Blog 8/2013

Thursday, 29 August 2013

FREE CHOCOLATE!!!! (may not contain chocolate)

Tuesday morning came along and expecting to have a lie in, but of course it's never as easy as that, my back was getting sore from stupid o'clock and getting gradually worse as I lay there trying to get back to sleep. I would normally take some pain killers if it is still early enough to get back to sleep, but today I didn't want to do this, today I had a CT scan so I wanted to be in as bad a condition as I could be, rather than hiding what the glands are really doing and my body telling the doctors that everything is going fine, cause it's not.

The worst thing about the appointment was that it was in the afternoon, I normally prefer my appointments first thing to get them out of the way and especially ones that you have to fast for, just don't eat over night rather than missing two meals, or at least having them at an unusual time.

The visit went as well as it could although it couldn't really go any other way, sat down they gave me a drink and I had to drink a cup every ten minutes for an hour and not allowed to go to the loo after forty five. Then the nurse called me through to get the scan, chatting away and didn't take any notice anything until she said "you missed your chance there" I looked back with a puzzled face, she smiled and left. Can't remember exactly what it was she said but next I seen her she was talking about her husband and kids. It's as well I didn't notice, but in typical Insy style I missed the obvious... whatever it was. Scan went ok, didn't take very long but with the die that they inject you with it made it feel like I had soiled myself for a couple minutes, they had warned about this, but the last time I got it this never happened and neither did the hot flushes that I got this time too.

I had to wait around for a while after to make sure all the different things had passed, but as the day had been going on I was feeling worse and worse and was finally able to take some pain killers to try and ease it a bit. It didn't work though and still gradually got worse. When I got home I had breakfast/late lunch and went and lay down for a while to try and get some heat into my legs. It didn't help too much and I just kept getting worse, even my head started to get sore and I started to get a bit grumpy and even watching people run, jump, hit and kick each other in the film I watched that night made me cringe and hurt me. That always seems to happen when I'm not well, even watching football hurts. It's weird.

Wednesday 28th August, didn't have too great a sleep last night, even with drinking the cherry juice at night and in the morning, unfortunately it hasn't seemed to help me too much, still waking up during the night after an hour or two of sleep and sitting around doing different things before I'm tired enough to get back to sleep. From quite early that day I was feeling very rough similar to last night but now I also seemed to have a temperature and when I finally checked to see what it was it was up to 38.7⁰, I have been told that if I ever have a temperature to phone the hospital straight away, but... I never do and wait a while to see if it settles down, I was quite pleased I didn't, we have family coming over to stay today from Australia and didn't exactly want to be in hospital for this and when I took some paracetamol and my other drugs my temperature went down a bit and the aches and pains settled, but now instead of feeling cold, I was very sweaty.

During the afternoon I got very tired but I didn't go to bed or anything as it would keep me awake during the night and wanted to try and get a proper sleep. A parcel arrived for me for stuff I had ordered, one was a pedometer just to let me know how far I've been walking when I'm out and the other was a DVD box set for once I have finished The Shield, but I'm sure I'll watch it more than once, it's The IT Crowd brilliant show and looking forward to watching it all.

Later things started getting a little worse again with a sore head and some of the aches coming back and rather than being on the right side only, I was also sore on the left and my chest was feeling a little tight and throat a little sore too and having a feel around I have another gland coming up in my neck on the left and a few glands coming up on my left leg too. This didn't put a dampener on the night though for me as we had a lot of family over and it was great hearing all stories from when they were younger and how so much has changed and not changed in East Belfast over the years.

By the time I got to bed it was later than when I would normally go but I thought I would be tired enough to have a great sleep, but wasn't looking forward to getting up in the morning and having my sore back and other pains too. I only got about an hour's sleep and was awake again, not just awake but full of energy, so I kept myself busy by playing Final Fantasy VII for a while on the Vita, tried getting back to sleep again and it wasn't working so started reading for a while. It started getting bright and thought I should definitely try to get back over, finally did and then my alarm went for the morning.

Instead of feeling like crap like I was expecting I felt pretty good but I still had all the swollen glands so it was bound to change soon enough and as the day went on it sure did. My temperature never went too high and was very low (for me) into the low 36's. In the afternoon my legs were very cold again so I decided to lie in bed for a bit with the blanket over my legs and that seemed to help a little and even dosed off for an hour. During lunch I still felt rough with the aches and pains the paracetamol seems to have taken care of that while I write this and my legs and feet are quite warm, maybe a little too warm. I'm not going to bother taking my roasty toasty slippers off.

We have more family coming over tonight and this is why I'm writing this now instead of later, I just hope I feel up for it and don't get too tired, or sore and more so I hope I get a half decent sleep tonight and may even get some simple results back from the CT tomorrow, I doubt I will but the doctor last week thought we would, nurse said a week and last time it took 2-3 weeks before we got them back. I just hope I get them back before next Friday.

Tuesday, 27 August 2013

A Bit Into How I Think...

Up at 6.30 to get ready for hospital for a now weekly checkups much prefer this to every three weeks gives me a bit of comfort, plus also get me out of the house for a few hours in the morning even if it just to sit around somewhere else instead of at home. The appointment didn't last too long was only there for about an hour and a half, if even. The counts that they got where all very good platelets where above normal and haemoglobin was pretty high too considering it's been pretty bad the last few months, at least the walking is doing me some good. White cells where high too but around the same level as what they have been for a while. I don't think this is down to the chemo, but then it does point towards an infection/virus, hopefully it's the one that I had when they found the lymphoma as it wasn't contagious, just wish I could remember the name of it, now I hope to remember to ask them next week what it was. Told them about feeling rougher a lot quicker this time around compared to the previous times, but they didn't seem too concerned about this. So if they're not why should I be.

