Hello healing team,
As always, I hope this update finds you well.
It has been a while since I have been in touch. I feel that I must apologise to those who have messaged me recently and I have not responded. I have just kept my head down to focus on my recovery. I will be better placed to respond in future so please keep the messages coming.
The last month has been rather uneventful, but a fair bit has happened. Today is Day 42 post Stem Cell Transplant (SCT). You may recall that I was discharged from hospital on Day 13 having got through the SCT relatively unscathed. Well just to prove that I am fallible, I returned to hospital the following week with the symptoms of high temperatures, excessive pain, extreme fatigue, restricted breathing and groaning belly. As it worked out, scans and test showed that my White Blood Cells had plunged back to zero but I was reassured by my doctor that this was quite normal. As it worked out, the symptoms I was experiencing were due to one of the following;
- expansion of the bones and reestablishment of my bone marrow
- the home cooked spicy vegetarian vindaloo that I had consumed. Gotta be careful what one eats!!
I have really enjoyed the last few weeks at home. Whilst I was in hospital, I missed being at home with Sarah and the kids. The time really helped me to refocus on what really matters. Since getting home, both Riley and Georgia had birthdays (and parties) and I was present to participate in all of the activities, I have found walking the kids to school has never been more enjoyable, it has been great being around at dinner time every night to listen to the days stories, we have spent much time kicking the footy, we have been going on walks down to the beach and we have even had the time to take our neighbours dog on a few walks. I really didn’t give enough time or priority to these activities previously!! They are precious.
The last few weeks has also been a time to re-establish my wellness routine. This has included focussing on diet, meditation and the beginning of some exercise. My recent visit to the guru Prof. Avni Sali has helped to reinforce how important these are to my recovery. To revisit some of the important points from one of my previous updates;
- undertake daily meditation and some exercise.
- all meals to have at least 80% veg/greens. The chlorophyll in greens helps to maintain your body with an alkaline pH
- avoid sugars and processed foods
- regular consumption of; turmeric/ginger (curcumin); red grapes and berries (resveritrol) , cold pressed olive oil (unheated), coconut oil for cooking, cinnamon for insulin and blood sugar management.
- oily fish and cacao (70%+ dark choc) as our priority foods
A recent visit to see Nan, my fab Kinesiologist, had us discussing things to consider once I achieve remission. Given I have found myself with cancer, I need to make sure that the environments and situations I put myself into going forward don’t contribute to deteriorated mindset and wellbeing. Whilst all of the answers to this quandary are not immediately apparent, it is something that I need to further consider and resolve. It is clear that the process of writing about my experiences and sharing my updates has been helpful and healing for me. So I wonder where that could lead?
Something that I knew would happen through this whole process is hair loss. I really had no idea how this would occur (or where). Well I am happy to advise that you loose all hair from your head, and hair from other areas only ‘thins out’ or becomes patchy. I must admit that it is a little bit freaky to grab your hair and have it fall out in your hand, or to wake up in the morning and have your pillow covered in hair and find that your head has patches of hair missing. It is much harder to explain than dandruff to those who are unaware! Actually, the real fun starts when it begins to grow back as it can come back as a different colour or curlier/straighter. I have kept my head shaved as I am not yet ready to see what that will look like. My beard has come back all patchy. I looked like I have been attacked by a blind dude sponsored by Gillette.
So as I sit here writing today, I feel quite well. The pain has settled down a fair bit. It is now manageable without medication. Fatigue comes knocking regularly which slows me down a lot. I find this quite frustrating at times, but I am heartened knowing it will go with time. On Monday I had a Bone Marrow Biopsy to assess cancer levels. I get my results of this later today. I feel quite anxious about the results. Effectively this result will tell me how effective the last six months has been having undertaken three months of chemotherapy, ten sessions of radiotherapy, a stem cell transplant, countless doctors appointments, blood tests, scans including MRI/CT/ultra scans. It will also assess my attempts at wellness and everything that has incorporated. So I sit here with fingers, arms, legs and toes crossed. I feel that the result will prompt me to either have a glass of wine…..or a bottle of wine. However, I do need to ‘keep the faith’ regardless of the result. As my brother Jerome reminded me this morning, “remember that all of your uni results sucked and look at how good you turned out.”
So…………I will be in touch again soon!!
Take care
Geoff
