meso Hubby sat me down on Saturday and discussed how I am doing on the pregabin, not good in his eyes, and to be honest not good in my own mind ￂﾠ Nevertheless I have increased the dose to 2 to see if it helps, then maybe think about dropping them and going back to increasing my daily pain ￂﾠ We don't seem to have much choice pain or tablets! My breast screening is on Thursday, that is surely going to be fun and I do hope that they excuse my left side completely, although if they do just an ultra sound of it maybe the tumour might show up ￂﾠ This time 3 years ago no one thoughtￂﾠI had much time left, it still amazes me that I am still here even though I started out with mixed Epithelioid andￂﾠSarcomatoid cells,ￂﾠ thankfully I believe only the Epithelioid ones h...

How often have I ranted at everyone insisting they get scanned every 3 months, how many times do we hear that the meso had started again because we werent' getting checked out every 3 months and had no idea how long it had been sprouting its ugly spurs, so how stupid was I to let my specialist tell me I was having too many scans and really I should only have one every 6 months ￂﾠ Infact, I wasn't even going to be given on after 6 months if I was waiting for my specialist I would still be waiting ￂﾠ A couple of weeks ago I said to hubby if I didn't have a date I was going to get back in touch with my old (privately paid) oncologist to see if he could get me one ￂﾠ Thankfully, my GP rang me on the lead up to Christmas and asked when my next scan was, I told him I hadn't been given one and he was non too pleased so it seems he organised the one I just had himself!ￂﾠ So my friend has returned, the areas that were suspicious and brought to my attention by Dr Abtin (USA...

I can't believe it, these last 9 days have been fantastic, at last the corner has truly been taken and all I can say is wow!ￂﾠ You forget how good it is not to be tired, achy and waking up isn't that awful feeling which takes hours to go away I've been up, coffee, shower and work, even staying longer and longer ￂﾠ Maybe I might get back into the habit of coming home for lunch then going back to work for the full afternoon ￂﾠ At the moment I'm arriving between 9 and 9 30 then leaving about 2 30 to 3 00, by the time I get in I am starving We went up to see baby Bear and Belle on Saturday and it was great, they both nestled up and when I held them they would nestle under my chin and were quite contented to be cuddled ￂﾠ Better make the most of these times as when they grow I doubt I will be able to cuddle them on my knee ￂﾠ We also met rescue Sam, what a beautiful 11 month old he was ￂﾠ Full of excitement, but so big he was bigger than Bear's Dad ￂﾠ We met...

This time last year hubby was driving me down to Sheffield, neither of us taking about the future but concentrating on the road ahead ￂﾠ In the shower this morning I was also thinking about my last holiday and the terrible heart attacks I use to have ￂﾠ It's been a year and two months since my body saw any proper sun and that was November when Dr Abtin blasted the tumour in my upper chest I am feeling strange with myself, I am blaming the reduction in morphine as I am sure it is doing something, the sweats have been bad and I guess that's what reducing must do, after all you get them when you start on the stuff along with meso and the menopause!ￂﾠ My pains don't seem any worse but my chest does feel heavier ￂﾠ Have dropped them again by another 40 a day but I have a feeling this may be a little too soon so may have to go back up by 20 only monitoring this will tell No one ever really gave an explanation to the heart attack kind of pain, it use to come on and I w...

Boy oh boy has the last couple of days flown in our household ￂﾠ Monday Gary drove down to see his mam before her forthcoming operation today ￂﾠ So we are on tender hooks now, we have no idea what time her surgery is and whether they will manage to remove all that nasty cancer sitting inside her ￂﾠ The good thing is she is a very fit lady, a golfer who never misses her games and some one that likes to walk for miles ￂﾠ Apart from having this condition she isn't at all under the weather, even the chemotherapy didn't put her off her game over the last 10ￂﾠweeks ￂﾠ I am sure you will all be sending a healing vibe out to her on my behalf ￂﾠ On a thought that Mavis reminded me, asbestos has been linked to ovarian cancer ￂﾠ Just shortly after Gary was born his mother had a problem with one ovary and had it removed, I just wonder if it has something to do with asbestos, after all his dad made snowballs with the stuff in the factory he worked in at Hull ￂﾠ I did mention th...

Saturday I was extremely tired, in fact I bet the sofa was as tired from me sitting on it all day as I was being there ￂﾠ Funny though how sitting around can make you that much more tired ￂﾠ I even had to have help getting up ￂﾠ I am not using my legs enough so am losing the muscle in them, which I know I need to do more exercise and build up the strength in those calf muscles and of course the thighs ￂﾠ I have pin sticks for legs now! ￂﾠ I did manage to do a little wrapping, I helped Gary, we only got a few done, butￂﾠ at least they are wrapped, although I still haven't got my postage ones done, nor have I actually finished writing cards, I had thought I had finished but realised I found another list I had missed completely, many of which are the meso community ￂﾠ He left me alone for a few moments in the dining room and as I stood my legs gave way and I fell to the floor, boy did I knock my arm on the side table!ￂﾠ So that was that, back to the living room and ...

The week has had been ill, pensive and normal ÿ Â