I had already decided to walk home today, I soon discovered that this was not a very good idea and really began to regret it, but I really wanted to walk past Ravenhall to get a picture, so my good pain bearing body and determination got me there, past and home. I'm not so sure I can remember a time that I was so pleased to get home and sit down, pure agony. But avoided painkillers cause well a bit of suffering done no one any harm... right? Plus most importantly I had planned to go out tonight, so a bit of pain now can only make me have a much better time tonight... right? Well for a few hours I really didn't think that tonight was going to happen, lay in bed until about an hour before I was to go out and still wasn't 100% but after thinking about it for a few days it had to be done. We ended up getting a free meal, think they had just started serving food in the place so where giving out samples of their stuff. I think it's a Spanish themed bar now in a way, as there was Spanish music and Spanish food. So I guess that's karma for the first "right?". Later in the night the bar man came over and asked if we liked Guinness, stupid question, he said that someone had bought them but left before he gave them to them. So I guess that's karma for the 2nd "right?".

Anyway it was a great night, lots of booze... I also had a few cigarettes, oh no!!! Well it's about time, I just beat my previous record of 11 weeks without smoking, so I'd just be setting a better record, I'd prefer starting over and breaking my new record of 12 weeks. Only problem is my addictive personality but as long as I don't smoke over the next few days I don't see this being a problem.

Saturday I got up pretty early didn't seem too bad but lay around for a while before finally getting up, head seemed ok wasn't sore or anything, my main problem was that I felt completely brain dead and just didn't function, this is my normal hangover, wasn't surprised by this except I was expecting my head to be throbbing. Watched the Arsenal game in the afternoon, the real Arsenal team turned up thankfully and I went back to sleep a bit later, struggled staying awake towards the end and was glad when the final whistle went. My keyboard finally arrived today and this one works fantastic with no problems, very happy about this. Another thing I had ordered where string for my guitar that I haven't used in about 7 or 8 years. Was also able to give it a good clean, the dust that had built up on it was ridiculous. What put it in my mind was a couple of things firstly I emptied out my room of basically everything and was going to sell it, until I looked it up and it's no longer being made anymore and the value of it has doubled what I bought it for, so I think I'll hold onto it for a while longer and make the most of it. Another thing was my numb fingers and feet , my fingers feel as if I've been playing the guitar, so I thought I may as well do what I'm suffering from anyway.

Sunday I done a lot less than Saturday and I didn't do much on Saturday, basically I got up, watched TV, had food, watched the motoGP, had more food, watched more TV and went to bed. Usual aches and pains, pretty boring day, but it was required, no point having a weekend if you can't have a lazy day.

Monday 26th August, well, as I'm in hospital again tomorrow I needed to do something today and when I got up I felt pretty good until I was having breakfast and my back started to get sore, normally when I lie in bed it's sore not when I get up so this was different. Planned to head eastward on my walk, but didn't know where exactly I was going, ended up walking up Belmont Road and seen Stormont so decided I'd go there. Felt pretty good so far apart from an itchy butt and scratching that walking down a carriageway wouldn't be a great idea so finally got to a bus stop and sat there for a bit, it was also quite nice on my knees, helped them settle a bit before heading on. Got to Stormont and had a look at the signs and seen there was a trail around the edge and went to go along one of them, kept to the left and going up but then the path seemed to just end, but I was near the top. A bit of a walk up the hill and I was there, I was the only one there. This really pleased me, took a few snaps and had a seat for a few minutes and admired the building, the view and the quiet.

Began to head home and was about half way back when everything started to get really sore, it's seems that three hours is all I can cope moving around outside before it gets unbearable even for me, and my pain threshold is pretty high, so this could help me plan routes for my next treks. Later in the afternoon I was unbelievably tired but didn't want to sleep as I'd like to get some tonight at least, only problem I'm not planning on going to bed early as with the appointment tomorrow I can't eat before it which means I can't have any breakfast and so I'm going to lie in as long as I can before getting up. I may just watch a film, or just some more of The Shield.

Monday, 26 August 2013

Reminiscing the past

So a few days have passed since I last posted, this is due to a couple of reasons, one was waiting for the keyboard and another was that I wasn't feeling up for it but that will be covered.

(I wasn't golfing) Wednesday 21st August I woke and still had that buzzing feeling from the last few days and still not sleeping great because of it the now usual back pain was there in the morning. Today I was definitely going to do something so that yesterdays unpleasant experience would not be the case today. Planned to go for a walk, it had been raining a bit so I wasn't expecting to be away for too long and only brought an umbrella. The walk I ended up doing was in total about 6 miles much longer than I had expected but it felt good on the muscles at least, bones though where pretty screwed as usual but they've been like that for a few years and I'd miss the pain if it wasn't there. I only got caught in a couple of showers but they where those showers that as soon as the water hit you it seemed to dry off and the water hitting my face was nice so didn't even bother getting the brolly out.

Wasn't sure to put this in, but I did. Once home it really hit me just how much it took it out of me and my eyes where heavy for the rest of the day, until of course I get an hours sleep and wide awake again, but was kept company again :) That night before my hours sleep I watched Moon again, fantastic film, first time I seen it was a "flashback" in the cinema with Emma and Andy quite a while back, before I had my GI bleeds, but then after I started having them it dawned on me how much the problems that Sam is having where the same as mine. There is one scene when he rushes to the loo to be sick and throws up blood, stomach juice mixture (it didn't seem to taste too bad for him) and then fall asleep beside the toilet shivering, while hopped up in what looked to be warm clothes. Ah I do miss them in a morbid way, but since I've cut out coffee and rice from my diet it hasn't happened, that and the doctors bending the rules a bit for the drugs which is probably more like the solution.

