Saturday and I attempt to get up quickly but fail, my body needs time to wake up. My partner brings me a hot water and I sip it until I am ready to arise. A quick bagel breakfast and my partner and I go in search of a suitcase for the holiday. We try the local shops at the big garden centre but to no avail so we return home empty handed. I do a Tesco order for later today and then take to drafting the blog having read a WhatsApp message that included my resignation announcement in May 2006 of my Therapy Directorship of the HMP Dovegate Therapeutic Community. It raises memories of people who I still meet with and those that have either died or moved out of my sphere of contact. Its a strange feeling after two decades to think about all the things that the group has done since and how they have spread out.
My afternoon sees me filling the bird and squirrel feeders before finally getting round to planting the rest of the bulbs in the front garden flower bed. If all goes well the Spring will bring five bunches of Narcissus to edge the front flower bed. It is intriguing how things will turn out. Having cleared everything away I sink in to the sofa to watch a rugby match, which turns out to be a really good one. I pack my holiday main bag and then watch England thrash Serbia 7-0. Of course Strictly follows on the i-player, during which I try to get some old compact cameras working and take in a Tesco order. Before going to bed I pack my traveling office backpack. I have a whole range of techno goodies that goes with me on holiday. This time the cameras and binoculars are going on holiday as well on the basis that there might be seals to see and photograph. Tomorrow is a long drive to be taken slowly.
Friday and I wake up feeling stiff and tired although I have slept well. My partner brings me a hot water and I eventually get up having found nothing in my messages or emails. While my partner busies herself with holiday preparation I make a simple breakfast dressed in my training kit. I am determined to train today to try an get rid of the stiffness in my arms and to try and get my body kick started. My partner goes off to shop for the holiday and my holiday underwear arrives. I get myself into the garage and get on the rower with my ear buds in and feeding me Sophie Ellis Bexter’s Kitchen Disco with summer music. All I want to do is get to the end of this session, as I start to slowly pull.
My fatigue shows up in the lack of metres but I finish the session.
As I suspected the session is hard and is the worst one yet in this new season of training. I take solace in the fact that I complete the session. That’s four sessions in the week, so not bad for the first week. As I am away on Sunday I will have to do my weekly weigh in on Saturday, I am hoping that my abstaining from sweets, cakes and puddings will see a drop in my weight, but I maybe being over optimistic. I shall see tomorrow.
My day now focuses on getting a shower and packing for the holiday. There is also the final arrangement of any possible break in the journey at a handy hotel or not. In the final analysis it is decided that we will make our travel arrangements to take up only one day so it will be an early start on Sunday.
Having showered and got comfortable I put out my holiday clothes. Its a dilemma of what t take and what to leave at home. The easy stuff is the inner layers, its the outer layers of hoodies, jumpers and jackets that pose the problem. I am spoilt for choice, which is definitely a first world problem. It is all so weather dependant and I’ve little indication of what its going to be for sure next week. In the end I hedge my bets with light weight rain wear and stuff that will keep me warm on wind swept beaches. So eventually I have a pile of clothes that should see me through a seaside week. With all this sorted I return to the blog while my partner is off visiting her mother in the care home with her brother. With my clothes packing sorted I turn to deciding what tech is coming with me in my portable office. It is amazing how much techno stuff alongside my book reading for the week I can pack into my office back pack. I’ve decided that if there is a chance of seeing seals on this holiday I am definitely going to take my proper camera with me. I have no doubt it will all get sorted by the time we come to leave for our holiday destination. I just need to sort out the folding chairs, although god knows if we will ever need them on a seaside holiday in October in England. Optimism needs to be fed I guess.
My evening is going to be food and the final episodes of One Dollar and if I’m lucky episode three of Slow Horses. Now I have another day at home I can relax a bit and may even contemplate another training session tomorrow.
“Any fool can make something complicated. It takes a genius to make it simple.”
