Tea and Chemo

I have no problem with the concept of ‘luck’ but I’ve always had an uneasy relationship with the word. I feel a little squeamish when people say that someone is ‘so lucky’. It smacks a little of their fortune coming through ill-gotten means, chance perhaps, cutting corners, cheating, even.

There are people in my life who really do seem to have more than their ‘fair share’ of bad luck. They’re the ones we all know, where you raise your eyes to god, the powers-that-be, fate or whatever holds the reins in your life, to just ‘give these people a break’. And difficult times do seem to have a habit of clumping together. But here’s the thing, the people who I consider to ‘deserve a break’, don’t seem to be the ones to describe themselves as unlucky. And vice versa.

And so I wonder if luck is all a matter of perception. I think that happiness lies in rejoicing when the toast falls the right side up rather than lamenting for too long when it falls sticky side down.

Granted, it’s annoying when you have to stop your day to mop up the gooeyness. And that pales into insignificance when compared to dropping a full bottle of milk onto quarry tiles in the kitchen and watching it seep faster than you can mop underneath the fridge, cooker, freezer... You’re not meant to cry over spilt milk, but when I think about it, I’ve come close.

I am always dropping milk bottles and they’re always full and they always smash. But then, I’m also always taking chunks out of plates with a slightly too speedy approach to stacking, bashing my hip on the side of the unit as I rush past the large piece of furniture which has been in the same position in our kitchen for the entire eleven years we’ve occupied the house, and have scars on my forearms to boast my devotion, if a little unfocused, to domesticity. If the toast falls sticky side down in my house, it’s probably more down to the inhabitation of fairies in my brain, and the law of averages, than luck.

When it comes to good luck in my life, I’ve had great deluges of it, for which I almost have to catch my breath. My daughter’s amazing recovery from a stroke could have been very different. I could have lost my arm in that spin drier instead of emerging with a scar and a story to bore my grandchildren and a great many others along the way. And I consider myself incredibly fortunate to be currently free of cancer. I am one of the lucky ones and very mindful of that. Even though the side effects of the drugs can contrive to make you forget it, it’s toast sticky side down to lament for too long.

And then there are the moments of fortune on a smaller scale which are nonetheless as sweet.

Such as when I saw That Tweet.

Call it luck, chance, providence, fate or fortune, I thank my lucky stars I happened to be on Twitter that day, when I happened upon a tweet from an author praising the brilliance and general loveliness of their publisher, Urbane Publications. How happy am I that I was playing around on Twitter when I should have been ironing; that I ever signed up to Twitter in the first place?

For whatever reason, I did notice the tweet, it did pique my interest and it did propel me to the Urbane Publications website. Once there, I started reading about collaboration and team working and proper editing and then I was hooked. A quick look at its list of authors and pending publications and a glance at page 17 of Google to check this too-good-to-be-true, small but perfectly formed and, in my humble opinion, going places press was kosher, and I’d dropped everything to draft my submission letter.

Roll forward a couple of months and the cover for my book is being finalised. I’m beavering away on the content for my copy deadline at the end of June ready for Urbane Publications to publish ‘Tea and Chemo’ in November.

When I was diagnosed with cancer I was swamped with factual information about the little blighter as well as the reasons for the treatments I was to have, together with their side effects. It was illuminating and helped me feel more secure. However there’s a difference between knowing what’s going to happen and knowing how it’s going to feel.

As well as the facts, I wanted an honest account of the experience of cancer. What does it mean to lose your hair? I mean, really mean, emotionally? I wanted to hear it from someone who’d been there, done that and got the hat and wig and scarf to show for it. I wanted a book which would educate me in a softly, softly way. I wanted the author to be an ordinary person who was still enjoying life, who’d got through to the other side, and, crucially, done it without any Super Powers.

My aim is for Tea and Chemo to be that book. With my blog posts as a framework and many more anecdotes added, I hope that it will inform cancer sufferers and their loved ones whilst also making readers smile. It’s useful information served with an empathetic hug, the story around the camp fire or a cup of tea with friends on a lazy afternoon.

