Janet's blog

To recap - the irritating news flash covered the rise in a liver enzyme* - alanine transaminase or ALT - which put a spanner in the smoothly turning chemotherapy wheel. Normal levels are around 4-56 International Units; on 7.8.18 mine was 370; on 9.8.18 it was 430. Really bad is >1000. Amid general uncertainty, (my) bewilderment, lack of helpful suggestions for the culprit, the way forward was to wait for the ALT to go down and/or carry out a liver ultrasound. Waiting for it to go down involved more morning visits to UCH for blood taking - Monday 13 August generated a result on Tuesday 15 August of 291 - in the right direction, if a long way from  normal. On the phone, the registrar said that this was OK for chemo to go ahead on Friday (17 August - one week's delay) but without the bevacizumab (Avastin). This suggested that their best bet was that the bevacizumab was the cause, trigger, partner in crime when put together with chemo, whatever - but they certainly weren't ...

I've been putting this off - summarising everything that's happened since I went in for surgery on 13 June has been in the much much too difficult box. At the time of my first draft, England had won two world cup matches, lost another and triumphed in a penalty shoot out and I had watched it all - the world turned upside down! Now, as I click the Publish button, everything England and World Cup has returned to the usual disappointment level, reduced to chip paper in the bin. Pre-surgery reception felt much too early - 7am on 13 June. I knew to anticipate an enema (another first) but anticipated it doubly by experiencing three anxiety enemas all on my own, including one that required getting off the tube at Highgate and finding a very helpful cafe. Worst station to choose - really deep and with a different entrance to the exit. Which was way down the road. Still managed to get to UCLH on time, unlike my notes. In pre-surgery somehow managed to see a preparation nurse, a stom...

Discharge from PACU came suddenly - after being delayed a day it was time to move on in the evening of 16 June. The hospital was quiet, I was still  pretty drugged up and the journey, by silent hospital bed, expertly steered by porters through an unknown hospital geography and lift infrastructure into the dim night time ward was yet another slightly surreal experience. 6th floor - great views And another temporary family of people to get to know, staff, students, patients. Again, there were aspects of recovery that were just astounding but which make that bit in A Fistful of Dollars more believable - the b eaten-up Clint Eastwood gets better and more accurate   before going out to gun down the baddies. When I arrived, I couldn't walk to the loo in the corner of the ward bay - maybe 10 metres away. Then I could creep on a nurse's arm, stooped over and trailing my drips and catheter bag. Then I could creep on Christopher's arm. But, attentive reader, I hear you...

Some lo yal and perceptive readers noticed that I hadn’t blogged since I had my surgery. As this means that I had more unreplied texts to f eel guilty about, it was high time I got back to it. For those of you who like time to flow in one direction, and feel perplexed, I'm sorry, even more time went by and I actually broke the radio silence with the annoying news about liver function. This is the post that should have gone first (and might indeed be followed by one that should have come before this...get the time machines out everyone). Why was there a long gap? Well – I did start writing about the surgery and the escape fr om hospital, but was unwilling to publish as it was a bit boring. I may still inflict those passages on you. Why else? a string of reasons. Certainly, it’s been a tiring business, convalescing. There was a lot of sofa, which transmuted into a lot of garden rocker, and a lot of daytime sleeping. There was a lot of drug taking (including 28 nights of self-...

How did the job interview go?

Rats! Should have been my 6th and last Friday chemo today. Might have been scuppered by sinking neutrophil count. But no, they have gone up just enough to allow another chemo. It's a new thing - Tuesday's blood liver function tests showed a rise in a liver enzyme, ALT, alanine transaminase - still rising on another test on Thursday. So no chemo today. Interweb a bit gloomy about causes, but doctors seem to think it's drug or substance related. Clutching at straws but I'm discontinuing treating my verruca (Bazookaing verrucae involves salicylic acid which is equivalent of strong aspirin....but only in drop quantities) and I'm going to stop rubbing Bio Oil into my wound scar (benzyl salicylate and a variety of essential oils but also in drop quantities). I do feel twitchy but I don't feel ill and my eye whites are still white(ish). Next blood test Monday morning. Promise to post to cover gaps soon.