Getting my self sorted

Yesterday I collected jessie , she is my new alter ego, she is sassy , sexy , and strong, I may introduce you to her if I think you can handle it.

I am typing this whilst sitting in the day room of St Luke's hospice after having a long session with a very excitable man call Frazer who is the local psycologist and runs hypnotherapy session for people with  cancer and their family's. It helps you cope through this long and possibily hard journey, not that this is everyone's bag , but those of you that know me well I am open to other options out there that  will help me .

I have come out of my session quite relaxed so if anything else I have benefited from that ,

I want control over the things that I can control, like my feelings and my hair ,(which by the way I'm defo cutting off on Saturday), so that is when Jessie will come to light.

I think I will defo come for more sessions of this and see where it takes me , if it help me keep my tigger around more and holds off the Eeyore's , that will do me , and every one is lovely and spending time with me , for me not this bloody growth .

It has been suggested to me to embrace the chemo and become allies in this fight against this bloody thing and between us we will join forces and kick is ass to kingdom come ......

Monday melt down/tinsels and baubles

Emotions riding high today, I was getting ready to go for my echo so I can go on the trial starting Friday , and I have a break down and I'm in floods of tears,
Not really sure why, may be because my treatment day is getting closer and yes I'm nervous and probably scared of the unknown side affects that I will have .

May be because since the first time I was told I had cancer I have been on such a whirl wind that I have not cried at all , every one else seams to have done enough for me .

So I have a really good cry and got massive hugs and cuddles from my ever loving husband and my beautiful daughter.

After we were talking (once I had composed my self) Mike said some thing that has stayed with me all day and made me smile :)

"He said he loves me for me and all the other stuff is just baubles and tinsel , my tinsel will grow back and I can have plastic baubles, he said once you take  them off the Christmas tree you still have a tree, "

I have felt loads better today after that this morning and I know it's healthier to have these moments than just to suppress all the feelings,


Today I also got a call from st Luke's who offer free holistic treatment to help you get through the chemo and I'm going to see a really nice guy called Frazer on Wednesday who will help me deal with the stress of my first chemo treatment and hopefully through the others

TRAMADOL HAZE

I spent four hour at the christie on Friday having a medical done so I can go on the trial drug they have offered me as we'll as the chemo,
I thought I was only going for a blood test, how wrong was I ,
They took blood and other bodily fluids, poked me , made me sign about 20 times agreeing to all sorts , took temp , blood pressure x-rays, and now sending me off to get an echo on my heart on Monday, but up to know I have passed all the tests, would you believe I am classed a fit and healthy lol
One thing that is has done is made me relise that its getting closer and I'm getting a little bit nervous , I don't think its having the chemo, or even the hair loss, it's the not knowing how sick I'm going to feel, I hate feeling sick , I want to carry on as much as I can , for my family and I don't want this to take over my life , I just want it to be an inconvince for a few days then pull out the other side. Ready for the next dose.
I have decided to shave my head next Saturday as this is the day after my first chemo, the reason behind this is when you have chemo and you hair starts to fall out around day 14 your head becomes that sensitive and your hair falling out hurts, so if I do it before all that starts I have control on how I'm going to feel.
I asked mike but he feels he is not able to do it and that is fine with me , I also want Olivia to help if she wants to .
And before you all start to offer you sadistic load of buggers I already have some one that has jumped in to that space , rather quickly as well now I think about it .......... ???????
Oh back to the tramadol
I asked them for a pain killer that I could use at night as I had had my paracetamol dosage in the day, so they gave me tramadol,
Well I only took a massive 3 over 6 hours and I have felt shit since then , and I think It totally ruined my night last night , I lasted an hour and came home got in my pj,s and went to bed at 10. What a let down , I did feel spaced all day ,
Only just been able to do this as I feel a lot less spaced now , put it this way not bloody taking any more of them.
Picking my wig up next week as well , lets see how often I wear that,
Struggling with tigger today .