Thursday I didn't do very much after yesterday long walk, but was not suffering quite as much I was expecting to be, with my muscles anyway. Back was still sore and glands where a bit swollen but nothing much more than the last couple of days. Walked to Consy and had doddle round there and picked up a few odds and sods that where needed and headed home. Was relieved when I did get home, everyone that was out seemed to be in a bad mood or just ignorant a-holes, plus my legs were sore, mostly the people though. When I got home I battened down the hatches and avoided people for the rest of the day. Had to have an early night tonight, had a nice early hospital appointment in the morning. The early night consisted of me going to bed early, tossing and turning and eventually getting to sleep at around 1.30 or 2 last the last time I remember looking at the clock anyway.

Thursday, 22 August 2013

Buzz In Around

Monday 19th August, felt a bit rough again in the morning, firstly my back was a bit sore again and my glands and lymph system seemed all clogged up. At least the chemo had gave me a couple days reprieve. But as usual once I got up and about it seemed to settle things for me. Today Oblivion was released on DVD, I'd never bought a DVD on release day before but I enjoyed this film so much when it was in the cinema I just had to. The first time I went to see it was back in April with a girl I work with after one of the meetings and seen different parts of it numerous times since then, going in for screen checks as often as possible. It may not be everyone type of film, but is certainly my type of film. The mixed opinions of what people thought of it after was incredible, don't think I remember a film that had such extremes.

"Morning Bob" Went out onto the bike for a bit in the afternoon and then as my "cool down" I'd walk to Tesco and the chemist, on the way there I bumped into an old friend I used to hang about with a bit when we were younger, haven't spoken to him in years... I fact the last time I did see him was a time when we seen an ass doing assey things, there were police, fire brigade and court involved after. All I was doing was getting cigarettes for a BIBG (beer in back garden). Giving a statement stinking of booze the next morning was interesting though.

At Tesco the glass recycling area was full of trolleys and trolleys full of bottles, seemed to me like some pub had just filled them and brought them down there rather than getting rid of them themselves. Once into Tesco I got my DVD and asked if I could take it to the self serve checkout, when I got there it was a restricted item but as soon as I pick it up to go find someone the machine starts beeping at me, ended up walking off with it grabbing the guy who scanned his badge and walked off. At least it stopped beeping. Paid and left. That was basically the highlight of the day.

The evening was spent watching Oblivion and listening to the Man City game. Sleep didn't come easy that night either a lot of tossing and turning, mostly because I was warm again.

Tuesday was something similar to yesterday where I didn't get up to much. My back was sore again in the morning, this probably wasn't helped by the fact that I woke up really early and lay around for about three hours before getting out of bed, nice daydreaming the day away. Glands have started to swell up more than they have been for the last few days but still nothing too bad. Morning went in fairly fast and it was soon lunchtime, but after lunch the whole day slowed down to an absolute grind, so much so while I was sitting at the computer a fly started buzzing around and was very easily able to catch it first go and threw it towards the window, but for some reason he decided to come back and this time he got squashed by a pinch in the air.

I felt as though I had way too much energy and at the time should have thought and maybe done something to try and burn it all off rather than just sitting around and letting it linger and build up. I had certainly developed a case of cabin fever by the end of it. Absolutely nothing I done had in any way entertained me. Made a friend today though, a spider jumped down and started walking up my arm, he must have seen I was an effective fly catcher and thought I could get him dinner. I declined and threw him out into the garden to find his own.

Started to watch Bridesmaids as a bit of comedy relief, didn't do the job at all, didn't think it was very good and gave it a pretty poor rating as well, was disappointed as a few people I know hype about it. The evening was spent watching Flight, this was also not quite as good as I was expecting. It really must just be the mood I'm in, but I felt that wasn't going to go away till I get out tomorrow for some fresh air and the lack of sleep is going to make that drag a fair bit as well. Which ended up being the case, was cheered up though talking a load of crap to a couple people before trying to get to sleep which took my mind off the mind numbing day and helped me get to sleep.

Thursday, 22 August 2013

I thought Chemo was supposed to make you feel crap?

Saturday morning I had a bit of a lie in, first in a while that I've been able to without my back waking me up or being sore, think this would mean that the back pain may be gland related, I hope so as this would be much preferred to the alternative. Wasn't a massive lie in but the extra hour or so was great. Hadn't made any plans for today, as the Premier League was starting up again today and wanted to just sit around and watch that, since it was announced that BT Sport was going to be on Virgin Media and that Sky Sports was free today. This meant I got to see the Liverpool game in the afternoon and the United game in the evening. Both of which won... which sucks and Arsenal lost, to Villa.

Generally I felt pretty good today, my glands had all went down and didn't feel rough at all, basically I felt normal, didn't want to go out for a walk or anything just to make sure things would settle after the chemo. One thing I discovered though, was that the lump at the top of my leg has not went down, it appears that it hasn't anything to do with the lymphoma and could in fact be a hernia. But only time will tell. The evening I tried watching Agora and got around half way into it and the DVD that Lovefilm had sent me was faulty so missed a bit in the middle, have got in contact with them about it and they're sending me another copy...

