A special blog update to help another cancer survivor

Hi there,

This is not a usual update from me.

I have had an email from a lady named Heather posted on my latest blog update.  She has asked me to help her out with raising awareness for a very rare cancer that she has suffered from in the past.  I feel like it is my duty to help and as I have so many loyal followers I thought why not.

This lady is truly amazing

This is her very brief story .......

I am a wife, mother, and a mesothelioma survivor. When my daughter was 3 ½ months old, I was diagnosed with this rare and deadly cancer, and given 15 months to live. 

Despite my grim prognosis, I knew that I needed to beat the odds for my newborn daughter, Lily. It’s been 7 years now and I feel that it’s my duty to pay it forward by inspiring others.

In honor of Mesothelioma Awareness Day tomorrow, I want to use my personal story to help raise awareness of this little known cancer, and to provide a sense of hope for others facing life’s difficult challenges. 

I would love it you would help me spread awareness by sharing the campaign page on your blog so hopefully your readers will participate! My goal is 7,200 social media shares - your support will help get me there!

Here is the link: www.mesothelioma.com/heather/awareness

Please read this and share if you can.  Lets help this inspiring lady get her message across.

Thank you xx

A hairy situation

So I thought as I am nearly at my penultimate chemotherapy session I would update you all on my hair growth/hairloss situation.

So far I have been very pleased with how everything has worked out.

At the beginning of treatment you feel as if you will look in the mirror one day and not recognise yourself.  I had this fear as I have said before.  But I do believe this is a choice.  You can either give up and let it happen, or you can be like me and refuse to look ill.

(In public anyway.  My poor sister and brother in law have seen me at my worst!)

I went to Look Good Feel Better day last Tuesday and it was fab. They teach you how to do makeup properly, and how to create looks when you have no hair. How to draw eyebrows on etc.

It is a charity that was set up 20 years ago.  My goodie bag was amazing!!

I unfortunately was not used as a guinea pig as I still have hair but there was a young girl, my age who had ovarian cancer( for the second time). 

She had had the same chemotherapy treatments as me. Well there was not a hair on her.  I mean no where! She was as bald as they come. 

I looked at her then I looked at me and thought, my goodness I am really lucky. My hair is really holding on in there!! I still have hair on my arms and legs.  The razor has not been chucked yet!

So I have decided to give you a glimpse into the reality of what it can be like having cancer and still trying to look as good as possible. 

My eyebrows are the first things I would like to show you.  I am going to recommend to anyone who is starting treatment or god forbid anyone who may find out they are too suffering, go and get your eyebrows tattood!! 

It costs a staggering £395 but totally worth it!! I went to Essex.  If I want anything like that done, I go to Essex, they know what they're doing!

Before....

(Excuse the pouty picture but at the time I did not think to take a picture of my eyebrows, not close up anyway)

After...

As you can see my eyebrows before and after are not that different.  I even had them threaded the other day!

I've lost a lot around the end of the brow but because they are tattood, you really can not tell. I use an eyebrow pencil to colour in the few missing at the front and hey presto I have perfect eyebrows and I do not look like E.T!! 

And when chemotherapy is finished they will give me a second coating so they will be more defined. Best money I have ever spent. 

I know that they will all eventually come out but I'm not worried now thanks to my tattoo and my tutorial on eyebrow penciling. 

My eyelashes are really hanging in there! They have become a lot shorter and there are a few that are missing but I think I had a hell of a lot to start with! 

Again I know eventually they will come out but because I have eyebrows I won't look so weird.

Before picture...

After...

As you can see they are little bit more like spiders legs but I can still put mascara on, just!  The bottom ones are holding on too.

My hair on my head is growing slowly. I am still wearing my scarves as they look pretty and also because I refuse to be the colour that is coming out! 

I'm a natural blonde don't you know!!! 

So like I have said before when I can dye it back to its original colour (cough cough) and it has grown a little more I will lose the scarves, not perminantly. It's funny, but I think even when my hair grows back I will continue to wear scarves. They really can look so pretty. 

In terms of relaxation and keeping myself looking as good as I can.  (Remember, I am vain, a trait I get from my father) I am looking after my skin and nails.  I paint my nails every couple of days and thanks to my wonderful friend Nat, I am using nailtique.  A pure protein that helps keep your nails in tact.

She brought in back from LA, it is cheap over there, about $12 whereas over here it costs around £25.

My skin is playing up a bit but I had a facial the other day.  I did not ask if I could, I just went.  I needed a pick me up.  It was the nicest facial I have ever had.  The beautician was very sweet and gave me a head massage instead of the usual arm massage just in case it would cause any harm. I went to  Beauty of Weybridge if anyone is interested.

Anything was better than the horrendous massage I had a few days earlier where the lady poked my face for a good twenty minutes!  No joke.  At one point I wanted to open my eyes and ask if she was playing a trick on me!

A full body it was not.  She stopped at my arms.  I thought that she was just getting ready to do my legs and she literally stopped, washed her hands and said she had finished.  I walked out of there stiffer than before I went in.  I was not impressed.

