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Category Archives: chemo

brave new me

06 Friday Aug 2010

Posted by azahar in cancer, change, chemo, friends, hospitals

≈ 16 Comments

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hospitals

It started with solo trips to the hospital for my monthly chemo port cleaning – I realised that if I went in the evening it was less busy and I could be in & out in about ten minutes. The first time I taxied there and back and the whole thing took less than an hour, which I thought was pretty good. It also felt good not to have to ask someone to come with me – thought it best to save that favour for scarier appointments like seeing the oncologist and going for PET scans. And so I started planning the port cleaning trips for evenings that Nog had a class nearby – we’d meet up after we’d both finished, go for a tapa and then walk home together (same price as taxi fare, but much more pleasant!). From there I started getting braver and braver…
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summer jobs

15 Thursday Jul 2010

Posted by azahar in cancer, chemo, home, summer, work

≈ 9 Comments

Tags

summer, work

I have to say that this summer is going so much better than the last two. Not only for the obvious reason of this being the first summer in three years that I haven’t been on chemo, but also because of summer jobs and work projects. First off, Nog has got a gig this month teaching a couple of intensive English classes at the language school across the street which – fingers crossed! – might also mean work in August, and perhaps a steady part-time position afterwards. This takes a whole lot of stress off of me as it means Nog will be able to pay his share of the rent & bills, at least in July. Meanwhile, my long-time student, good friend and GP Agustín has continued with his once a week English classes this month. He has always taken a “time out” from July-September and so I reckon these are kind of sympathy classes, but what the heck – I’ll take em! And I am continuing with my social media part-time job, which I am LOVING. Which for me sums up all the paid work I am doing, however…

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wonder twins

13 Tuesday Jul 2010

Posted by azahar in cancer, change, chemo, death & dying, friends, hope, hospitals

≈ 13 Comments

Tags

cancer, friends


Sometimes I think about the things that have happened over the past two years,which never would have happened if I hadn’t got cancer. And amongst all the nightmarish crap there is actually quite a lot of good stuff too. One of the best things has been meeting and getting to know my friends Gaelen and Jed, both of whom I met on the Colon Club forum. There are a lot of very good people on that forum, but somehow I’ve always felt especially connected to these two guys in a way that’s difficult to explain. I’ve also had many parallel experiences with both, and most recently with Jed…

You probably remember the seriously bad scanxiety I had before my last PET scan a couple of weeks ago, feeling almost certain that the other shoe was about to drop and I was going to end up back on chemo this summer. Or worse – that they would find more tumours and chemo would no longer be an option. Well, at that same time Jed was very seriously looking at that latter situation after having had a scary PET scan result a few months earlier. His follow-up PET was scheduled for a few days after mine but he then had to wait another ten days to get his results. Which was yesterday.

Jed’s been in Taiwan with his family this past year, teaching and writing, which means we are in way different time zones. And so when I woke up yesterday morning I knew that he would have already seen his doctor. First thing I did was grab the iPhone and check my emails, and there it was. A quick report from Jed saying those magic words – nothing visible on the scan – and I almost cried from relief and happiness, also knowing how relieved and happy he must be feeling. As he said, “we have both had our doctors convinced we were beyond hope before climbing back from the brink”, and I think it was over on the forum that he first made the remark about us activating our wonder twin powers, which made me laugh. But hey – it worked!

So, well done my wonder twin.
Together we are invincible!

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a good day

25 Tuesday May 2010

Posted by azahar in cancer, chemo, food & drink, friends, hope, hospitals, neighbours, sevilla, work

≈ 18 Comments

Tags

cancer, friends, hospitals, pet scan, tapas

After all was said and done my “scary” hospital day yesterday turned out quite well. I’d got up early for yoga class and tried to keep busy doing biz stuff at home later, but I was getting more and more nervous as the day went on. And it was silly because I KNEW that this oncology appointment was just going to be about setting up my next PET scan, but unlike going to get my port flushed out (which I can now do on my own!), actually having to talk to the oncologist makes the whole cancer thing feel more real and threatening somehow. But it went well. Had a nice chat with doctor Ana and, after a bit of consternation on her part, she agreed to let me have the scan early in June, which was what I’d been hoping for. I have so many things on the go that I want to know as soon as possible if I’m going to be okay for the next few months. Also, if this next scan is clean, it’ll be the first summer in three years that I haven’t been on chemo…

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monthly

22 Saturday May 2010

Posted by azahar in cancer, chemo, photohunt, photos

≈ 12 Comments

Tags

monthly, photohunter

Today’s Photohunt theme is “monthly”.

Just to the right of that scar is my chemo port.
I have to make monthly visits to the hospital to get it flushed out.

photohunter

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