Hope and a prayer needed

Well my bloglets,

Less than a week since I last wrote and I feel that I have come full circle.  On Monday after submitting two essays and having a wonderful cancerversary, I felt happy and light and relieved.  I didn't realise quite how tense, that's not the right word, but how much of an impact my cancerversary has.  This is not to say I will not celebrate and acknowledge it.  It is too much of a major day to have pass by without recognising it.  And maybe as time carries on, the reality of being able to replace it with a day that I celebrate as the day I came off treatment is fading as a reality, as a hope.  I don't know.  My check-up is in a couple of weeks.

I have allowed myself a few days off and to relax.  So today, I feel fucking exhausted, as I did yesterday.  I have been carrying myself forward with so much stress, adrenalin and caffeine, I feel utterly spent.  I need to do some work but it can wait.  A not good result today has upset me, but not as much as the fucking harsh feedback which I am going to flag with the University.  Just because the essay does not seem good to the marker does not mean no effort was put in.  And I am struggling at the moment.  I know I can't have extra marks but it would be nice if the fact that I am doing a fucking stupidly intense degree whilst on fucking chemotherapy would be acknowledged rather than told that the essay was obviously rushed.  I feel like telling the marker to write the essay with no guidance at all from the module staff, do other work alongside including treating patients and having chronic fatigue and see how fucking well they do.  Twat.  It's moments like this when I think fuck it.  I'll drop out.  Give a shit.  Why should I feel like this about myself?  It doesn't do me any good.

Yesterday I decided to come home for the weekend.  The realisation of exhaustion hit me and home was all I needed.  I have also found out a wonderful friend of mine is suddenly really quite ill – the latest scan shows the cancer has spread from a couple of tumours in his brain to all over.  Fucking cancer.  I'm not massively religious, more spiritual, but I am praying for him and ask that you will too.  I don't know if he reads this, or if his wife does, but the admiration I have for them cannot be put into words.  And another friends mother is awaiting surgery. Cancer is everywhere at the moment and it would be quite nice if it fucked off.  I am so lucky to be here but the guilt sometimes is overwhelming.  Guilt that I am ok when others aren't, guilt at the cost of my drugs, guilt that I whinge when I am fine.  This is not going to kill me.  The side effects yes, are a bit shit. Chemo plague is in full force at the moment.  But really.  What right do I have?

My throat is so tight at the moment, I will process this and let go - as I should of my marks.  I want a 2.1, but does it really matter? One of my lovely twitter lot writes about hope.  They have faced adversity but do it so gracefully.  In a much better way than I do…  Hope is needed at the moment.  Maybe I will get that tattoo I have talked about for 10 years, and it will say hope.  I carry it with me always, even if it sometimes gets hidden behind a cloud.

And so I go, focusing on hope.

XXX

7 years

Well my lovely bloglets,

Today is a bit of a strange day for me.  My 7th cancerversary.  Can't believe it. 7 years of treatment and over the last few months it has really been taking its toll.  My degree is insane and the work load is monumental.  I was talking about it on Thursday in a small group session I have once a month called Personal Development where we can bring issues/problems/things that have been playing on our minds from clinic and our interaction with patients or each other.  I spoke about burnout because that is where I am.  Burnout.  Dropping out sometimes is a very tempting thought, but I have not got this far to do that.  Deferring modules is not an option as we are, this year, the last of my course.  I never understood why final year students left this close to the end.  I now get it.

Whilst I was talking about this and the fact that today is 7 years, I got upset, which didn't bother me, I warned everyone that it would happen and it's fine, but I also experienced the most surreal feeling.  I got very hot and sweaty and felt that every cell in by body was vibrating and felt very shaky and jangly.  After this I experienced a calm and the realisation to allow myself to let go.  It must have been a massive emotional release that I have been needing to do for a while.

In December I saw my personal tutor and she said I never ask for help.  I have been thinking about this and it's true.  I feel that I must be strong and make sure that everyone knows I'm ok so they are ok.  I need to trust that everyone is ok and that I can talk about how I really feel without upsetting anyone or feeling that I am constantly whinging.  This space, where I can write helps me so much, but I need to talk.  To stop bottling it all up.