Thursday and the 1st of October I wake up knowing I have to shift myself as I have jabs this morning. Breakfast is a quick toasted tea cake and orange juice to accompany my morning meds. I have time to check my messages and my emails before my partner gives me a lift to the GP surgery. I was going to walk but to be honest I do not feel great. My partner drops me off at the GP surgery, I am early but I get in straight away and in no time my usual nurse has stuck a needle in each upper arm with my COVID and FLU jabs. I am very quickly back in the car and on the way home.
I am just resting when my partner goes to the gym for an Aqua class so I decide to join her. It gets me out of the house. I throw a journal and some books into a bag and of we go. My partner goes to her class while I munch a bacon roll and drink dark black decaf coffee whilst reading Cicero’s essays on friendship and old age. I also start to read his collection of letters. Sending letters in the ancient Rome empire seemed to depend on having slaves you send, if in Rome, or knowing someone who might be going in the general direction of the intended recipient. I sent a letter on the 11th of September to a friend who lives a 25 minute drive from me which did not arrive until the 29th of September. Not good for a service that is supposed to deliver within at least two days of posting. Had I been in the Roman empire I would have sent a house slave off with it and it would have arrived the same day. Tell me again how modern technology is making my life better.
My partner reappears and we leave for home. On the journey I remember it is one of my grand children’s birthday is in mid October and the pharmacy has sent me a text to tell me that my prescription is ready to collect. Once home I get comfortable and start to draft the days blog listening to medication music.
As the afternoon progresses my partner start to plant out the winter pansies in the front door and drive way pots. I assist with getting the compost and preparing the pots. I leave my partner to plant the flowers while I clean up the block paving from the side of the house. There are a lot of small plants and weeds trying to establish themselves in the blocks but I get to them and then fil the gaps with salt and sweep it into the path. I have found that using salt in this way prevents weeds growing back, simple and easy. With the pots done and the garden tools packed away I return to the sofa and some big bang theory. I have an early tea as I am expecting a call from a friend who duly rings at the agreed time. It is a long time since we had a long chat so we catch up with what we have ben doing and how our respective families are. It is really good to have time to chat to someone who is not in my family and who is living a very different family life out in the world that I no longer have much dealings with. After my call I settle down with my partner to watch One Dollar. I have to say that the setting of the Rust Belt in America seems a grim place to be apart from the shows plot line. I am tired so go to bed relatively early having taken my night meds. As I go to bed I become aware that one of my arms is aching a bit from the COVID jab I had earlier in the day.
Seneca builds on Cicero as Nero watches Rome burn.
Wednesday and I over sleep. I hate it when I wake at about 8am and then reawaken later to find its gone 10 o’clock. It sets me back and disturbs me. The assumption I make is that my body is telling me that I need the rest but it is still annoying. My partner pops in before she goes to the gym and gives me the now warm, but was hot, water she bought me earlier. I get up and make my breakfast feeling groggy. It makes me wonder if this is adrenal insufficiency or fatigue from the previous days rowing session. It could of course be both. I take my morning meds and try to get myself going. First up is buying some sports socks which should have been easy but MandM had locked me out of my account so there was that to sort out first. Finally I get things ordered and turn my attention to other things.
The big job of the morning was replacing the bulb holder in the bathroom. I had already prepared a new bulb socket so the first stage was to remove the old bulb socket from the ceiling fitment. Standing on a chair I managed to get the old fitment out of the socket and then chop off the bulb socket. With that done I could rewire a new bulb socket onto the power supply wires. It went relatively easily, but my arms tired quickly and it took several goes to get it done. I plugged in a new bulb and to my relief it worked. All I had to do was reassemble the light fitment and put it back into the ceiling. It all worked! All that was left was to put all the tools away, which by the time I had done I was knackered and retreated to the garden swig seat to recover.
The garden swing seat is where my partner found me when she retuned from the gym. After a chat and some planning we went off to our local good coffee garden centre café and had lunch. There we chatted a bit about the state of the universe, the phenomena of pilots stabbing each other and what luggage to take on holiday. I am personably intrigued by whether there is a contiguity between the development of our personal universes by which we make meaning of being and living, and the creation of astronomical universes. I suspect I will never know. I think there is too much dark energy and matter in my processes to know. On our return I napped. I was overwhelmed with fatigue for a while until I started to draft the blog for the day. I then spent my time reading Cicero and writing a little bit.
