Light in the picture...ode to a small campsite in Talybont, Wales.

Sunshine through the curtains,
Glinting in the green.
Early morning campsite.
Happy, hopeful dream

Taking in the noises,
Children start to play.
Babbling excitement,
Starting a new day.

Colour true & banners
Encampment stripped & bright
Streets of vivid canvas.
Nylon, shine & light.

Tinkling stream & birdsong
Whistling kettle fare.
All awakening joyous
Life just everywhere.

Packing, awnings,sorting
Towels drying in the sun
Beautiful world this morning
Hold it close we are but one.

So for all I have to go through
Every dark and lonely time
Here within in me is  this campsite
Held together yours & mine

Key focus of the picture

Its all about perspective; the width of your vision, the depth of the view and how things relate one to another. The news was not good from the oncologist; not the worst but pretty grim.

PET & CAT scans and bloods show primary vaginal cancer has now spread to four sections of my lymphatic system. Prognosis incurable, life shortening, but treatable. manageable, treatable, containable... all words in the echo of that room. My husband in shocked silence and a small voice in me ,resigned and peaceful.

"We can start chemo", "Radiotherapy is not suitable", "we'll try a double drug chemo", "3 time 3 weeks", "hospitalised treatment" ~  all phrases that altered the perspective, changed the focus and limited the view.

Like a Spielberg movie, the scene changed, shots lost clarity, held intensity and shocked. Seems I am to star in my very own blockbuster...' Mortality'

All those blue jigsaw pieces...

Tomorrow I go back to the oncologist to get the prognosis & all the test results.

I had thought it was to be a straightforward, though hardly desirable radiology 'Planning Meeting', but as of Tuesday that was changed. Now the  specialist wants to see me. Now logic says it could be good news or just that he needs to feed the results back to me, but my heart is heavy in anticipation of bad news.

Call it  anticipation, anxiety or adrenalin I'm finding it hard to settle. So what do I do with my time? Weeding, well that reminds me of  the effect of radiotherapy killing the cancer at source, pruning I'm thinking surgery and  spraying, oh no chemotherapy.

Hence I resort to my trusted remedy tidy & write; put my house/ mind in order & sort my thoughts. Strange how perspectives change! My mother used to clean windows when she was anxious, Ron mentally solves small practical problems, whilst others listen to music, solve puzzles or play computer games.

When working professionally, I used to bemoan my 'avoidance behaviour', until a colleague  and psychologist on a behaviour project pointed out that it was not a negative behaviour, but 'Displacement Therapy'. So here I am being clever & logical, whilst I just thought I was being afraid & wasting  my time.

Fearful Friday has  just become Future Friday...bring it on!

Euphemisms and Medical Descriptions

Medics have a strange use of vocabulary, it sets them apart from the everyday world.

Now I am full of praise for the NHS in every sense;  family, personal and current, but medicine itself is a funny old affair. At this current  time I'm intermittently under the care of  oncologists, radiologists,  dermatologists, anaesthetists & gynaecologists, not to mention general practitioners, specialist nurses, nurse practitioners, practice managers & district nurses. And they all have their own way with words.

I started as, 'concerning', a phrase my GP said was  medic shorthand for 'we are concerned we don't know'. Then I became a 'woman of mystery', not slinky clothing & secret moonlit meetings, no, but shorthand for 'we don't understand whats happening'. Later they were really 'excited' at finding the primary cancer and, because it was vaginal cancer, I then became an ' interesting rarity'.

Since then I have had consultants describing pain as 'exquisite' and the final operation as 'beautiful'; isn't that how they describe diamonds and football respectively? 

Now I could be very flattered being; ' mysterious, exciting, exquisite & beautiful', but they are not referring to me in person. As any good patient knows, even with the  great advances in medical training & people skills, the medics passion is the puzzle that is you or more importantly your ailment.

My husband has been told, by a surgeon, that  he had a 'gall bladder like a bear' and  the GP (who he rarely visits)  'you bring such interesting things', for these read ectopic heart problem & testicular cancer.

So there it is, strange vocabulary for a strange and noble profession and the rest of us can only stand in grateful linguistic  confusion, now that's the real mystery. Patiently patient while they practise their practice

Humbled and happy...the weeks of recovery

Its been a while, but I have kept writing, its been my sanity; scant but holding me firm. The operations was a success, well at least in terms of the surgeon, who next day proudly showed his work to the assembled medical gang who followed him around.

I was in a lot of pain & had been all night. Being unable to take any of the standard morphine or heroin based heavy painkillers because of a previously diagnosed opioid sensitivity, paracetamal just didn't fit the bill. What followed were days of sleep and wakefulness, not necessarily at the right times and Ron ever vigilant to my needs.

Friends & family were great and the social media flooded with well wishes and greetings. My window sill was full of beautiful cards; pictures of flowers, sunlight and hope. Phone calls & texts, deliveries of gorgeous flowers, my parents visiting jointly...a first in forty divorced years. Just all quite amazing. It was very humbling how much care was shown, how people tried so hard to give me strength, engender hope and simply share human love.

My legs swelled, lymph oedema, a usual but distressing side effect, which medics and district nurses tried to aid. So the days turned into weeks and slowly, and with a lot of help I have been improving.
The great news is they found no further cancer in the lymph nodes they removed
Happy days... feelingloved.

The Waiting Poem : Inguinal Lymph Node Dissection...snappy title

I wait again, same clock, same time.
Fingers silent, no reason, rhyme.

As though my life so measured be,
By test & scalpel remedy.

How much they cut, how deep the pain.
I long resolution & crave the same.

So this will happen, that might be.
Just get me done, operate on me!

I'll wake in confusion, confirming my name.
But let it be over & not come again!

I'll give all their honour & smile sublime.
Please let me be healthy...live this life of mine.