The final installment of nine months worth of cancer treatments, starting with a lumpectomy on the 1st of May last year, followed by a mastectomy, four months of chemotherapy and now these past weeks of radiotherapy. There are, of course, still many years of hormone treatment ahead of me. Years of follow-up appointments, scans and who-knows-what-else. (In fact my next hospital appointment, to take my blood and discuss all this with the doctor, is on Monday.)
But that doesn't really count, that is merely the New Normal, the Normal where I have become - and will forever remain - a cancer patient in the NHS.
I felt remarkably well last weekend.
Two weeks of treatment in the bag, and there I was in the swimming pool on a Saturday morning... ("They told me I'm not allowed to swim," said my Choir Friend who is also having radiotherapy at the moment. Yes, they told me that too. I've considered the advice and decided to ignore it on the basis that the I-feel-much-better effect of a swim outweighed the risk of chlorine-induced skin irritation. Anyway, I can't feel the skin around the radiotherapy site.) ...so there I was, and before I knew it, it was half an hour and 50 lengths later. Only a week earlier, I had floated sedately along in an effort to keep my limbs vaguely flexible. Now, I was positively cleaving through the water. For the first time in living memory, I felt strong. (I'm not exaggerating. I had genuinely forgotten how that felt.)
The next day, I stood in front of the microphone in church and sang lustily without becoming dizzy or sweaty of even vaguely out of breath.
I came home on top of the world.
"I feel BETTER!" I beamed, several times, to make absolutely sure that my husband and children got the message. Because I did feel better. Properly better. All the more sweet for being so unexpected, because I was still in the middle of my radiotherapy treatment.
"What shall we do to celebrate the end of nine months of misery?" I asked them.
To which one of my children remarked, "Now mum, don't exaggerate. It wasn't really nine months of misery."
I suppose I should see this as good news. The fact that my children don't seem to be too traumatised by the whole affair. I suppose they haven't seen the tears on my pillow, and I'm glad they didn't.
It even made me stop and think. Am I exaggerating? Perhaps it hadn't been too bad, after all? Because look at me, here I am, still smiling (no, beaming, as noted above), with not much to show for my efforts except a bald head. And even that won't last.
But still, I was entitled to a bit of a celebration, I thought. So I booked a very English afternoon tea (with champagne) at a posh hotel near the Royal Marsden Hospital, to be enjoyed immediately after my final zap. I found a good friend who could take time out of work to celebrate with me.
It's been a funny sort of week, an up-and-down one, but with the up and the down happening at the very same time. Two sides of the same coin.
On Monday, I marched cheerfully along to the hospital, chatted cheerfully to my fellow patients, cheerio'd the radiotherapists cheerfully, walked cheerfully back home, then fell into bed and cried and cried. Perhaps "wailed" is a better description.
My happiness, borne of that wonderful feeling of getting better, only exists because of all the misery. (Yes, misery. I'm going to insist on it. It was bloody miserable.) It means that I can't be this happy without acknowledging the misery at the same time. I can't smile without tears.
And it isn't all over. Having fancied myself fully recovered last weekend, I then had to acknowledge that actually, these daily round trips were getting a bit too exhausting, my daily recovery time a bit longer, so I had to give up on work. Trying hard not to feel too guilty about it, not too much of a wimp. I'm sleeping well beyond the morning alarm clock.
So, today's final zap then.
For some reason, it was a couple of hours later than the usual 11.30am slot, so Mr A and Mr B and Ms C and Ms D weren't there, but there were several other patients I vaguely recognised. I joined in cheerfully with the standard how-far-do-you-have-to-come and how-many-more talk.
"My last one today!" I said, cheerfully.
Cheerfulness all round. In the waiting room, in the zapping room, walking out of the waiting room: I couldn't stop smiling. Then I went to the toilet, and just like that, the coin was flipped and I cried.
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| Afternoon tea to celebrate the end of cancer treatment |
A couple of hours later, I crossed Albert Bridge for the last time. Well, not the last time I'm sure, but next time I'll leave Owl at home. I'm quite done with it all.
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| Leaving the Royal Marsden behind for the last time |
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