My current reading.
A little reading and then I write:
561 I find as I get older my body moans more. Not just silently but involuntarily audible. A grunt or expletive meeting movement, once youthfully easy but now seized. I’m smaller too, used to be over six feet with a good pair of Cuba heels, but now I come in at five nine. My discs are slimmer, worn down by years of sport and pelvic thrusts, unless my arches have collapsed spectacularly. My lungs can no longer out dunk my grandchildren and Scuba is off limits. I also think my balance has gone. But this is easy to explain, the weight of all that wisdom in my head topples me over, except when the idiocy in my arse pulls me quickly earthwards. 562 30-09-2026
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The evening arrives along with the evening meal an TV. Tonight there is more of The Crowded Room to watch before its time to take my meds and get to bed. Tomorrow is not only the first day of a new month but also it is COVID and FLU jab day at the GP surgery. I’m booked in early morning, I’m just hoping all goes well there is a holiday journey to drive on Saturday.
Tricky things universes, especially the making of them. There is clearly much dark in the process.
Tuesday and I wake up to find my partner still home due to a cancelled physio appointment. She brings me a hot water and then goes off to the gym to do an aqua session. I get up and make myself a muesli breakfast and take my morning meds. My muscles are aching after the last two days training so I take some time to update my journal and prepare it for the coming month. by late morning I am fully organised and prepared. I get into my training kit and wonder if I am doing the right thing, there is always the anxiety that if I over do it I might induce the dread blood in the urine but I am willing to chance it as the benefits outweigh the down side. The garage is cold even though the weather forecast said it was going to be in the 70s. I strap into the rower set the session for 20 minutes, put my ear buds in and tune into Sophie Elis-Bextor’s Kitchen Disco and get under way. It feels a tough session, my body complains but I realise at the 10 minute mark I am doing okay and might improve on yesterdays session. Being driven I pull harder and faster with the result that I do indeed exceed the previous sessions this week. This is a typical case of no gain without pain, not a view I necessarily agree within this case it fits the situation.
Wow that’s about 200 metres and 12 calories better than yesterday
So my body was feeling rough but produces a session that is the best yet since I went back to training. I take that that to mean that there is potential to get back to a decent level of fitness. It provides the motivation to continue with my efforts, my diet and water only intake. I wonder if I will be able to row for an hour by Christmas? After a few minutes to recover I take a shower to refresh me and give my body a treat. Feeling refreshed and revived I take to the sofa and start the draft of todays blog. I have been looking on the internet at where my poetry collections get offered and I am surprised at how many stores say they offer it, a lot in America, I think. I am convinced the Americans I first dealt with ripped me off, I’ve never seen any royalties from there. Maybe nothing has ever sold, but I am suspicious.
I wander into the afternoon waiting for the return of my partner before deciding on which task to take up next. My partner returns and we decide to go for a bite to eat and a coffee. We go to a local garden centre that does good coffee and average tuna melts. Having eaten we drive to the garage next door to check my tyres but the air line was not working. I drive on and go to another garage where I check my tyres and to up my fuel tank. Once home I feel fatigued and decide to have a nap. Feeling slightly groggy I rouse myself and go and fil the bird and squirrel feeders. Between the birds and the squirrels they will eat me out of house and home. The light leads I had been waiting for get delivered and I set about making up one to put into the bathroom light that needs mending. By the time this is done its tie to eat and watch England’s football team beat a ten man team. I take my night meds early, watch the first episode of strange American thriller, The Crowded Room. I draft the blog, put the bins out and go off to bed feeling tired.
Monday and I wake up late and slightly achy after yesterdays exertions. When I do get up I get into my training kit before taking my morning meds with orange juice. Then its into the garage and onto the rower. I’ve no ambition beyond doing my 20 minutes so with ear buds in I start out on my row. My body complains but I push on to the end. I am pleased as I find that I have gone further than yesterday and further than the last session 152 days ago. Somewhere inside a small voice is pleased that I can still do this. with the training out of the way I indulge in a toasted tea cake and some water.