Sunday I told myself I was going to have a lazy day, but had full intentions of not obeying this and doing some exercise, which turned out to be the case in the end. Afternoon, I seemed to be in my "funny half hour", kept doing silly things, one of which was turning off the plug to the kettle while the steam was coming out and putting my wrist over the steam, burnt a bit but nothing long term or serious. There were a few other things I was doing like going to the wrong drawers and cupboards etc, just general silliness and not paying attention to things.

Later in the day after I let my lunch get down me I decided to go out onto the stationary bike in the garage, was there for about an hour, felt pretty good and did do quite a workout, and then some stretches after and a few light weights. It's nice just sitting on the bike with the wireless headset on just listening to your music, the same stuff I've been listening to for years, a few newer tracks thrown in but mostly all really old stuff. After all this I weighed myself (I had weighed myself before) and I had lost 4lbs, in about two hours, I don't exactly have much to lose and that's a fairly hefty percentage that I did lose. I thought I would be putting on lots of weight not losing it.

I made up for it in the evening though and had a McDonalds and ate chocolate while watching stuff in the Insyplex and the MotoGP, Marquez running away with it again. Had been recording some of the game play I had on CS:GO and discovered I have over 300GB of footage, so felt I had to clear some of that, didn't use it all but got some, nothing special just some stuff from a few rounds, basically it's all my kills and deaths, I'm gradually getting worse at it, or everyone else is getting better.

My sleep pattern over the last few months has been quite irregular, been focusing most of the time on getting up at 8.30 at the latest, but with the sore back it had been getting me up earlier and when given the opportunity I have been sleeping in. This certainly won't help with getting a good night's sleep so I'm going to focus again on definitely getting up at 8.30 each morning and not having a nap or anything during the day and maybe going to sleep at a slightly earlier time.

My main problem at the moment is feeling so warm constantly, I can't remember the last time I was cold. I'm not running a temperature or anything, I've just got a blazing fire burning off everything inside me lately. Thankfully I haven't been the only one and been able to speak with some good friends, new and old at such crappy hours in the mornings, which has certainly cheered me up and if that fails I've got the Vita to entertain me.

I do have a feeling that this will pass soon as I start to get used to things, if possible. Plus I do enjoy it in an unusual way, the peace and quiet is relaxing and nice, rather than the continuous hustle and bustle around. Some of my finer works have came in the small hours of the mornings such as the majority of WGF songs which are now all just in the minds of the three of us. I wouldn't want to embarrass myself trying to play the guitar again, never mind singing... not yet anyway.

Friday, 16 August 2013

Hot Chocolate Day!!!

Friday is Hot Chocolate Day!!! i.e. I drink lots of hot chocolate today in hospital while I'm waiting. Had a nice early appointment at eight fifteen got bloods taken and finally into see the doc, he was saying how well he thinks it's going with all the counts being at a nice level and the RBCs having been 8 are now up to 13 odd, then he asked how things where. I told him about my armpit and another lump in my groin. He had a check at them and I said I thought initially the groin was a hernia (obviously I'd forgotten the name i think i called it "the artery type lump") but it doesn't change when you cough so I'm now not sure, when he checked he said it was quite hard and asked me to cough and it didn't change. He went on to say there is a hernia you can get there that can cause pain down that part of your leg, so that would be the occurrence of that explained. When he was checking my armpit he couldn't find any glands that where swollen and said there must just be a leak, didn't explain this to me though so I don't know what this could mean, obviously nothing serious otherwise he would have done more tests to find out.

4 of 4 getting a bit big I got the feeling that he wasn't going to do the scan that he had been talking about, as he was so pleased with the blood counts and how they were going, I may be wrong but I definitely wanted the scan done and with the bump in the groin it certainly started to think, yeah let's give this guy the scan. To finalize the scan I said to him that I haven't felt this rough since before I knew I had Lymphoma. So it was obviously on his mind to give me the scan since he was the one that had initially brought it up and I think he just wanted to ensure me that it had been doing the job, I really hope it is, or I could just have been misreading the situation and he was going to get me the scan anyway. But with how rough I have been feeling it makes it hard to believe that "things are better". I had also asked him if I could come up more regular to keep an eye on the counts to see if anything happens with them and remembering everything that had happened and how I felt for three weeks is tough, I barely remember what happened in the last week in any detail. He asked me how often would you like to come up and I said each week and he was fine with that, not often you get people wanting to go to hospital more.

He decided to continue on with the dose I was on anyway and that the scan should go down far enough to be able to see the lump in my groin too to find what exactly that is. We organized what drugs I needed to take home and went to speak with one of the nurses to get some of them there and then, and was told to go for a cup of coffee. I was going to go into town for a bit rather than waiting around for a couple of hours like the previous time, but I don't think a cup of coffee would kill three hours and I was sort of wondering why last week the nurses where apologising for it being such a long day. So I assumed it might be a lot quicker today then, so I didn't bother going out and sat around reading 1984 and on my phone, the time went on and on and on and it was soon half twelve and I thought right if I was in there I'd be getting a lunch, I'm not, so I'm going to get my own. Went to the shop and paid for one I would've been getting free if I was in treatment. Had started watching Men In Black before this so continued on with that, read a bit more and finally decided I'm going for a nap, obviously this is when the buzzer goes off to get me in to get sorted after four and a half hours of "getting a coffee" one hell of a big cup.

