The Unwelcome Guest

A bright beautiful autumn day sees me cycling down Albert Embankment, past MI6 and MI5 and then along by the Houses of Parliament where Big Ben is currently boxed in black scaffolding.

The turbid Thames is on my left and I’m thinking how lucky I am to live in the greatest city in the world when out of nowhere one of those huge junk trucks screams by me threatening to snuff out my stupid daydreams. Pay attention Jim and try to get to St Thoms’ in one piece. Locking my bike in the hospital car park I stride in.

The trouble with me is I’m nosey, I like to know what’s going on and I’m a bit pushy. So sitting in my gown waiting for the previous patient to complete his fraction, (This is what medics call individual treatments) I see the radiographers looking at computer screens which I assume show the luckless cancer sufferer’s prostate. Well this looks interesting and of course I want a look and as the team are a friendly bunch I walk over to take a dekko. This brings a sharp reaction, sit down Jim, you’re breaching patient confidentiality. Suitably rebuffed I back off before making my way to the doughnut.

For me this is fraction eleven and despite having decided that on balance I was going to have nothing to do with side effects, a few are kicking in. I need to pee several times a night, my bowel movements are, how to put this delicately, fluid and today during treatment such is my need to pee that it actually becomes painful. Now whether this is the product of nearly a dozen doses of RT or the result of the rays actually hitting my walnut sized prostate I’m not sure, but if it happens again I’m going to seek medical advice. Not nice, but still no signs of tiredness, though as I have more than 20 sessions to get through there’s still plenty of time for that.

Coming out of the RT suite I put my foot in it again. I thought you, dear reader, might be interested in what my RT team looks like when they’re at work, so I bust in like a walrus, whip out my trusty iPhone and take a snap. This is not well received, and I’m given strict instructions to delete it. Given these kind people are firing their ray guns at delicate portions of my anatomy I think I’ll comply. So as much as I’d like to show you my young and attractive team that pleasure is going to be denied. I think I’ve annoyed them enough today.

But I’m not done yet, I still want to see how they monitor the treatment so I’m hoping to persuade them to take a picture of their screens while I’m in the doughnut. Then I’ll stop being irritating, honestly I will…fat chance. 

Time chunks

When I was first diagnosed with PC, like everyone else I was scared, I didn’t know what it meant. Cancer packs a big punch, it’s the scariest bully in the medical playground, did I have weeks, months or years to live? Could it be cured, what treatment would I receive? Reading the Facebook Groups I mentioned last time I see that my experience exactly mirrors most others who get this vile disease. As time goes on you quickly learn, unless your diagnosis is particularly severe, that there are effective treatments and you may have many years ahead of you. Always bearing in mind that the Unwelcome Guest is a slippery bastard, an assassin in your midst, who can’t be trusted.

It’s not just your physical health that cancer messes with, it tends to trample on your mind too. Here’s what I do to keep my head in shape, it’s not the result of any professional counselling, but it works for me.

My treatment comes in chunks, first came the diagnosis then the start of hormone therapy and then a gap during which not much happened. That gap was the wonderful summer just gone, which I thoroughly enjoyed. Of course the threat of cancer was there in the back of my mind, but it wasn’t a constant scourge.

My RT comes to an end at the beginning of November and after that there’s another time chunk until the appointment with my oncologist in January of next year. So from November, through Christmas I’ll enjoy myself and not get too stressed. Of course stress will start to emerge just prior to my appointment, fearing the result of the inevitable PSA test, but I’ll leave that to another day.

The trick is to live in the moment, enjoy the here and now, and don’t get too stressed about the long-term. I’m 64 now, so thinking long-term is for the birds anyway.

Having just re-read the above I see  it comes across as obvious hippy bollocks, but It’s true for all that, so I’m going to let it stand.