Tuesday and I wake up late, 9:45 late and I have an oncology review in two hours. My partner brings me coffee and I come round a bit. I have breakfast, more coffee and my meds. My partner braids my hair and the post man delivers two letters. I am fortunate in my friends, they have written me thoughtful and supportive letters since my sisters death. I drive to the hospital with my partner, where we both sit and read until I am called.

I am shown my PETT-CT scan results. My cancer is obviously in my prostate but apart from that I have small amounts in a gland in my left side and one other spot. It would appear that I have not been invaded too radically. Given this the team think that giving me a shot at radiotherapy is a good call. I ask about a change in the drugs that they talked about. The discussion centres around why we would use two things at the same time and risk burning out all the options. Using one at a time is a better bet at preserving me in the long run apparently. Steroids get mentioned but I am not keen, very not keen on going down that route at all. So the bottom line is I will do radio therapy and stick with the meds as they are at present. I will have s blood test before I see the radiotherapy team in May to establish a baseline PSA level and I will have another CT scan before the radiotherapy. The expectation is that while I wait my PSA will rise. The expectation is also that my PSA may rise in response to radiotherapy and only then decline. The whole tone to me was about buying time and going step by step through the options. My part in all this? To stay as fit as possible and control my diet. My partner askes about my pissing blood if I train too hard, the oncologist shrugs it off and says its just the prostate. He did not seem concerned at all. So all I can do is train, train hard and try to stay off the sweet stuff. So now I am in the run up to radio therapy and Rocket will have to keep fighting for me. I was intrigued by the oncologists comments about the fact that two years ago they would not consider me for radiotherapy and that the thinking around it has changed. I guess its a matter of degree, but as I said to he has made a pact with the devil, I’m all for cutting the head of the snake and I would have attacked my prostate long ago. So I am to be spot welded.

I drive us into town where we go to a restaurant for lunch. Its an Italian place called the Merchant of Venice. I am disappointed to see that “a pound of flesh” was not on the menu. I settled for Arancini followed by creamy chicken penne. The final glory was a light chocolate cake called Salvini washed down with coffee. My eldest daughter met us at the restaurant and we brought her home with us.

As soon as I get home I set about sending out the death notices. I and my eldest daughter sort out addresses and I write the envelopes and put the cards in. It takes a while but we get there when we run out of cards. I fil in the mail redirection form and my eldest daughter and I go to the post office for stamps and to process the redirection form. That done I return home and make up a list of all the addresses we have sent cards to and I download a couple of pictures my son has sent me of him and my sister. Finally the admin is done and I start to draft the blog. While all this has been going on there has been the worry of my partners brother being admitted to hospital yesterday. He remains there at the moment and so it is a household full of concerns and no little anxiety. To crown it all Tesco suddenly out of the blue cancel our delivery with no explanation. We will not starve but we could have done with out the additional aggravation at this time. I guess a trip to Sainsburys is on the cards. I drift into the evening with no ambition beyond feeding the hedgehog and reading my latest book, Perfume by Patrick Suskind. It is a reread, but an excellent one. I feel I need a time of reflection and processing, my pixies are feeling over worked but I cannot slack off, I need to be as fit as possible to meet the challenges of radiotherapy. Onward.

Sunday was a slow day. There was breakfast and then I spent the day sorting through papers relating to my sister. Apart from a little gentle vegetable shopping the outside world was not indulged in. I spent most of my time putting together a file of pictures relating to my sister. There were pictures of her art work, stained glass work in particular. The rest where documents, I think my intention was to produce materials that the celebrant can use to construct the reflection moment and to get a framework. I provide an example of stained glass work.

The evening came along and I found myself watching TV and trying to get some organisation into the materials we brought back from London. I’m tired, fatigued by going through family history and piles of photographs of people and places I thought I had left behind. One piece of her art work sticks with me and in some way sums her up.

I go to bed post football and just want to sleep, there is too much to process at the moment, my pixies are over worked and tomorrow is a full day.

Monday, awake at 7 o’clock and being jabbed at 8:30 having had a shower and a walk to the surgery. I return home for breakfast with a paper and do the cross words. I surf the net looking for a hotel near the crematorium where my sisters funeral is to be held. I find one and book the family in. It will be the first time that all my children will be together in a long time, but that’s what funerals do I guess.

