Life Is Good

Hello everyone,

Sorry it's been a while. I've just had another load of chemo which I thought wouldn't be too bad but after two weeks of feeling brilliant (for the first time in ages) it's been a bit more difficult than I thought. At least with the other chemo it was so quick that you never really had time to get better. With this one I was dreading it because I felt good but I knew I was going to be feeling rotten for a couple of weeks. I haven't been THAT bad but in the mornings I feel a bit sick and I have been really tired. I usually perk up a bit in the afternoons but it means that the housework is not getting done which I hate... I can't even be bothered to do the washing up some days which I feel bad about because Ashley is working so hard at the moment and it's not fair for him to have to do everything.

Today is Friday and I just took my last lot of pills for this round of chemo so... no more pills for two weeks!!!!! I'll go back to work next week too which will be good (financially and for my peace of mind).

I have done some interesting things recently - chemo is not going to get in the way of me living my life! Ash and I went to the Biggin Hill Air Fair which was excellent - I really enjoyed the jet planes and the army helicopters and stuff. It was very noisy though! It was a beautiful day and I got quite tanned. The only thing was that because the traffic was so bad we had to walk all the way from Bromley Common up to Biggin Hill (about 2.5 miles uphill). It wasn't too bad, we took it slow but I was wearing pumps and by the end my feet were killing me (girls you know what I mean!). In the end though we overtook the two buses that we would have been on and got there a lot quicker than if we had got public transport or gone by car!

I also did my charity "run" in London for Crisis/the Willow Foundation. We had a little team, "Team Betty", and we did pretty well, we walked briskly and it took us about an hour, allowing for a bottleneck under London Bridge.



The Team

Ashley getting up close and personal to a sheep!

Me and my sister Helen (us, posing? Never!)

Me and Ashley

Scooby and Ken (who started the race - I think they probably booked him when he was still Mayor!)

I've managed to catch up with a few more friends (brilliant seeing Nicky and Charlotte yesterday - I can't believe it's been over a year!)

I also managed to fit in a very pleasant day out in Cambridge with Lindsay and Hazeley (or Lindsay and the Two Baldies - sorry Haze, at least mine will grow back!). We had lunch outside in the sunshine, wandered around the town which is beautiful and then went to the cinema to see Sex And The City (I loved it - the clothes, the shoes!!!!!)

Oh! I nearly forgot to mention there is a new addition to our household. Ophelia has moved up to London now to be closer to work so a new housemate has moved in - welcome to Mr Piggy-Whoop! He is a (I think) two-year old Guinea Pig that belonged to Ashley's sister Emma. As she is having a baby soon Mr Piggy had to go :( so he has come to live with us and so she can still see him.

Dora thinks he is hilarious and tries to pounce on him but she is not a very good hunter (can't even catch a fly) and he has lots of experience of cats so he is not fussed at all. In fact, I think they might be friends.


What's wrong with this picture???????

*UPDATE*
It's Monday and I'm back at work. It was a bit daunting thinking that I had to catch up to where I was before but I had a productive day and loved catching up with everyone.

I saw Mr D last week and have a date for surgery - 19 September. This will be to put in the tissue expander which will then be filled with saline to stretch my skin out ready to have a permanent implant put in. I'll be in for one day and it's not a long recovery period so the radiotherapy will start as soon as possible afterwards.

It really feels as though things are happening again and the end of chemo is sort of on the horizon now.

Hope you are all well,

More news when I have it

Lots of love

Liz
xxx