Go me! More metres and calories than yesterday and 151 days ago!
In the early afternoon my partner and I go to a local garden centre for a bacon roll and a coffee. While there we peruse the seeds and plants and end up buying some bedding plants for the pots that need reinvigorating. Once home I retreat to the sofa and spend my afternoon reading Cicero’s essays on friendship and old age. Its good stuff but quite dense. After the evening meal my partner goes to her singing lesson while I watch The Big Bang Theory. The evening comes to a close with me taking my night meds and getting to bed relatively early. Tomorrow I shall see if my drugs order has gone through as I plan the travel to our holiday destination on Saturday.
Sunday and wake up after a late night watching Strictly on the i-player. Todays the day I start my recovery properly. There is weight to be lost and fitness to be gained before I can declare myself body fit for Christmas. So no more sweets, biscuits, puddings or nibbles till Christmas and regular exercise, for me that means the rowing machine needs to be used and oiled. I g o to the bathroom for the first of the day and then weigh myself. Its horrific, fat boy weighs in at 104.9 Kilos, that is unacceptable. It is a combination of comfort eating sweet stuff during the misery of 8 months of chemo therapy and the bucket loads of steroids I have taken during that time. All of this must change. I get into my training gear, put my ear buds in and march towards the garage and my rower. I strap myself in and set the rower on level 3, the last level I trained at pre chemo, and set the time for twenty minutes, and then I am pulling away.
It goes okay, I am of course tired but happy that the calf muscle I strained three weeks ago has held up and I have managed the full 20 minutes. I sit on the rower giving myself a minute to recover and then take a photo of the machine’s monitor, so I can compare the data with the last time I trained. I make my breakfast muesli and open a fresh bottle of water. I take my steroids with the food but today is special, its the first day of reducing my steroids below five milligrams, down to four. This is the beginning of the tricky bit of tapering off steroids. At levels below 5mg it will become apparent whether or not my body has switched on its own adrenal system or whether I am going to suffer from adrenal insufficiency. Time will tell and I shall be watching out for fatigue and the other symptoms of the insufficiency.
The first session of a long journey
I check how long its been since I last trained and it turns out that it was on the 30th of April this year, that’s 150 days ago. When I compare my performance today to the last training session back at the end of April I find I am only ten metres short of the April session and expended 1 calorie less than in that session. Given what the last 150 days have contained I am pleased with todays session. In a months time when I reduce my steroids again by 1mg a day I will increase the level of effort to level 4 on the rower. If I keep tapering my steroids dosage by 1mg a month I shall be free of them by February and if I am persistent a few kilos lighter.
With the morning exercise and reduced meds done I record it all in my journal and think about cooking tonight’s meal, I ‘m going to cook my special smoked paprika chicken one pot using the smoked paprika that our Hungarian guest brought us, but in order to do so I need to go and get red wine and bacon. My partner who is gardening decides to accompany me so we walk off to the village shop. This is something I have not done in a while and is a symbol of my perceived inability to do things due to the chemo fatigue. My partner and I arrive at the village co-op quite hot as I had worn my leather biker jacket and she her fleece. We gathered up the food we needed and managed the self check out but not before some one came and ratified that this 78 year old was old enough to buy alcohol. The walk back home was slow. I stowed the goodies and then took to the recliner to start the draft of todays blog before watching the Leicester Tigers play Saracens.
My team lose at the rugby and I make my way to the kitchen where I prepare paprika chicken one pot. There is some football to watch while the food bubbles away. The food is good and moves my partner and I onto watching Zero Day starring Robert De Niro. It keeps us going till I take my meds and head for bed. Day one of the “body fit for Christmas” has gone well, I hope day two goes as well.