I HAVE NEVER BEEN SO HAPPY TO HAVE JUST BREAST CANCER

Wtf. I hear you ask........ Well I have not been totally honest with you guys, the reason for this is I had no idea how to tell you................
as I blogged I had a CT scan done at Leighton , the results were not good , I was told that I had secondary cancer of the liver, not sure if any of you know but secondary's are not curable , they can be kept at bay and they can be liveable but inevitably you will be living with a cancer that could flare up at any point and you have to start treatment again, these results were given to me by my Macmillan nurse at Leighton........... We were yet again totally devastated , all I could think of is Olivia is only 6 and 10 years of marriage is not long enough and how long do I have left with my family, anxiety rose it bloody ugly head again, we were back at square one , I was not allowed to go on the trial and I did not know what treatment I was to have.
i was not telling Olivia ...........
as it happens my oncologist (big boss) had not seen the scan and the day after I got a call from my nurse saying, in not so many words , that the oncologist is not happy with that diagnosis and may be i should not have been told before she had seen it and that she wants to do an MRI as the christie with her team and with people that know what they are looking at as that is what they do every day.......
mike and I spent the next week till my MRI going through all scenarios , did they get it wrong, is it so big that it need major treatment,
so on the Friday just gone , I had my MRI, back to waiting again for the results..
trying to put it at the back of my mind and crossing everything I could possibly have they have it wrong,
we tried to carry on as normal for Olivia
well today I have had a call , do I want to go back on the trial ,
and what Leighton saw we're blood vessels NOT cancer
who would have thought blood vessels in my liver !

like is said in my title
I HAVE NEVER BEEN SO GLAD TO HAVE JUST BREAST CANCER
there is now a light at the end of the tunnel again
so I start my chemo and trial on the 2nd November
I WILL BEAT THIS Wiht the help of my family and friends
xxxxxxxxxxx
massive tigger day, I'm now ready to go out on the piss on Saturday night xxxxxxxx

WIG SHOPPING STAGE 2

Today I have been stage 2 wig shopping with Naomi @ .http://www.discretion.uk.net/Home.htm .....she is a bad influence on me.


I get a choice of two wig shops that I can use my £95 NHS voucher(they are far more expensive than this)
so after trying on rod steward and Anthea turner last week I wanted to see if this place had any other styles


This is how it goes , we go in and she asks me a load of questions,
what lenght ?
what colour ?
straight?
curly?
so the last shop I went to seamed to be mostly blonde or colours of.... And I only got to try on the short ones not really sure why!
This time I'm going in and making sure I try on as many as possible , So then Sarah (what a fab name) starts to pull boxes out , and then the marylin comes out ?? , she says I know it's blonde but try it on and I can get in a different colour if you like it ...................
OMG that has to be the funniest ,and one of the worse wigs I have tried on ,
I might go back to primarni and get the pink one,

tears were running down my face from laughing, Naomi is killing her self and Sarah is trying not to laugh and trying to be professional , but that was it she went as well , and from that point she tried to get me to have the marylin with every offer , she even offered me chocolate to take it ...............but there is not enough chocloate for that
because of the fun we had I'm more inclined to get them from Sarah, I felt more comfortable as she read the situation and my personality really well , and for some thing that is a really hard decision to make she made it more fun even though it has a serious side as well.

eventually I have decided on 2 styles and I am just waiting for them to come in to the shop.

p.s i have also treated my self to some expensive makeup , The Christies moto is "look good feel better" and im goin to try my hardest.

xxxxx

TIGGER DAY

I was told that there are two types of cancer patients ........Tigger's and Eeyore's................
LIMBO.
Thing have been up and down in the last week, due to a Ct scan that did not pull up what they needed,iIl now have to have an MRI done at The Christie, this will be done on Friday,
because of this we have been back to square one,as we do not know what treatment I'm having and when ,as it was all relaying in the scan results, I had got my head straight and was getting my self ready for treatment to start this week.......but hey ho. It is the NHS
WIG SHOPPING.
Well all I can say is OMG
I made an appointment at an "approved NHS supplier" as I get a voucher with some money off , I would get it free if I did not work,
Rod stewart , Anthea Turner , Kevin ( off of brook side) all appeared while I was there, and for some
Unknown reason most of them she had is stock we're blonde.
One even looked like my dog Charlie ...............

I settled on one and have seen another one that she is ordering for me........not blonde
I'm still not convinced about them, but like a wedding dress I have to go and have them refitted once I have no hair ,
I may just stick to head scarfs and wooly hats which I have been buying and practicing wearing, all I know is that I will shave my head before it starts to fall out as I need that little bit of control in my life. Typical it's going to be winter and my head will be bloody cold, I will be able to sympathise with you follically challenged out there.......
BEEN IN TO WORK TODAY
Decided to get my shit together and make a trip in to work , as I have not been in since my diagnosis.
I was nervousness seeing my work colleagues and friends , as I did not know what type of reaction I would get,.....
You were all fab and would you believe it yes I did eventually get fed up of talking about my self lol
I felt like a pop star as people kept coming up and giving me a hug,and wanting to talk to me, at one point I was asked if I was starting to charge for my hugs, I did think about it as I could spend the money on another wig and not a green Mohican as mentioned by some one.............
I really enjoyed coming to see you guys and I loved my hugs from every one , It makes me feel loved and missed and not just a statistic which you can feel like going through this...
I'm hoping to come to see you all again during my treatment, may be in my wig or scarf, you never know , it may happen
P.S I can not believe how much my blog has got people talking and even some of my top bosses know about it, and a massive positive today is some people have started checking their breasts because of me, and men should do so as well, as we all have breast tissue, some just have more than others............................... no comments lol

