About this Blog

This blog started as an online diary and place for me to rant about annoyances in my family.

However since July it has become a place for me to catalogue and express my views and opinions on the treatment I have recieved following the diagnosis of a potentially cancerous tumor in my bowel.

On 3rd August 2011 I was told that it was cancerous. In April 2012 I was given the all clear.

October 15th 2013 I was diagnosed with peritoneal disease and liver metastases. The cancer was back and this time it is inoperable.

It is a little bit out of date as the NHS doesn't tend to have a WiFi connection in hospital and I can only post when I get home and posts take a while to write.

It is NOT about individuals or the nursing profession. It is about some of the inadequacies in the system and the way the NHS is failing some people.

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Monday 19 August 2013

Today's dramas!!

So, at 5:10 this morning my beautiful little girl decided that it was time to get up for the day. This is alongside me running backwards and forwards to the toilet all night.

I fed her, she was definitely not going back to sleep so we watched some Airline USA, there is really nothing on other than news at that time in the morning!!

About 5:45 I went and put the kettle on in preparation for my final drink of citramag. 

By 6:45 it was ready to drink and I sat back and thought positive thoughts and it stayed down. I chased it with some water and sat back and waited. 

By 9am, we were all ready to leave, big two breakfasted, laundry hanging on the line, multiple toilet stops completed, you get the drift!!

We dropped the big two at grandmas house and headed to the hospital. 

Little one decided tactics at this point were to scream her way to the endoscopy department as suddenly she was starving.

I booked in, fed Hope and started waiting. The nurse called me in about 10:45 and went through all my details. He also tried to insert a cannula.

I asked him if I could wait in the waiting room and have about 10 minutes notice before my procedure so I could feed Hope again. 

Back in the waiting room, we watched some more BBC daytime TV and waited. About 11:40 I got my 10 minute warning so attempted to feed Hope and waited.

And waited, 40 minutes later I still hadn't gone in so fed her again and checked with the receptionist what the situation was. Then my nurse left, clutching a bag of carrot sticks!!

A different nurse then came out and seemed slightly confused about where I was and despite me being pointed out twice by the receptionist still seemed slightly confused. 

The next bit is slightly surreal, I had not been sedated, but felt fairly sure this new nurse was one sandwich short of a picnic. As we walked up to the treatment room he kept staring at me, finally I asked him why. 

'I have never seen a women as tall as you'  he said. I mean WTF, talk about random!!

I won't fill you in on the details of the procedure, mostly as i can't remember, but unfortunately it was not very successful. 

It appears I had double the amount of sedation and was sucking on the gas and air like it was going out of fashion. But due to my surgery I have a very twisty colon which means that I cannot tolerate the procedure like normal people and am now going to have to go through the preparation all again to have the procedure under a general anaesthetic.

So, having finally got a bit of sleep this afternoon, I am facing another weekend in the not to distant future cleansing my colon and another 4-5 hours waiting and waiting.

Really bowel cancer and its subsequent complications never end.

Sunday 18 August 2013

Colonoscopy prep, this might be graphic!!

So, at 2pm today operation preparation began.

The 10 senna tablets went down during the first episode of 24 series 8 that I had decided to watch to pass the time and keep me close to the toilet. 

Coupled with the copious amounts of water I have been forcing myself to drink this kept me on the loo for a while, although things were not really moving as well as I wanted. 

Come 4.30 I went and put the kettle on for the preparation of the citramag (ok I lie, Tony actually did it, but I went and made the stuff). After letting it cool for the requisit 30 minutes I attempted to drink it, which I managed. And then added more water into the mix, as well as a strained vegetable cuppa soup. 

This had the effect of making me feel very bloated and almost looking pregnant again!! 

Come 7pm it was time for more citramag, which my loving husband prepared and delivered to me. I took one sip and that was it, I knew that this was not staying down and boy was it not staying down.

Other than returning to bed to briefly feed Hope I have been vomiting & defecating with alarming regularity and ease for the last two hours.

I have missed Dragons Den ( thank goodness for BBC iPlayer) and am now trying to catch up on Dexter, but having missed the last two episodes and with no time for a sky plus catch up, I have no idea what is going on.

Things appear to be calming down now, and hopefully I can settle down and get some sleep in.

Send me sleep vibes please ;)

Friday 16 August 2013

My body has given up

Since December 2007 I have either been pregnant, breastfeeding or battling cancer and as a result I think my body may have decided it is time to throw in the towel.

No, no, I am not dying but there are a lot of things wrong with my body and I am annoyed that in this quick fix era there is no quick fix for the human body.


Before Hope was conceived I was a comfortable dress size 16. I was happy with this and had started running and doing yoga to try and tone up some of those Mummy Wobbly bits, but was not planning on loosing any more weight. Fast forward to today. I am wearing a pair of size 14 jeans that I bough when Hope was 6 weeks old and they are too big. I have lost at least 15 kgs since she was conceived and I am worried. 

I know that this statement puts me at odds with the vast majority of my sex. Most women would kill to loose weight without having to watch what they eat and excersise, but not me. I have never worried about my weight. Other than 3 months before my wedding where I used slimfast to try and loose a few pounds I have never dieted. Yet, I cannot keep weight on at the moment. I look in the mirror and see an ill looking stranger looking back at me. According to the NHS BMI calculator here I am healthy, but I was also healthy when I was 15kgs heavier and I was also a lot happier.

Add to the unexplained dramatic weight loss all the other health complaints I am suffering and you would be forgiven for thinking that I am on a one woman campaign to use every bit of the NHS!!

I am still having physio for the back pain which came on when I was pregnant.

Then there is the bowel stuff

If you do not like poo related discussions you might want to stop reading now :)

Since having Hope my bowels have become somewhat unpredictable again. I almost feel like I have regressed to how they were acting post surgery. It is explosive, unpleasant smelling, urgent and frequent. Combined with incredible bloating & stomach cramps like I have never experienced before my GP has been able to refer me for another colonoscopy (on Monday so I am starting my preparation tonight) and I have seriously considered cutting things out of my diet.

No, scratch that I have cut something out of my diet. On Wednesday I made the decision that the agony I have been suffering after a sandwich is something not worth the pain so I have decided to cut out gluten/wheat. Actually I do feel better for it. But it is unscientific as I have no diagnosis to confirm whether or not I need to do this. But it does help. 

What doesn't help is this TV advert which has me crazing a large slice of hot buttered home made toast and marmite.

But hopefully come September we will have some answers or some tablets and I will be able to move further away from the toilet!!!