Its Friday and I wake up late and rouse myself to get up and make breakfast and take my morning meds. Its a tricky timing day as I need to wait for somethings to arrive before I can send out the review copies of my latest collection. Eventually the posting boxes and the labels are all together and I can start the process of packaging things up. Firstly I have to make sure that I have the right addresses for the recipients. It takes a while to do the research but I eventually get the ten or so addresses that I need. Three daily news papers, two radio stations, a TV channel and a couple of prostate cancer organisations. Armed with my research I start to assemble posting boxes, which I realise I will need to tape up for security. I go and root out my collection of coloured gaffer tapes and in doing so manage to drop a pack of them on my head. Undeterred I carry on and make up the first boxes. I also dig out foam envelopes for the book to go into and then run off the Ruler’s Wit letter head letters to various editors, managers and directors. Of course if anyone responds they will respond to Ruler’s Wit, the publishers so I may never know, at least not quickly. With all the component parts.
By four o’clock in the afternoon I have a pile of ten boxes to go to the Post Office. I load them into carrier bags, which my eldest daughter and I lug across to the post office. The chap behind the post office till does a sterling job of stamping up the posting boxes and eventually hands over my list of tracking numbers. While I have been “boxing” my eldest daughter has gathered up a paper and treats for the evening. I return home relieved that the task is done. Somewhere in the day I have exchanged emails with the publishing team and decided to have hardback versions of my last two book made. It means that all of the Cancer Years series will be in hardback and may physically survive for longer.
The evening is filled with watching the end of The Recruit and the start of a series called Cracked. The later is poor and I think I will be searching for a more engaging series to watch. Finally I go to bed having taken my night meds and watched some of a Timothy Daulton Bond film. I conclude that he was underrated but I do not stay to the end of the film.
Saturday and it is a Poetry Stanza day, via Zoom today. I wake quite late to find my partner has gone with her brother to their mother in the care home. I spend time having breakfast, taking my morning meds and preparing the office for me to attend the poetry stanza meeting. This includes reading all the poems through and thinking about which one I will offer to read. There are some really good poems this month. Unfortunately I cannot share them here but perhaps in the future they will become available. I will share mine though, it is one that is not in the latest collection.
552 It’s the persistent alive that are the pain. The thankless resentful who cling on, making their children pay in guilt and anxiety with no regard for the anguish the others have to contain. As everything fails the character hardens, the anger and pettiness rises and is released on those that love the most, those that work to make dying humane, the care enough and the pain less. Fighting to the end means everyone is the enemy and all are in the cross hairs of discontent and frustration. Death knocks loudly but has the door slammed in its face. There are more days, more opportunities to express displeasure, to vent the fear of going and the loss of selfhood. Everything is taken by nature, the growing old, the infirmity of a being ending. All around the family grits its collective jaw and makes the arguments for patience, tolerance and doing the right thing. Partnerships absorb the tears, the helplessness, and self doubt, and sometimes, just sometimes whisper “ it would be kinder if they were dead”. But dead they are not and until they are there is no relief for anyone. Either Nature has got it wrong or medicine got too clever. Humanity no longer understands how to do this?
551 13-08-2026
I spend time before the meeting with my partner on the swing seat and then fill the bird and squirrel feeders before returning to my partner on the swing seat. In very few minutes the squirrel appears as do the birds. They have an uncanny knack of knowing when I have just filled their feeders. No chance of them starving this winter.
The poetry stanza goes well and my “on the nose” poem seems to be accepted. Some of the other poems are just brilliant, especially the ones about how our modern internet living is excruciating. The discussion and analysis of the poetry is always informed and intelligent, there are many good brains in the group. It is fascinating to hear what other people are picking up in the world and what issues move them to write poetry about it. It was a really good meeting.
Post stanza meeting I settle down to draft the blog for yesterday and today, while my partner prepares tea and we both wait for Tesco to deliver our weekly food shop. Tonight England play Spain, so we shall be watching that before sliding off to bed. Tonight is an important night. It is the last night I shall be taking 5mg of my steroids. Tomorrow I start the serious tapering off of the steroids, so I will be down to 4mg as of tomorrow. I have also decided that this is the moment to start to train, so tomorrow I will get my arse back on the rower and endeavour to kick start my body back on the road to fitness. It also means this is my last night of treats, no more sweets, biscuits and sweet snacks. My aim is to be body fit for Christmas. That’s just three short months away.