I asked the nurse if that was the normal procedure and timescale of things and she said yes I would go home and come back for about two, so that is the plan for the next cycle. Got my paracetamol and piriton (can't say this enough but I really do bloody well hate that stuff) the nurse was surprised by this, as I tell everyone how much I hate the stuff every time and she said that most people like getting it and being able to have a nice sleep while the infusions going in. The nurse also asked if this was part of the ITP and then had to explain that it could be through a genetic thing but we're waiting on results of that, or it could just be another thing. Also told her the story of how it was lucky that it was discovered with having the chest virus and getting a CT scan only to find "ok yeah your lungs are mostly blocked up but we're more concerned about these swollen glands in your back". I would probably still be on an inhaler from my GP otherwise. She also asked how long I'd been going up to Bridgewater and I said I think its 9 years now, she had been there 8 and said that would be about right, I remember finding out about you. The staff there are really nice and friendly well most, maybe a couple I'm not too keen on but the people who work there already probably know who they are.

Got the chemo and started on the Rituximab and during this I watched MIB 2, still got about another four minutes left to watch so i'll do that now and then watch Agora, yes Agora, not Argo, Agora Rachel Weisz. Will be the third, not often I watch films multiple times.

But now I'm home and everything feels fine, I think I got up early enough this morning so that my back pain didn't have time to kick in thankfully and didn't have any of the aches and pains of chills or flu-like symptoms so that was nice, but might not have been a bad place to have them, although I did have the sweats. So fingers crossed to a couple days of not feeling too bad and then a week of feeling good again.

Night.

Thursday, 15 August 2013

Pictures and videos make it all better

Tuesday a new day and a fresh start, well apart from the back, certainly feeling a lot better than yesterday. First thing I done was check film times of Alan Partridge, had to go see it this week so decided today was the best day. I had most of the morning to kill so used that time to get into contact with the suppliers of the new keyboard again, they're sending me a new one that is perfect in every possible way, or at least that's what I'm hoping, but as long as the keys work. I'm sick of having to delete spaces.

Swalted Popcorn!!! Got the bus into town as I didn't want to get too warm before sitting there for a couple of hours. First time in years that I was actually early for the cinema, normally I get in just after the credits or half way through them. But as I hadn't seen any of the latest adds and trailers thought I'd have a look. Alan Partridge was great as you'd expect and really enjoyed it. After had a chat with some of the staff and aimed for home. The leg so far today had been pretty good but on the walk just after I bumped into Chris (a' right Chris!) there was a hill and started to get sore then, but I pushed through and got home, sweltered...

That night I watched The Shield in the Insyplex and had an early one. In the morning up bright and early again with the back pain, and felt as if it was going to be a similar day to Monday so knew I had to get out as soon as possible to try and take the edge off it before it got too bad. The walk I took today (Wednesday) brought me past a few places I used to hang out when I was younger and brought back some good memories. Going on up the hills I thought would be too much for me so turned off and along the carriageway. Ups and down(hilly) but helped push me a little. Home for lunch and started playing on World of Warcraft (Emma put up a WoW picture and tempted me into it again) ended the day with another level 90. Also watched some more of The Shield in the background, missed a bit of the plot in one of the episodes.

St Finnian's Parish Church, Cregagh

One of the highlights today was that someone got in contact with me who suffers from ME, Myalgic Encephalomyelitis, completely different but the symptoms seem to be very similar as to what I'm having, although I think theirs is much worse. Was good to speak with someone who has a similar mindset to what I have and always seem to look for the positives and willing to talk about it rather than suffering and keeping it bottled up and making it worse. It was nice and even finding out about ME and other things was very interesting.

By the end of the night I had just had enough of the keyboard and its blooming space bar so I put in the old one again, not that it's bad, it's just old and felt it was time for a change, will miss a couple of the features on it but the new one should just be plain better (if working). Woke up a few times during the night again so in the morning I decided to have a lie in which I kept getting woke up during to be told what other people were doing and that the rubbish had been collected... no need.

Once I did get up I felt fairly well so I think that the lie in was definitely needed. The helicopter was up over the house, never thought much of it but when I went out for my walk I seen a couple of police officers taking a guy back to their car, gave my "oh our streets are so much safer" smile or it could have been my "you got caught by that!!?" smile and got a "yeah, we got him" smile back. On my walk going up Bloomfield Road, rather than feeling sore I was just getting ridiculously tired and chest tightening up and my arm getting sore, not in a stroke way but in a really bloody done out, tired way. My legs haven't been that tired in so long years and years, ok it was a hill but even when I used to run they didn't go like that. So that was my que to go home plus it was a showery day so I had only planned for a short walk, was only away about an hour. I got home and after another hour had lunch, during the time I was having lunch I started to feel really rough, flu like symptoms again and sore arms and legs. So I went to bed for an hour and watched a film and tried to warm up a bit, but obviously nothing's as simple as that, I started to overheat and was getting too warm.

When I got out of bed just sitting at the computer just after my 100th knife kill and a few more on CS:GO about 10% of my kills, my arm was still a bit sore so I started to rub it a bit and checked for and swollen glands in my armpit only to discover my whole armpit had swollen up, I wasn't sure if I'd just put on a lot of weight in a couple hours or it actually was swollen so checked the other and it was normal. Went and checked it out in the mirror and it had actually swollen out. Weird, very weird, but it's very amusing at the same time. Much the same in the evening I'm still very warm, sweaty and armpit is still swollen, it's hard to get a respectable picture of it so you're not seeing it.

The last couple of weeks have been pretty rough, much worse symptom wise than before I was getting the chemo, but I don't think this has anything to do with the chemo apart from it not doing quite as much as they had initially planned, tomorrow will be the start of the third cycle but I wouldn't mind maybe getting a stronger dose to really push it out, as I haven't been getting any real side effects from the chemo, but I'm not sure if they can do that or not. At least I will be able to talk to them tomorrow to tell them what it's been like the last couple of weeks and find out a little bit more myself about things.