I WILL BEAT THIS ......................PMA

Hi ,
I'm Sarah martin, I am 41,I am married and have been happily for 10 years to Michael,I have a 6 year old daughter Olivia,
3 weeks ago i have been diagnosed with breast cancer
a little bit of back ground :
After a long struggle(20 years on and off) with cancer my mum passed away the end of August 2012, she was on her 3rd round of the big C and it had spread to her spine and brain , she decided to refuse Chemo at this point as she said she would rather have a good quality of life she had left, than spending it being ill due to chemo that was not going to cure her anyway......brave woman my mum.......
We had her funeral two weeks after she died, it was a Friday (it was nice as funerals go , it was so my mum) then on the Sunday i found a massive golf ball lump on my left breast, I knew it was not normal as I did check regularly over the past few years,
NO MATTER WHAT AGE YOU ARE PLEASE CHECK YOUR BREAST, MALE AND FEMALE.
I had tried to get on the early screening but due to reasons i do not understand i was refused.
When i found it I had no idea how to say that "i had found a lump" to my family especially my husband because of what they have just been through with my mum, so that Sunday i was very quiet and hardly spoke,
my husband just put it down to me missing my mum.
That evening i told him and that was when the roller coaster started,.
Monday morning i was in the docs , who referred me to the hospital, trying to reassure me that 8/10 lumps found are not cancerous and all my symptoms , pain , lump movement, lump size change all pointed to cyst of some kind
The hospital were really quick and the following Friday I was in having a mammogram, ultra sound, core biopsy ouch!, then the waiting started , I would not get the results for 10 days after that ..............
this had to be the longest 10 days of my life , why could it not go fast like my annual holiday seams to.
I could not eat for 3 days , i felt sick , i seamed to sleep but not heavy and the second i woke up i could feel the anxiety build up from my toe to the top of my head
The dreaded day came... my husband and i sat in silence waiting for my name to be called , i was the first one in , the doc came in followed by my mums Macmillan nurse, she smiled and winked at me, the doc sat next to me and said you have two malignant tumors.
I was dumb struck, Mike was distraught,I did not know what to say , and for some strange reason i did not cry, even though my husband broke down . I remember the doc saying "you were not expecting that" the hell i wasn't.
I asked questions like,
ME: how big are they?
Doc : small 8mm and 14mm small
ME: treatment ?
Doc : 6 doses of chemo
i have a choice of where i wanted to go to , i chose The Christie as that is all they do and the care they took of my mum pending staffing levels was amazing.
a few other question were asked but its all going into a haze now
I now have the task of telling my beautiful 6 year old daughter , that mummy has the same thing that grandma has just die of............................
I needed back up , we had tried talking about it when she was out of ear shot, buy as 6 year old do she always came in when we were crying or sad, she knew something was wrong but she never asked,.
I asked my brother Nick and his better half over for moral support ,i needed to tell her about mummy.
I had done a bit of trawling on the Macmillan site and a lady had put a video of how she told her kids about it ,
So i told her in language she understood, she took it well ..too well
then it was bed time , she went upstairs and broke down as i had said its breast cancer and she had heard brain cancer (which i what my mum had, in the end)
after a lot of hugs and reassurance that mummy was not going any where, she went to bed.
The day after it was the Macmillan coffee morning so i decided to go with hubby to the hospital one,we had collected over £700 from mums funeral to give to them as she had requested.
My BCN (breast cancer nurse) Debbie is fab, she was worrying that it might remind me about mum her being my nurse as well,but it helps as i do not have to explain it all over to some one new,
she gave me a book for My daughter called "mummy's Lump" and bugger me its almost word for word how i told Olivia .. i was well proud of my self.
since then i have stayed away from google (its the worse this you can do,Google stuff) and i have stayed on the good sites like Macmillan , breast cancer care,
I have been poked , pin pricked , flushed with die, bloody taken.
****************
It is now 3 weeks later , i feel the best i have felt in years,eating , sleeping , very few anxiety attacks, i have had my hair cut shorter as it will fall out anyway and its the best hair cut i have ever had bloody typical....
i have agreed to join in a drug trial for future generations of cancer patients to help ( may be it will help me as well, it cant make it any worse)
i have arranged with my future sister in law to go Wig hunting , i have bought scarfs, hats and have been practicing how to wear them and how to do my make up when all my hair is gone,
If you see me do not ignore me , come and speak, i dont want sympathy, Hugs are nice, i will talk about it if you ask me to , or you can just load your worries on me , it gives me a break from mine,
i'm going to keep this blog going as much as i can on my ups and down of treatment.
so you can keep up with me journey...........