Thursday and I wake up feeling crap and with a head ache, not sure why. My partner brings me a hot water which I sip as I sort out the next Tesco delivery slot. I get up and have my meds before packing my shoulder bag to take to the gym, I drive my partner to the gym where I order a bacon roll and a black coffee to eat while I set to work on my laptop. I down a couple of paracetamol and check my emails. The draft letter from the publishers is there. I have to say their additions to my draft are a definite improvement. Later in the day I run off copies and start to pack up review copies to be sent out. I spend time trying to decide which poem to take to Saturdays poetry stanza meeting. The choice is wide but I narrow it down to two possible poems. Its a decision I will make on later in the day.
My partner finishes her aqua class and finds me dozing in the gym lounge. We have coffee before I drive us home via the pharmacy to pick up my steroids. Once home I load up my dugs dossettes with my reducing steroids. I move on to reading my energy meters and sending the readings off. The draft letter for the publishers is worked on again and I send off my poem for this weeks poetry stanza.
Amazon delivers the books and the labels I have been waiting for so I am able to make up the first parcel of books. This one goes to the author of the Foreword for the collection. All this admin takes me to the evening meal and then on to another episode of Slow Horses and more in the series of The Recruit. I finish off the blog for the day and take my night meds before going to bed hoping for a lay in tomorrow.
Tuesday and I wake to hot water and a timetable to get up as I’m going to accompany my partner to the gym, she to do aqua aerobics and me to have a bacon roll and a shower. So having taken my morning meds my partner drives us to the gym. My partner disappears to change and I await my bacon roll, at which point my partner’s brother appears. We chat and sip our coffees until he leaves for home. Having eaten my roll I head for the showers and indulge in multiple doses of body wash. Feeling refreshed and clean I meet up with my partner and we drive of home. We do not make it home as we decide to eat lunch out at our local Pesto. The place is empty and quiet as we dine whilst outside the sun shines. The food is good and of course I cannot resist the Affogato with a shot of Amoretto. Finally we get home, well fed and content.
On reaching home I head for the garden swing seat to gently rest. I am soon joined by a squirrel who rummages through the lawn looking for peanuts. My partner joins me to read and soon we are joined by a second squirrel, so the pair of them continue to search through the garden for food. And so the rest of the afternoon passes until it starts to get chilly and we retreat indoors to the comfort of the lounge. I check my messages and emails and then I decide to radically reorganise my end of the sofa, which means sorting out my piles of books and all the impedimenta that I have acquired to entertain me or do my life admin. It takes ages but by the end I have a pile of poetry books and a pile of reading books, the unread ones or ones in process at the top. Another pile is completed journals, the current journals and my spare ones. This pile is next to my own poetry book pile and the they are all surrounded by odds and ends that I am sure I will need.
There is more of The Recruit to watch before I take my night meds and get myself to bed.
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Wednesday arrives after a reasonable night sleep. My partner brings me hot water and I get ready to take my partner to lunch. First I have to draft a letter to send to potential book reviewers. With my admin out of the way I drive my partner to a distant garden centre for lunch. We take our time over the food and then spend some time looking at what the garden centre has to offer and in the end we buy some plant seeds before driving home.
I was tempted just to rest but I made the effort and got into the garden where I emptied the pots that had the sunflowers in them. It took a while to remove the canes and retrieve the ties before I got the pots free. I replanted the three pots with Narcisssus bulbs and netted them to prevent the squirrels from digging them up. They should flower in March next year but I suspect that of we have a mild winter they could flower earlier. With everything packed away I return inside for tea and to watch the the final episodes of season one of The Recruit. I finish the blog for the day, take my night meds and go to bed. Today I have felt fatigued but I am hoping its just a passing bad day.