Time to sort out what to bring with me. Movies for tomorrow will be Men in Black 1,2 and 3....

Tuesday, 13 August 2013

The Weekend

Friday evening passed without any real incidents, just a little tired compared to normal, got some cake and cards. Next morning my back was worse than it normally is and woke me up early again, but after some paracetamol I got back to sleep and lay in till around tenish. When I was having breakfast my brother called over with his kids and got another couple of cards and a some Celebrations as well. A bit later "ding dong", a large box for me, I couldn't work out what I had ordered and not got yet, opened the box and it was full of chocolate!!!! Thornton's chocolate, toffees and truffles, that's my meals sorted out for the next few days. Took a bit to find out where it came from as i couldn't find where the label was but it turned out it was from my Aunt Dot and Erick, thank you.

Felt really bad all morning and into the afternoon, as if I had a chill or flu, tingly and uncomfortable and stiff. Joints are really sore as well, just want to roll up into a ball and lie there. Started getting sweats too, no temperature though for now and hopefully this will continue, but now having second thoughts about heading out tonight for a few drinks for my birthday.

In the afternoon I was playing with my nephew and we were throwing the ball back and forth and this seemed to get rid of all the blocked grogginess and most of the pains went away but still not a hundred percent and still had the sweats for the rest of the day, which I didn't quite like but I couldn't do anything about it as even in when I'm cold I'm still like this. That evening though I got to meet up with some people for drinks, was a great night was nice to get out again after 96 days without any booze. This is the longest I had been off booze since I started drinking all those years ago, the next "milestone" is on Wednesday when I will be off cigarettes for eleven weeks, or at least that's definitely when I had stopped, it may even be longer that I've been off them for.

The hardest part of the smoking was last week when I was out and about and going past places that I would normally spark up and resisting the urge to, I always knew it was more of a mental addiction rather than a physical one and considering the physical addiction is all gone and it is purely a mental one now.

Sunday I didn't have much planned nor want to do anything, firstly though I wasn't hung over which was quite a pleasant surprise, even though I did have a fairly early night compared to what was the norm. But I did still have the sore back, which eased again when I got up and about for a bit and was still sweaty and warm again today, but still no temperature. Watched the Community Shield and was told that the Vulcan Bomber was taking off from the City Airport at about 3.20 so kept an eye out for that and got a video. Pity it took off towards Bangor/Holywood so it was quite a distance away but was still impressive and glad I seen it.

As the day went on I was just getting gradually worse, was starting to get sore joints again and the sweats were still going on. I was getting incredibly tired and even starting to get a bit dizzy at times. By the time I was going to sleep I was so tired, but for some reason I wasn't able to get to sleep, I was completely done out. Eventually got round but not for long, woke up again with my back in agony and soaked with sweat.

Monday was the worst I had felt for quite some time since before I was diagnosed, but at least now I'm starting to know how I feel with the chemo and how I feel with the lymphoma and starting to get an idea of when things begin to happen. Back sore again when I woke up but didn't take any paracetamol to make sure it wasn't just that that was clearing up my back in the mornings. But this may have been a bad idea, as the morning went on I was getting more and more sweaty and sore, my joints and glands being uncomfortable, felt very groggy and tired. This gradually got worse and worse and my temperature was gradually rising but never got so high to call the hospital.

I ended up going back to bed for a while to try and sweat it out and seemed to work to an extent but not fully, by this stage I took some paracetamol and it at least took my temperature down, but still felt very drowsy and felt my lymphatic system was still all blocked up, as the day went on these have gradually died down and now I'm just sweaty, so I'm thinking tomorrow when I get up the first thing I'm going to have to do is to go for a walk to get it out of me early, but that also depends if I get any sleep tonight.

This hasn't been the greatest few days that I've had, but at least I had a good time on Saturday night for my birthday, doubt I'll be about again for a while, while I've been writing this I've been watching the Amazing Spiderman so, I'm definitely going to have to read over it to make sure it makes sense, but I haven't done too much over the few days so I don't think I've missed too much to tell, next one will hopefully be a bit more fun and back to some "adventures", rather than sore this sweaty, lying around which is this condenced into a few words.

Friday, 9 August 2013

and... BIRTHDAY!!!

Tuesday 6th August, same normal morning pains, back being sore and wrists as well but today I had plans and I did not want to miss or change them. I had planned a few days in advance that I wanted to go and see the ice-hockey in the odyssey, it was the semi finals of the division 1 section, which where the good ones. Thought the semis would be better than watching the final, you get two games and you at least get to see the eventual winners, one way of another.

First game was Toronto against Sweden and the warm ups where pretty cool to watch, the Toronto guys where great and passed out pucks after their warm up to the kids that where all down at the front cheering them on. This was the first ice hockey game I'd been to in near 20 years!!! There were a lot more people than I was expecting, not loads maybe about up to 100. Lots of school kids and I heard that different teams had been going to primary schools to get them to support their team. It certainly added a lot to the experience with the children chanting for their team, loudest ones where for Toronto who ended up winning ten to one, biggest cheer though was when Sweden scored their only point. After the game one of the Toronto players passed out a hockey stick for the kids to fight over, which a mum got and gave to her son who was only about three, he could barely carry it, but what a memento for him!!

Another thing I was looking forward to today was getting a nice cup of proper coffee. I've been off coffee since October, I felt that this was maybe a cause of my stomach bleeds or at least not helping with it so I stopped drinking coffee and went back to drinking tea instead, seems to be doing the trick, as since I've stopped I haven't had any bother with my stomach. At the end of the first game went round to the drinks place and asked if they done coffee to which the reply was yes, so I asked for a latte, "we only do coffee" which was from a large thermos flask, bit disappointed but went for it anyway and to disappoint me more it was bloody £2.40, absolute rip and it was rank as well, last time I'll be doing that.

