18 radiotherapy treatments gone, and another 12 to go; one group of 5 with three days off, then a group of 4 with 2 days off, and then a final group of 3.  I have a Tupperware box of medications to help me through because apart from other side-effects the nausea has been unremitting.  However, today I’ve had a bit of a reprieve and managed to eat a roast lamb dinner and three crumpets with low fat cheese.  Result!  I feel like doing a little dance, and I still have 2 sick pills in hand.  How cool is that?  Whether the dancing about will make me feel sick again I don’t know, so I’d better stay sitting down.

One thing this treatment has taught me is that if you do not have good health then everything else pales into insignificance.  I sit waiting for my treatment every evening with a roomful of people battling all types of cancer.  Some are having the double whammy of chemotherapy at the same time.  I am the only one there who has any hair, and I’m grateful for having lost only the hair right at the back of my neck.  When the wind blows I get a cold draught at the back of my head, but at least I’m not bald and so I have to be thankful for small mercies.

Another thing I’ve come to realise is the abject terror has disappeared that I felt at the start of the treatment at the thought of having to lie immobilised in the CT scanner tube underneath a mask which stops even my lips from moving.  If you do something often enough, even something that you’re terrified of, then you will get used to it in the end.  I lie there supine and calm and listen to one of my favourite CD’s for the 15 minutes of treatment, and I’m sure my blood pressure has improved since the start of treatment a month ago!

It all points to that little sign above the reception desk by Addenbrooke’s main door – ‘It will pass, whatever it is’.  It’s my thyroid cancer that needs to pass, and this treatment had better pass as well, otherwise none of my clothes will fit.  But it was a lovely roast lamb dinner today, and I managed to stay awake to cook the whole thing myself.  I’ve written a blog and there’s still 2 sick pills in the Tupperware box.  It’s been a good day.

See you soon, love Stevie. x