Since taking my first steps into the cavernous universe of cancer, I have learnt a little in my non-scientific, better-if-you-give-me-an-analogy kind of way about hormones (your body doesn’t take kindly to you changing their levels), medicine induced water retention (who’d have thought to get rid of water retention, or ‘Herceptin Bum’, you should drink err, water?), Vitamin D, Parabens, free make-up, eyebrow tattoos, Prosecco over white wine, Chemo Brain (it’s for real and it sucks but it gets better), chemotherapy, radiotherapy, hormone therapy, tea therapy (ok, I made that one up) and time (that one’s for real because time really does help you get used to anything – and then you can deal with it).

Tea and Chemo is about sharing what I’ve learnt. It’s an outstretched hand if chemo gives you a mouth full of ulcers, your bones feel like they’ve been squeezed in a vice and you just want to go to bed and wake up when the whole darned cancer thing has been sorted.  I hope it will give you a hug when all your food tastes as though it’s been sprinkled with bicarbonate of soda and stirred with mud. And I hope it will help your loved ones, too.

And I know some chemo secrets. I know that white sauce (sweet, not savoury) and Rich Tea biscuits are the only things which taste as they should in the first two weeks after a dose of chemo, and quite frankly, this is a time in your life when you can eat five bowl-fulls on the trot (I did) and even mash a packet of biscuits guilt-free into the bowl. You see, treatment has its perks.

So, was I lucky to have found Urbane Publications? You bet I was. My experience so far is everything that Urbane Publications promises. I’m working as part of a team with people who know what they’re doing, and who are just as excited as I am about Tea and Chemo’s publication.

Regarding my good fortune in reading That Tweet, I am not allowed to complain about sticky toast on the floor, or even a crate of smashed milk bottles, for a good few years to come.

What do you do?

In my last post I talked about those well-meaning throwaway comments made to people with cancer which might have less than the desired effect. I found it a tricky post to write as uppermost in my mind was the fact that nobody wishes to offend and everybody means to say the right thing. With one man's compliment being another women's slap in the face, it's a minefield for those without privileged entry into a cancer sufferer's chaotic mind. Nonetheless, I hope the post was useful. Your responses were, as ever, thoughtful and touching.

I'm happy to say that I'm back in my comfort zone with this post. It was inspired by the lovely Chriss Green, prolific sharer of my blog for which I'm supremely grateful, who suggested I list things people have said which hit a good spot.

I started scribbling immediately but quickly realised that it was the things people had DONE rather than those they'd said, which stuck more in my mind. So, instead of words, I've listed some of the bountiful gifts and good-deeds people have bestowed upon me over the past ten months. This isn't a definitive list of how to empty your money box or eat up your already hard-pressed time when you find out someone close to you is suffering, and it won't be for everyone, but I hope my experience might offer a few nuggets of usefulness.

And at least I get the chance to say thank you :)

Meals on Wheels

People would ask me to let them know what help I needed. They truly wanted to help - but it feels wrong to ask somebody with a job, various children, a dog, family taxi service and clean toilets to provide, to run around for me when I'm confined to the sofa.

This doesn't mean that help wasn’t gratefully received - even getting dressed was a bit of an effort on my worst treatment days - and so to open my door on several mornings to find a meal for four requiring only a re-heat and transportation to the table, was wonderful. My Meals on Wheels deliveries made me smile and I'd just like to say a public thank you here, as well as an apology for not always returning the Tupperware in a timely fashion.

Picking my children up from clubs and feeding them
Thank you.

Picking me up from home and taking me for a coffee

(and appointments) Thank you.

Supermarket delights
With special thanks to the Marks and Spencer Dine-in initiative.

Bags of healthy food, home-made chocolate brownies, cakes and bought cakes (I'm not choosy)

Thank you.

Loans of DVDs and books
Again, thank you.

Messages

Personally, I'm not a great fan of speaking on the phone. I blame my poor hearing which makes the process excruciatingly painful for all parties involved. But I had some sleepless nights and painful days through chemo and receiving texts out of the blue saying simply that I was in people's thoughts, was a great tonic. With my treatment induced lethargy however, responding could take chunks out of my day so I hope you'll accept my apology for the tardy replies.