Back to the ice hockey, the second semi was between Tartarstan and Montréal, support started arriving for the Russians waving their flags and chanting, was great, got me on their side before it even started. Was a much closer game than the first, or at least more contested and very enjoyable. Russians ended up winning eleven to one, doesn't do the Montréal team any justice but does show that the Tartarstan team was pretty impressive.

The walk home was rather uncomfortable especially going up the hills, my leg was pretty sore, the same as before anytime you tried to raise it just a real sharp pain around the groin area. But eventually made home and sat down and that settled it again.

Wednesday after checking to see what was on in the WPFGs, I chose to go for the rowing, it was indoor but thought it would still be enjoyable. Still had the usual pains back and legs where sore as well this time and glands seemed a bit swollen still. Was in a bit of a rush to get there for the first race, so just got the bus into town and dandered over to the Waterfront where it was being held. Got to the main doors and went to go in the left automatic door and one of the volunteers said , "could you go to the one on your right please" so I went to go in the right automatic door "no, the one on your right" so I held up my right hand and said "the one on my right", he pointed down to my left and said "down there", I gave a bit of a chuckle and went down the way to another door. Asked the guy here where the rowing was and he asked me if I was competing... me... competing? With a smile I said "no, just spectating" and going through the metal detector it beeps, I look round and walk on, they didn't stop me so just ignored it.

Once I got in, it was in the studio rather than in the main hall, there were quite a few people, most where family and competitors, and me. Stayed and watched a few of the races. I was quite impressed they completed 1000m in just under 3 mins and the 500m in about 1min 30, some people seemed as if they were dying after, I'm not surprised with the effort they were putting into it. The atmosphere in the place was buzzing too cheering on their fellow countrymen.

After the men's races had finished I decided to head on elsewhere so walked into the centre and took a trip to the cinema to have a look at what was on and Percy Jackson and the Sea of Monsters was coming on in a few minutes. I enjoyed the first one, but this one wasn't quite as good and seemed to go in pretty fast, I feel they could have stretched it out a bit more and add to it in one way or another. But it wasn't bad, watchable and for kids.

After I ended up walking home to burn off a bit of the cinema food I had. The walk had the usual pain in my leg so may just have to rest a bit for a couple days to see if it eases it at all. Had the family over that evening and was pretty tired.

Thursday I had a nice lie in didn't get up till about ten or half ten and thought it would be a good day to have a lazy day, which it was to an extent. Went out on the bike machine for a while, or at least until a massive wasp came in and got trapped at the window which doesn't open, didn't know what to do so let it fly around and tire itself out and then eventually got a bit of card for it to sit on while I took it outside, saving it from the forest of webs around the window (it was the garage window so it doesn't get cleaned much and lots of things blocking the way to the window).

Once I got him out I went to the chemist and the sandwich shop for lunch home to eat that and watch some more of The Shield. Got a delivery of my new keyboard too, which so far seems pretty nice, solar powered and the connector to the computer to charge it is the same as a my other devices to saves having to have a load of different cables lying around. Only problem I am having with it is that the space bar seems to be over sensitive and constantly putting in double and sometimes even triple spaces so I need to see if there's a way to change the sensitivity on it until then it's going to be annoying deleting all these spaces. (turned out there where 89 of these double spaces in this alone)

Got a visit from Tim and decided what to do over the weekend for my birthday, heading out for a "couple" drinks on Saturday and maybe even a couple on Friday as well with others that can't make it on Saturday but all will be decided.

Friday morning and my back is pretty bad and generally feeling bunged up and unpleasant, but I'm sure once I get up and about it'll clear up. Guy came to fit the carpet in the bathroom, but I've spent all day watching The Shield until I started this. But today is my BIRTHDAY!! whoop 28!! I've proved that not all the greats die when they're 27. Win to me, maybe a drink to celebrate today? quite possible.

Happy Birthday me!!

Tuesday, 6 August 2013

Start of August!!!

After feeling pretty good most of Saturday afternoon with all the walking and so forth, the evening turned a bit sour. My wrists and legs, just below the knees at the front and giving pain down the shins. I've mentioned before about the osteoporosis but I hadn't mentioned that I also have avascular necrosis, which is that my knees are basically chipping away.

The doctors are unable to do anything about this at the moment and are just waiting for my knees to "collapse". My left is worse than my right, can get pretty sore and is just generally sore but I'm used to General Pain (/salute).

Wrist pain I'm guessing is just from the osteoporosis which is probably getting worse with the high doses of prednisolone after the chemo and this is just cycle two, don't want to guess how bad it's going to get after cycle 6 or 7 if it goes on that long.

Crowds at the cricket (or the beer tent) at Stormont The night's sleep was an unpleasant one but I finally got over. When morning came my back was incredibly sore again, it had woke me up, got breakfast and sat around a bit but didn't ease much. So I felt I had to get out and about to try and ease it. Thankfully there's lots of sports on and the weather was great, went to Stormont with my Dad to watch the last match of the field hockey which PSNI beat NIFS 6-2 to get gold and round to watch a bit of cricket after, target was only 73 so didn't take too long to complete, but thought my time was done there so went home and watch the 2nd race of the World Superbikes.

