Tuesday and its been a rabid night, my injection site is very sore and tender I got up at 5am to take paracetamol again and clearly passed out till 11:15am. I came to feeling shit and sore. It takes a while for me to get up and get breakfast (more an early lunch) and take my meds. After the disappointment of the blood results last night I am feeling flat and deflated. I’m not sure where my next move is. I know that cycle 10 is out the window and that the oncologist will just want to monitor me for three months and tell me to fuck off and have a nice summer.

I spend time sending the additional poems and manuscript stuff to the editors at Rulers Wit to complete the manuscript for the new poetry collection. Later in the day I ask the person who wrote the Forward for the Man to Man anthology to write the Forward for The Rechallenge. My partner returns from the gym and has lunch after which we drive to a distant garden centre to collect a new hand bag ensemble that my partner has ordered. It is identical to the one she has and reordered one because it has been so successful and functional. Just like buying the same brand of underpants because they are comfortable. I am wearing my new Wildhearts T shirt, a gift from my eldest daughter who went to one of their gigs last night. While sipping diet coke and forking a coffee and walnut bun into my mouth we chat about my blood results and that the Chemo Rechallenge has come to an end. We both know that there will be no intervention beyond weaning me off the steroids for at least three months so we decide to investigate a short break away at a Spa. We drive home and I set about booking a Spa break. Mission complete. In early August we will be Spa ensconced and being rubbed down with oily rags and dining on, hopefully, robust food.

The evening arrives, I’m not hungry so it turns into a FFY (Fend For Yourself) evening. Apart from the Great British Sewing Bee and The History boys there is sod all on TV so I might just get the Stratocaster out and see if my fingers still work on a guitar. It all depends if I can find my Roland headphones. After my crap night last night I shall head to bed early having taken my meds knowing that tomorrow is the last of the Chemo Challenge and that my oncology review is going to be a disappointment, at least I can negotiate a tapering off of my steroids. I think I’m tottering on the brink of just saying “Fuck it”.