Cards

As above. I have kept them all :)

Gifts

This may sound terribly materialistic but to know that someone is thinking of you when they go shopping (and I know that often presents came after much research and probing of shop staff's knowledge) touched my heart.

Most practical gift? There were so many! Warm items of clothing went down well – I wore my fluffy pink angora wool socks constantly as well as my Bamboo Chic Lite cardigan. It isn't particularly that treatments make you cold, it's just that our house is Baltic if you aren't running up and down the stairs every second minute.

Most used item? Probably my Anastasia Beverly Hills eyebrow kit. People expressed their delight that I'd held onto my eyebrows – I hadn't ;) Luxury hand and body creams were also a great buy as cancer treatments really dry out the skin. I was lucky enough to be given lots of luscious products I wouldn't normally afford which I'm still using now.

Most tear-inducing? My four-leaf clover bracelet, four-leaf clover necklace (there's a theme here), message and pocket sized hearts. And don't get me started on the hand-made ring given to me shortly after the wedding of one of my closest friends, which I couldn't attend due to an incredibly poorly timed third operation.

Home visits?

I learnt something about myself during chemo: I don't like to see people when I'm ill. I prefer to lick my wounds on my own, cushioned by my home, cancelled appointments and my texting fingers for when things are improving. And then when I'm recovered, that's when I like to see people. Of course, one person's nightmare is another's delight so it's probably worth asking the question.

Showing you know

Everybody wants the cancer to be treated and consigned to the past post haste. Having treatments behind you is wonderful but the fear that the cancer will return is massive. I've needed my friends and family more mentally post treatment than during it. While you're to-ing and fro-ing to hospital for the potpourri of chemicals and radiation assigned to you, you're invincible. The brilliance of modern science and your medical team are all over this little cancer blighter. Pah! Those piffling little cancer cells wouldn't have a chance against drugs which make your hair fall out and turn your bones to putty. 

But when treatment ends and it's you, your body and a measly little tablet fighting the good fight, staying mentally strong enough to banish the fear to the back of your mind can be tough -particularly when every drug-induced side-effect or contact with bugs with a weakened immune system feels incontrovertibly like the return of cancer. Those of us who have beaten cancer or who are in remission are the lucky ones and I never forget that but sometimes the dark thoughts can be over-powering and it's easy to feel a little alone at this post-treatment time.

We're all so busy and I personally find that as soon as one person I know edges out of a crisis situation, another moves in. But showing you know doesn't have to be time-consuming. A word or a hug to remind your friend that you know the shadow of cancer is still pretty overwhelming, or that the side-effects of drugs can be depressing, might be all your friend needs to help them get on with the business of living.

Timing

Anyone who's had a baby will know that when your new-born is tiny and cute and sleeping a lot, everybody comes to visit. Then the visits stop and you're left with the magnitude of looking after this new little person who is sleeping less, feeding more and making more washing. Right now is when you could really do with someone holding the baby while you put the tea on.

Cancer is a little bit like that. Lots of people visit at the beginning and it's a very human, touching reaction. But if you're well before treatment starts, this period can be very busy. The same pending-birth-nesting need kicks in and suddenly having clean bed linen, every item of school uniform washed and neatly pressed, full cupboards, full freezer and a sparkling toilet in place before your operation, becomes monumentally important. And then there's the children's schedule to organise for the three weeks post op when you won't be driving - the cancer will not make them miss out on any of their activities mantra beating inside your head - supper to arrange because you won't be entertaining for a while and work to finish for previously made deadlines set smack in the middle of a dose of morphine.

So, I'd like to suggest you take the pressure off yourself. Visits are lovely but don’t feel guilty if you can't rush around the moment you find out – sending a message and arranging to meet once your friend is out of hospital might actually be more relaxing and helpful for both. 

So, that's my list. Can you add any top tips? I love to read your comments.

By the way, did I say thank you enough?? This wouldn't have been a year I'd have chosen but nonetheless, I look back upon it with a smile. I've seen lots more of my friends and family than I normally would and who could possibly complain about that?