So all in all everything on the hair and skin front is good. And if in time I lose the rest of the lashes and brows then so be it, I am fully prepared to still look like me and not like an alien. 

It ain't cheap this cancer situation! I'm more high maitanence now than I ever was!! 

Wish me luck, Clive is getting brutally crushed on Thursday. 

Until then.....

xx 

19th September....Finally vertical

So it took 6 days for me to actually recover from docetaxol.  Being up right is a real treat.  They were the longest 6 days of my life!  Being that ill is horrible.

I think the last time I was that ill, I had tonsillitis and was in bed for about a week.

It really makes you appreciate being well.  It is like when you have a horrendous hangover and you swear you will never drink again.  You are pleading to feel better but the ache doesn't go away.  It is only the next morning when you feel good again that the relief sets in and you feel amazing.

That is how I felt. (Why do I always relate everything to alcohol? It's slightly worrying? I truly may be a lush!)

So whilst I am up and about for this week I intend to make the most of it.  I am back to work, albeit for 3 days but still it gets me out of the house.  And I am off out with the girls on Saturday night for an italian.  Anything to enjoy the freedom of feeling better.  Until next week when I will be shot down again and run over.  I wait patiently for the truck.

Maybe I wont be so ill next time.  Yeah right.  I am not that lucky.  Although I do not mind now.  I have two treatments left so if I have to spend a total of 2 weeks in bed then so be it.  I have all the time in the world when I am recovered so I can cope with it.

The one thing that I have realised is never to take your health for granted.  To all you readers, appreciate that you wake up every morning feeling good.  I can not wait to just feel good again.  To look good again.

To be able to just go and get my nails done without worry.  To go to the hairdressers and have my hair done, to go to a salon to have a massage.  Even to take such silly things like paracetamol for a headache without questioning it first. It is strange to think what we do without even blinking yet when it is taken away you realise how simple life is when you have good health.

My mum asked me the other day what I wanted for Christmas.  To be well is the only thing I would like, oh and for santa to give me a leg up on the old hair.  I would like a bob for Christmas!

Too much? The way my hair is growing it may not be impossible! 

I still have eyelashes, they are a lot thinner but they're holding on. I never quite appreciated how lovely my lashes were!  My eyebrows are still in tact.  So much so that I'm gonna get them threaded later! 

Knowing my luck the next treatment they will all fall out so that'll be a waste of money! Although gotta look as good as I can whilst I still have hair! And enjoy it too. Again I'll miss plucking and waxing when it's gone. (If it goes) my hair is a tough bird, it's hanging on in there!! 

I will keep you posted about the hair, I know how much you all want to know! 

I must just mention that my tumour is nearly non existent! My lump was very prominent just above my right nipple. It literally stuck out, it was hard and ridged. 

Thanks to the chemo it has become much smaller, softer and basically disappearing. I am so happy. 

So long Clive, your being incinerated!!!

Ha I'm winning but in the end I always do! 

Xx 

10th September 2013.....the truck has arrived

Docetaxol you are the devil.....

I was going to leave this update a bit longer but then I thought, why?  You want to hear my story so here it is, all of it.

I write this from my bedroom, where I have been cooped up since Saturday night.  I have been horizontal for so long I am now on a slight wonk!

The truck arrived at full speed ahead.  When they tell you 'it's like a truck' oh boy do they mean it.  It literally means exactly what it says on the tin!

I should be pleased.  No lying ey?  Well 'Clive' is driving that truck so fast he is hitting me, then reversing, then hitting me again.  I can see him laughing.  Laughing at my pain, the bastartd.

He knows this is hurting.  The fec was just too easy he thought.  I let him have his laugh and this evening i'd had enough.  Time to stop wallowing.  He will not win.

So how am I actually feeling?  Well combine the worst food poisoning, fill the bowl with the flu mixed with the worst heart burn and exhaustion just for good measure.  Mix it together and that it a tiny bit of how I am.

I have not eaten in 3 days apart from some  Jewish chicken soup which was made for me by Sarah. Their penicillin as they like to call it.  It really works.

On the plus side, (there always has to be one)  I am thinner.  I know, I know its not the be all and end all but a girls gotta feel good about something.  And yes I am aware that when I breath again I will put the weight back on but let me revel, just for the night.

All in all I have never been so ill.  I was scared to admit this at first.  I still, in my mind wanted people to think wow how strong, how well i'm coping but then, why would I lie?  I will have good days and bad days and these are my bad days.

All I can say is thank god for a spray tan!!  My friend came over and laughed at how well I looked.  It's the tan.  It works wonders.  Although I think in a years time they will all say to me, by the way you really did look like shit!!  I'll cope.  I look in the mirror everyday. I'm not stupid.

I am still not upset or low.  I am still in good spirits.  I'm just bored of feeling like death.  (maybe not death, wrong thing to say) but you get it.

My strength is knowing that even though right now 'Clive' thinks he's winning, I know he is not.  He is a bully, trying to push me down, but I told you all,  he picked the wrong girl.