I feel a massive relief today, I have finished two essays and I have, I think, got a 6 week extension on my dissertation which means I can breathe a bit.  I can take this week off and look after me.  

I never thought I would still be on treatment now, and I don't quite know how to ....I don't know what I am trying to say.  Yesterday is was my friend Jacks birthday who died a few years ago.  He was so strong and positive and yet it wasn't enough.  I don't feel like an inspiration at the moment.  I feel fed up and sick of it all, but yet so grateful I am here.  Guilt.  It's a fucker.  

But I'm so happy I am here and able to so what I do.  I have such a wonderful time on so many levels and am surrounded by love which is why I celebrate today.  Today is about recognising all the good that has happened over the last 7 years which is huge.  The list would be so long, I'm not going to put it here.  I have met so many and done so much and as I said on Friday at a meeting at the Teenage Cancer Trust, I wouldn't change it.  I would not remove and edit out my cancer. I would change parts.  I would hope to be treatment free by now.  But the cancer diagnosis, it stays.  It would be nice if all the cancer cells buggered off by now.

Today is about all of you and a fucking massive thank you to you.  You who read this, who watch my video blogs, who say wonderful things to me, who keep me going, who smile and laugh with me, especially at my slightly dark tumour humour.  You, because it is you who keeps me going.  So with all the love in my heart, thank you. And especially to these four people - My Daddy , Mummy, Claudia and Milo.  My wonderful family who make me, me…

So wherever you are, take a minute and smile, because that is what I shall be doing,

With love and laughter,

XXX

Stuck on the can't instead of the can.

Well my bloglets.

I don't know where I am going with this.  It's 10 to 11 and I should be asleep.  I've got an exam in two days that I definitely don't know enough for, and then two essays to research and write and hand in by 10am on the 20th alongside patient research, being back in uni for 1 and a half days a week and trying to have a bit of a social life and time for me.  The essays are two weeks late due to my extension.  I am forever playing catch up with my uni work.

I'm not sleeping well at the moment.  It is taking between one and two hours to go to sleep, then generally I'm fine, but this morning woke up with a start at 7.30, which would have been ok, if I didn't need so much sleep. And I do.

Over Christmas, whilst it was amazing to be at home with Milo and Claudia and her boyfriend Rob, the whole family together, I didn't sleep well.  The stress and worry of an essay I was doing then and then not having enough time to do the next two and revise.  And the pain returned in my legs.  I feel very unemotional and unattached whilst writing this which surprises me because this is not how I feel.  There were a lot of tears over Christmas being so fucking fed up of being tired.  And getting angry with adverts for doing a 'dry' January. Because not drinking for four weeks is so fucking difficult.  I also feel that I am not acknowledged for everything that I have given up and sacrificed.  I'm just the one who doesn't drink and it's no big deal.  Maybe now it's not, but when I stopped 5 and a half years ago it was.  And I didn't announce it to everyone or ask for money or not go out because I would be surrounded by booze.  I just did it.  As with all the other changes I have made.  My 20s have been stolen from me.  And maybe my 30s as well.  It is yet to be seen.

One cousin has just had a baby and another is pregnant with their second and I ache to have a baby.  But will I be able to?  When will I be able to?  I know that my treatment by no means makes me the only person to question this.  My life is so controlled by things out of my hands. As is everyone's life to an extent.  I know.  I just.....I don't really know what to say or how to say it.

I have spent the majority of today in a fucking awful mood.  I'm so fucking tired.  My face aches and my eyes burn and I hope to god I pass my exam on Wednesday.  More often than not a little voice creeps into my head saying it's not worth it.  The stress and the exhaustion that this degree causes cannot be good for me.  Can I really get to July?

And then on the bus on the way home as the fucking Victoria line was closed between Warren Street and Brixton, my darling Daddy sent me an email entitled -'This is you Baba!  XXX' with this picture.

 Maybe I need to give myself a bit more credit and recognition for what I have done and what I can do, than

what I can't. I don't think I am amazing or strong or brave or a fighter or any of those other words associated with a cancer diagnosis because it didn't kill me.  I am just trying to deal and cope with this the best and only way I know.  By being me. It's just seems that at the moment, the exhaustion and the can't out weighs the can.

With love and a hint of laughter,

Me, XXX