Lab Rat in......Life

I think my last few blog posts may have seemed quite depressing and that some people might think I was being quite negative, but hopefully you can all understand why. I was worried that I was constantly complaining, but after my last post a friend going through their own cancer experience (one that is much more emotionally challenging than mine I might add) thanked me for what I’d written and helped me to realise the importance of being as honest as I can be in this blog, otherwise what’s the point? So I'll continue to try and just hope that I can get a good balance. At this time of year when the dark nights draw in and the weather becomes cold and wet I know that people usually start to feel a bit down, it’s pretty common. Since returning from Tanzania and spending my time in the north of Scotland I have to say it doesn’t quite affect me in the same way. Living near to the equator when every day is virtually 12 hours all year round you start to miss the long summer nights and sh...

I haven’t written a blog for a while because I’ve had total writers’ block. I’ve been trying to figure out why.   T he title of the blog has been in my head for some time, back to life, back to reality. In fact, that tune is constantly playing in my head, but the process of getting back to reality is not quite as simple as I’d thought and so I suppose I’ve found it hard to sit down and write about that. I don’t want to complain, I do try hard to stay positive, but I’ve found out that it’s actually much harder to do that now I’m finished with treatment than it was when I was in the middle of it all. Everybody told me that this would be the case, my BCN, the people at Maggie’s , friends that had already been through it and pretty much everything you read online, but somehow, I still wasn’t prepared for it. In August I had a lovely holiday with my family, it was just what I needed, although it was still a bit of a reminder that I wasn’t my ‘normal’ self. I was tiring easily, parano...

I'm not quite sure where to start this blog post, but then that's not really surprising because I'm not really sure of anything at the moment. I think I mentioned 'chemo brain' before and I can tell you it's a real thing and it's not just a problem during chemotherapy! Some days I just find it so hard to concentrate or focus on one thing. I find my mind drifting off but I have no idea where to. It probably doesn't help that my sleep can sometimes be disturbed, which is quite a common side effect of various cancer treatments added together with stress and grief you can probably understand why I'm not totally compos mentis! It's for this reason that I finally had to take a break from work. At the beginning of radiotherapy I was trying to continue working but it felt like a battle every day just to get myself into the lab never mind concentrate on any kind of work. Eventually I had to admit defeat as I realised forcing myself back when I wasn't...

When I start to receive an increasing number of messages asking how I am and how my treatment is going, I realise it’s time to write another blog post, but this is one I’ve been avoiding writing. I woke up this morning with a Queen song going around in my head, “Inside my heart is breaking, my make-up may be flaking, but my smile still stays on” In my last post I said “The last few weeks have probably been the most challenging ones since starting chemotherapy”, well sadly the day after writing that I found out what could be more challenging than Docetaxel when my mum passed away suddenly. I don’t really want to go into too much about this as, firstly, it’s still very painful, and secondly, it’s not just my personal bereavement but that of my whole family that I need to consider. As this blog is about my personal ‘Cancer journey’ (sorry, cheesy I know but the best way I can describe it), I’m just going to talk about the impact of losing mum in regards to my treatment. I h...

I have to admit it feels quite strange and self indulgent of me to be here writing about my treatment in a week where so many young lives were needlessly lost in Manchester and it does put a lot of personal troubles and worries into perspective, my heart goes out to all the people affected by the tragedy and all other such tragedies going on, all too often, all over the world. However,  I am, if you forgive me, going to go ahead and indulge myself by writing another blog post as this really if the best therapy for me. The last few weeks have probably been the most challenging ones since starting chemotherapy. I think I explained a little in the first blog about the treatment plan I'd decided upon, but I'll explain again just to clarify. My chemo regime is one that is pretty standard for treatment of breast cancer in the UK, usually referred to as FEC-T - with the first 3 drugs (the FEC part -flourouracil, epirubicin & cyclphosphamide) are given in combination for three cy...

One of the hardest decisions I had to make when I received my diagnosis was whether or not to stay in Inverness for my treatment, I had only been living and working here for a few weeks and had only one friend (and her family) in the immediate area, with the majority of my family living almost 400 miles away in Huddersfield. As a well travelled 35 year old singleton I'd say I'm pretty independent and most definitely used to having my own space. My friends and family are quite used to me moving around and being away for long periods of time, but that's not to say I don't need them, in fact I depend on them a lot, WhatsApp, Skype and Facebook have become my lifelines over recent years. After some deliberation my gut told me to stay in Inverness, I knew that, if I could, I would want to work as much as possible to keep some normality and independence in my life and prevent me from being just a patient for the months to come. I also felt it was important to keep the contin...

Yesterday I had my third and final dose of FEC and I have to say, I'm tired. In my last blog I wrote about how lucky I have been to not experience bad side effects, and that is still true, but perhaps that first round did make me a little bit complacent. I tend to have the motto in life 'expect the worst and you can only be pleasantly surprised' - perhaps not the most positive outlook, people may think, but I think it works for me, I'd much rather be pleasantly surprised than shocked or disappointed. Anyway, with my first round I was really expecting the worst, and as I said that never really hit, so with the second round I let my guard down a little. I decided to attend my friend's wedding in Edinburgh despite it being the day after my second chemo treatment. I literally went from the hospital to the train station. Don't get me wrong, I was still careful, I met my friend halfway in Perth and she made sure I was okay the whole weekend, but looking back I see it...

So first I'll start by thanking everyone for all the kind messages and gifts/cards, I've been truly touched by the response to my last blog, and once again I apologise that I haven't responded to everyone, but please know I appreciate all your kind words. Many people have been asking how I'm doing now and how I'm responding to the chemotherapy. Hopefully this post can answer some of your questions. So the type of chemotherapy I'm having is called FEC-T, the fist few cycles are the FEC ( f luorouracil , e pirubicin ,  c yclophosphamide ) part. I know many people find the name FEC very funny, and for me it definitely brings back memories of watching Father Ted and of my wonderful Irish nana insisting that 'feck' is not a swear word. I have to say that when I thought about writing this blog at the end of my first cycle I fully expected to be contradicting nana and saying that FEC was most definitely an expletive, but honestly at the moment I can't ...

Okay, so I've debated with myself a lot about starting this blog. Part of me feels like its a good way for me to process everything that's going on at the moment, and to let people know some details so that I'm not asked the same questions over and over again. Another part of me feels it's a little bit self indulgent and that now is not really the time to share such personal things. I guess if you're reading this then the first part won through. I started writing a blog back in 2013, when I moved to Tanzania, for the sole reason of keeping people updated with stories and pictures, but found that the blog became a bit of a therapeutic tool for me more than anything else. Since leaving Tanzania I haven't continued with blogging, I didn't even really finish that one properly. In the year and a half since I returned I have struggled a little bit to adjust back to life in the UK, I've spent the time as a bit of a nomad working as a locum and moving around v...