My friends have been amazing.  I have had messages everyday from so many people just wishing me well.  That is my strength.

I am on so many pills that if you turned me upside down I would rattle.  Do not put me through an xray right now, I do not look good.  They better be doing something right.

I have the pleasure of an injection once a day in the fat of my stomach.  Thank god for the love handles.    It is to boost my white blood count.  I let my sister loose with the needle.  It is a scary process letting her jab me.  I'd better not piss her off!  It really is a mind field of all the pills and fluids that goes into making me better

I really should look at the labels before putting stuff in my body but right now even lifting my finger hurts.  I did not even know that I had any feeling in my finger tips.  Well I do.  I have feeling on the bloody hair on my arms!!

So as I have felt so awful I decided, as any girl does, to shop.  So I have booked a holiday to Dublin, tickets to see Miss Saigon and I have purchased a new Jimmy Choo handbag off my friend.  All in all a very expensive day but hey I've gotta smile through the pain somehow.

Me.....a shopaholic?  No, just expensive taste.  'Clive" hasn't really changed me.

xx

7th September 2013 only 2 left!!!

Where the hell has these past few months gone?  At the very start of this process it looked like a very daunting and very long journey.

I will not lie, it has been but the time has flown by.  I remember a few girls I have had the pleasure of 'meeting' through twitter and have become an amazing support network saying to me, the time will simply fly.

I did not believe them until now.

I am now starting to understand them.  I can not believe that I have had 4 out of 6 chemotherapies and my next one is the penultimate.

It seems so totally unfathomable that I actually have the potential to see my finish date.  Not my chemo finish date but my actual finish date.

My doctor has already told me that I will have another meeting with my surgeon Isabella to have a date in the diary to look forward too.  It really is all too much, I actually well up at the thought.

Yes my emotions seem to be coming back.  Don't get too excited, just a few!

They will come pouring out of me when I hear the words I have wanted to hear since I was diagnosed. (well one will hope so anyway!)  My friend asked me the other day how I was really feeling.  I say the same to her as I do to all you fellow readers.

I have absolutely no idea and I do not think I ever will.  This will all be a dream one day.  It will always stay with me and with my charity that my friends and I have set up it will always be beside me, I just do not know if I can ever really explain my feelings.  I do not think it is such a bad thing either.

So as for my 4th chemotherapy session.  Well so far it has been easier.  My herceptin was a piece of cake.  No side effects, no bad reactions, not sickness, nothing.  A complete breeze if you will.

My docetaxol, the new drug, well not so bad.  I have not had the deathly bone ache yet.  This will come, that is a promise. I was all hooked up and ready to go, my veins are holding in there, good body!!

I have stocked up on epsom salts.  An old fashioned recipe that my grandmother used to use for joint ache and something I have been religious about this whole time I have had 'Clive'.  It, I think has helped a lot.  A long hot soak in a bath with these little gems will do the trick.

For those of you just starting out I do recommend.  It has helped me to relax, and to sleep.  Do not get me wrong, I have had the odd night where I have not slept but all in all I can't complain.

It is a powder that is pure magnesium.  It is a gentle detox for aches and pains and helps release toxins out of the body.  All you need is a cup full, straight under hot water and have a bath for a minimum of 15 minutes.  Buy the pure epsom salts, not those mixed with anything.  They do not work as well.  Any fancy chemist will do them, but not Holland and Barrats, they are mixed with aromatherapy.

I am also waiting for a district nurse to come over and inject me with some unknown drug to help my white blood cells.  So far she is a no show.  Oh good, I will have to drive myself to the hospital later.  Hopefully I will stay on my side of the road and not fall asleep whilst driving.  If you are near the A3 at around 4.00 pm, stay clear.  A mad woman in a blue polo will be all over the place.

This whole experience so far if I am allowed to be a little sentimental has taught me a lot about myself.

I have learned to not sweat the small stuff.  I have always been the glass is half full kind of girl but now more than usual.

Looks are still important but it teaches you to really love yourself more than you would think.  It is teaching me to really love life and to enjoy and look forward to little things, like a glass of wine with a friend.  Simple things in life.  One day I would like to think I will share my love of life with my soul mate.  I do believe this will happen now.

So far I have learnt that I have have better friends than I could have possibly ever comprehended.  You girls know who you are.

A family that has showed me true support, kindness and a structure of love that I could have only dreamed of.

And strangers that have become like family without even knowing them.  Again you know who you are and thank you.

I know I am jumping the gun a little but why not.  I have only the future to look forward too.  I may be feeling so exhausted that even typing this paragraph is making my fingers hurt.

I have not eaten properly in 2 days because the thought of food makes me feel ill and no matter how much make up I put on I look and feel like death.  But hey ho, thats life.  It will all be over soon.  (God only really knows when.)

But for now I am in a good mood and I intend to stay like this.  Well at least until the truck comes and whacks into me, but I will keep you posted on that.

Talk soon.

xx