Easing into 2019…. spots n’all

I take it all your decs are down and put away, house looking empty and Christmas feels like a lifetime ago!

Happy New Year to you all. Our Christmas seemed to fly by, relaxed by the fire, watched films and spent some time recharging the batteries.

New Years Eve saw the start of cycle 3, Simon tried to bring the NYE party to the chemo unit…..

I promise you he didn’t drink the gin, and neither did I…. well not on the ward but once home that bottle had my name on it.

So we didn’t party, or even stay up until midnight (part animals through and through).

This chemo has bought about different side effects, some not visible but one of the side effects of the Cetuximab is a “rash”, this has turned out to be quite a bit more than a rash.

The rash arrives after a few days of chemo and will go within the week for the cycle to start all over again. We knew it would happen but Simon never does things by halves and he certainly has had a reaction. This reaction is caused by the immunotherapy drug and our take on it is if he gets this side effect it must be doing something and so as always that’s the positive of having a nearly 50 yr old husband look like a teenager.

We have through the past three years since Simon was diagnosed tried to keep a positive stance on everything however over the past few weeks we have allowed this pesky disease to creep into the dark parts of our minds and take control. This has been terrible on us both, it’s a long mental game where you have to keep control of your wits as like a controlling demon this disease will want to control you. There are certain reasons for this:

1. Cancer is a bastard, no other word for it!

2. It’s winter, darker days and longer nights. The nights are Simons nemesis. He hates them.

3. Everyone is planning their year, holidays etc and we are again in a hiatus and waiting.

We have the ability to change this, to drag ourselves out of where we are. We both work, yes, Simon is working the days and hours he can. We both are career people and have job roles that we have worked hard to get, but they both have a considerable amount of stress attached to them. However, our work keeps us grounded, in reality it is normal life. Without this we would both be on a different place, probably rocking backwards and forwards on the settee.

We have decided we need to plan, small trips, meals out and treats to break out of the hold this disease has on us. So watch this space and I promise to post pictures of us out having fun……

Onwards and upwards, TTFN