In the evening I noticed I had a bruise on my arm, not a big purple one, but one that looked to be as if a vein on my arm had been banged and was bruising along it, so I'm wondering if my platelets have dropped as I've no idea where it came from. Used to this type of thing with the ITP and could even be caused by leaning on the computer desk, I'll get interested more when I start getting the red dots(petechiae) on my ankle and shins, or my stomach starts getting "bubbly".

Monday morning at 5a.m I woke up thinking I heard the smoke alarm going off in my room and sat up on my bed, no one else in the house was stirring so began to think it was just a dream. sat on a few moments to settle down a bit as I was now wide awake, then BEEP BEEP BEEP, the smoke alarm decided I wasn't enough company and tries wake up everyone else up, I jumped up on the bed and pulled it off the roof and nabbed the battery out of it. Don't think that's part of the official procedure when a smoke alarm goes off, but it was still dark so there were no flames and no smell so no smoke. Then I get the blame of setting my alarm to the wrong time...

I put the battery back in and it hasn't went off since and got back to sleep pretty quickly, which looking back I would have preferred not to, when I woke up later I felt very very rough, glands had all swollen and felt all blocked up and back being its now usual sore self. Found a new bump as well which could maybe explain the sore leg. It's on the inside, at the very top, right in the middle, but just hidden behind the muscle/tendon that come up from your leg to your... middle, there. Weird thing is that all the swollen glands seem to all be on the right hand side, the left ones are barely noticable. Maybe I sleep on my right and that's what causes it?

Titanic Building After being up a couple hours and still feeling rough I decided to go back to bed and sweat it out of me a bit, I do this with colds and works wonders most of the time. As this was a similar feeling, thought I would do that and it worked. Up again at about 12 and decided to go for a walk. Went to the post box and chemist and kept going and got the bus into town and headed for the Titanic building, bumped into a good friend who I had seen just before I went into hospital who works over there who was on his lunch and we lunched together. After, I headed round the back to the dry dock and watched a couple of the muster events for WPFG, but there was quite a sharp breeze so headed back to town to get home. Felt fairly normal by this stage and most of the pains had eased. Rest of the day was spent watching The Shield and Snow White and the Huntsman and then to bed.

The Shield is quite a good show, just finished the first series and starting on the second. Snow White was pretty turd.

Night.

Saturday, 3 August 2013

Completing the week after cycle two.

My previous post stated that I had not been doing as much walking for a few days as I had been the previous weeks, so I decided to change this and change it I have. Thursday when I got up I decided I would get my hair cut, it's only a five minute walk down the road and it was quite showery. Didn't let that put me off so started walking...

River Lagan behind Gasworks Got about half way there and thought, hey screw this, this is nice and turned and took the scenic route. Planned ahead a bit and was thinking of what was in the direction I was walking, Forestside, town (if I went to either of these I would end up getting the bus home and return with all my hair), Ormeau, "yeah lets go Ormeau" and "hey the towpath, haven't been along that before", so through the golf course and out at the bridge and round the towpath towards Albertbridge and probably about an hour or so after I was originally to arrive at the barbers I finally made an appearance.

Buzz, snip, snip and home. Felt like a good walk and everything was fine, was quite impressed and pleased. Friday morning though was a different matter, woke up and by back was killing, or more my back was killing and it woke me up. I think it's caused by the swollen glands or at least I hope it is. If it's not that it'll be my osteoporosis which causes a pain in the same place, but not quite as severe. It's just below the ribs either side of the spine and worst when you stretch back and when moving its sore at the front, as if it's coming from your stomach. Very unpleasant but after moving around a bit it eases up and finally disappears.

My groin also felt sore on the right hand side mostly when I lifted the leg to go up a step and my throat too on the right hand side, swollen similar to what I had a couple weeks before. This encouraged me to go for a short walk which turned into a slightly longer walk, which turned into me having to get the bus home as I couldn't walk much further without it being too sore to move. During this I passed and stopped at the Dragon Boat racing to see what all that was about for the World Police and Fire Games, was quite interesting. But the time in between the races was too much for a minute of seeing a couple of boats going past. Once I was home and sat down everything seemed to settle. I did notice my nose a bit red and was wondering if I'd been rubbing it, when going to bed my face and head where all very red, so I'd got sunburnt, even though I was in the shade, must have been from the wind, it's not sore, but i guess this is why you can't go out in the sun when on chemo. Lesson learnt.

Same thing on the Saturday morning, but had breakfast and out the door before I thought too much about it, to watch the Field Hockey at Stormont for the WPFG, PSNI beat Scotland 15-0 (think I'm going to go back again tomorrow to watch a proper match) and seen a bit of the Tug of War.

PSNI 15 - Scotland 0 with 15 seconds left Weather was nice and in a good mood so walked home, initially I thought it would take about an hour and a half to get home, but driving there is quite deceptive, makes it seem as if it's a lot further away than it is and took a mere 50 minutes, by the end my back had cleared, but my throat is sore to touch, (touches throat) yeah sore to touch, but only on the right hand side and my leg is sore to lift up, so I'm starting to think it may be a muscle thing more than the gland, but could even be a combination of both. Either way I'm sitting on my ass now so it's not sore.

Today was the first time I'd been to see hockey, was good, but it was obviously very one sided being 15-0 and all, so the game tomorrow will be interesting, it's basically the game for gold/silver, the final, guaranteed medal though and might even see a bit of cricket after.

Moved the computer and stuff about in my room a bit, feels like it's completely different, although I've basically moved two things, the projector and the tower onto a hard surface which I was going to say made it a lot quieter, but turned the voltage to the fans down and its silent!!! the projectors noisier when it's on. Any hoot I love this bit of kit!!

Until next time...