Back Home

I am sitting in my bed having returned yesterday from another stay at GBH.
They changed my tablets so that I do not have a slow release patch but tablets daily and an extra tablet when extra pain occurs or I want to get into an artistic mood.
Sadly I was tired and gloomy last night with a more cheerful state of mind this morning but a lot of vomiting.
My trip in was to deal with the big problem of the left hip. Both cancer and arthritis have been working on it and my confidence in it has been diminishing. I'm less worried now.
I was worrying about my next trip to Aberdeen where I will be going in a few weeks.
This will be for Zapping, the only thing they have not tried yet. They say it will slow the growth of the cancer in the bone. So I get a tattoo to ensure they send the ray gun in at the same place and the same angle each tine.
I looked on the website while I was in hospital where I find the top hundred players from each country. I am in the top hundred in Scotland. There are no Scots in the top hundred in the world.
I shall try and get into the top 50 in Scotland. It is  possible but not likely, although I may play some amazing stuff under the influence of my latest drugs. I'll keep trying; its good to have an ambition.
I'll be putting in short bulletins as I feel able.

Reading the bones

We have a conference daily. It goes a bit like this.
Nurse(or Janet) "Does it hurt?"
Me: "Yes.",
Both of them. "Ha Ha.)
They then manhandle me out of bed and into a wheelchair wheel me to the next room and pour me into the electric chair.
I make obligatory noises like Ooo! and Aaa! while they either laugh happily or tell me keep a stiff upper lip.
My favourite is one of them telling me "It doesn't hurt that bad."
The doctor rings daily and asks how I feel about being X-Rayed. I tell her I will need an ambulance door to door  each way. She agrees but I do not trust the people in Lerwick to do it.
Anyway I need to recover to enable me to have the checks in Aberdeen in November.
I'm not keen on travelling anywhere at present.
We still have two house but are gradually clearing the old one. It would be impossible to live there at present so the sooner it becomes our ex house properly the better.
Apart from asking about the pain, looking for wiggly bones, and assessing my ability to move things they can do little before getting me under the machinery. So coming soon may be the trip to Lerwick.

Frail old bones

I was trying to get from the armchair into the wheelchair. I slipped backwards and decided to throw myself forward again. There appeared to me to be a cracking noise and a lot of pain. I lay in the armchair shouting Oh! and things like that. Janet got the nurse and they got me into bed where I stayed for the rest of the day.  I am taking all the painkillers now. I got up for a couple of hours yesterday but just  a minute or two today.
They mentioned Xrays but I cannot go into Lerwick by car. I will need an ambulance each ways.
The nurse has ideas to stop bedsores and I am taking her advice.
I can watch films on the computer so have some entertainment besides internet chess.
Meanwhile I am reading Frank Muir's autobiography.

Foiled Again

Having arrived at the hospital with my entourage, Janet with Graham and Jeff, I was given a bed but decided not to change and get in in. I was thinking, give me the blood and I'll go.
Anyway the long and short of it was that I had no lung infection and that I would not get any blood. They thought it could give me more problems rather than fewer.
So I got the free lunch which was fish and chips - but the chips were last weeks by the taste. They also had a strange sponge pudding with odd dark bits in it. I thought I would steer clear of that. When I saw someone I knew from previous visits to GBH I asked her to remove the plate.
Since then we have been talking pain management.
They are very keen to have paracetamol in the background whatever else I take. I wonder about steroids as they gave me an appetite and I was able to drink beer and wine. My visitors had the odd drink but I seemed less able to bend the elbow as I had done earlier.
So Graham and Jeff have gone, Margaret and John arrived, Barnaby and Erin dropped in and Emma (Oscar's fiancée) and her father Andrew looked in and stayed a night.
Apart from the doctor on Friday, the local nurses every other day. the MacMillan nurse on Thursday, Rose and Murray on Monday to play Scrabble, and of course some neighbours with a few very healthy looking mackerel, no one else called except the man to fix the door handles.
So I am back in the groove watching the chess competition in St. Louis and looking forward to one in California later this year with a 1 million dollar first prize, oh, and a world championship match coming soon.
I hope to have a star night in September but have not decided which night. I may let people know we have telescopes here and they can ring saying when they want to come. I have to be able to at least get them started before going back into the warm. We'll see. 

Ham it up

Janet asked me what I had been shouting about. I hadn't realised I was shouting.
I had been wondering why my doctor had been cowering against the far wall when I was making what I considered a reasonable request,
Anyway the doctor rang me today to say that Gilbert Bain Hospital (you remember Grevious Bodily Harm)  were getting blood in and would arrange for a transplant - hopefully this week.
It made me wonder whether a group of vampires is called a battery.
If my circulation is still going round next week we should nave fun.
They had sheep dog trials today; no winner yet as they continue 'til all the fish and chips have been sold. No mushy peas but a reasonable curry sauce.

Now then

A greeting used in Shetland. It is  sometimes taken as a  precursor to an argument by incomers. Anyway it's "How are you?"
I am fed up having things I can't spell.
I had anaemia and thought I might have had two neemias but they said no. Then septicaemia which you would think might be called septiposher to keep up appearances, but no.
Then the other night I had a temperature again. I was told I was getting rigor which I thought came later.
The nurse told me dipped a sample of mine and it lit up the test paper like a rainbow. I had some of everything.
I had to be quiet the other day while the other nurse took blood. (They toss when Janet calls and the loser gets me.) I waited for her to finish before warning her that if she pushed the needle in too far the mattress would pop.
I am riding the bed today watching films from a hoard I was given. Tomorrow I will gather the trusty walking stick and sally forth to my electric chair.
I put my email on a previous blog so you can contact me individually if you want to do so.
Look after yourselves - I have a team looking after me..

Now Read on

There has been a break because the chemotherapy had a worse  and worse affect. They have now given me a scan and decided that there is no discernible improvement in my situation following the chemotherapy but an increasing downward change to my quality of life.
The hormone therapy had been partly successful.
They have a new wonder pill that I will start about 18th. August.
They will take a baseline blood test first. In November I will be checked again. If all is well I will stay on the palliative treatment.
I had another relapse the other day and gave the District Nurse some overtime. She went home at 2 a.m. leaving Janet to care for me until she returned after breakfast.
I am now relaxing and recovering.
I am looking forward to a visit from a couple of ex colleagues who used to march round the SW Coastal Path with me. We will look at the sights, try the local food and sample the output from our local brewery.
We should be able to make a good chilli sauce so I am trying to work out what to have with it.
The anaemia is still trying to take over but I am not yet needing more blood. Maybe I will manage with my own for a good while.
I  will update this site a little more frequently if I don't get feverish again.