The rest of the morning was taken with mending the washing machine, Not spinning and draining so its a manual syphon and drain followed by the removal of the drain filter. I forgot to take a picture but it was stomach churning the state of it. After a bit of a paddle and a lot of quiet cursing of tissues, hair bands and general gunk the machine is ready for a trial run. I use the wet towels used to mend the machine. All goes well and the machine pumps itself empty as planned. Go me, I’m a hero.

I dash to the printer to pick up the “death notice ” cards to be told the printers had forgotten to do them. I’m not chuffed but they agree to deliver them in the afternoon. I agree and leave them to it. I have very little time before I am laying on my back in the dentist chair having a filling. Numb mouthed I return home a few quid lighter and put away my washing. The cards are delivered as I am drafting the blog and beginning to feel hungry as my mouth has been in quarantine for a couple of hours post dentist. Tonight I and my partner are going to see Coppelia, I hope I stay awake although this ballet is one of the chirpier ones. My injection site is now getting sore and tomorrow I have an oncology review to go to where I will get my PETT-CT scan results and and an explanation of why I have an appointment with the radiotherapy team in May. Its going to be another fun packed day. And the cards need to go. Meds and beds will be the order of the day.

Saturday and I wake to a dull day. My partner makes me coffee quickly followed by a coffee. We are about to leave to go into town and the post arrives. I have an nhs letter, which I am not expecting. I open it and find I have an appointment with the radiotherapy team in May. So prior to my oncology review next Tuesday the team have already decided on the basis of my PETT-CT scan that they are going to offer me something. It feels unexpected and unbalancing. We go into town and return goods to a shop and then have coffee and cannoli at a little Italian café.

My partner and I return to the shops to pick up some gift tokens for up coming birthdays. We return to the Italian café for lunch where we chat about what we are going to do in the foreseeable future. On returning home to the village it is still full of cars from the traveller funeral that had been taking place. The afternoon is spent going through the paper work that was brought back from my sisters house in London. There are receipts for jewellery and objects that we had not found in the house, so I will need to instruct the solicitor accordingly soon.

When no more paper work can be done I watch some athletics before I go and train for the first time in 10 days. I row for 45 minutes and it goes reasonably well. I at least burn 600+ calories.

After a quick tea I settle down to seek out my latest blood results. I find them and eventually get them caste up in a grid as usual. The headline is that my PSA has risen again and this time it is faster than before. Velocity is everything and mine is increasing. So now it seems that a radiotherapy appointment in May seems a tad casual and laid back. The rest of the results appear to me to be average or thereabouts.

Frankly after the last few days I am not sure I care or at least not in the same way. I shall train, eat sensibly, most of the time and read. I shall spend Shed time, write letters but before all that I shall bury my sister and then see what happens. My evening drifts as I draft the blog and watch the days football highlights. It seems a packed day, and I am not sure where I am in it, so its night meds and bed for me.

Friday and I wake up in my own bed and immediately I read some more of my new book Perfume. I read until I realise I need to shift myself to the GP surgery for my bloods to be done. I get to the surgery on time and soon I have a needle in my vein. I get home and while I drink coffee I start to compose the notifications of death cards that need to be sent. It takes a while to find the right form of words and layout. I notice that my blood letting vein is more bloody than usual so spray it with plastic skin. I take some time out to do the crosswords and to have a bite to eat. I drive to the printers in the next village. You can tell its a posh village because there is absolutely no where to park and the pubs are full with locals.

I do the business with the printer and then return home to continue working on the funeral organisation. I choose music for the funeral. Mozart to enter to, Roderigo for reflection and Vivaldi to leave and enter the world again. I guess I decline during the rest of the day as my tiredness catches up with me. By the evening I am tired and watch TV zombie like apart form face to face call with my youngest daughter. I usually stay up to see my blood results on line but today I can’t rustle up the energy or enthusiasm. I go to the night in hope of sleep and dreams that are kind.

Thursday and I wake up in the hotel again. Breakfast and then I drop off some more papers at the solicitor’s. My partner and I pay our parking fees adn then drive to the house in London. Once in we start to go through piles of paper work and files. After quite a time trying to make sense of a lot papers I come across a box file with a letter from the solicitor with an invoice for work to a will. The date was 2020, ten years later than the ne the solicitor read to me the day before. I ring her and she is perplexed. At first she cannot locate the reference number and then she finds it. So there is a later will which names me and both my daughters as executors to the will. She is will share with me in due course. The solicitor is bringing estate agents to the house in the afternoon so I leave the papers I have found for her to find. My partner and I have had enough. Its a strain being there in the house so we leave and drive home.

The drive is smooth and I get home about three o’clock. I unpack the car while my partner makes coffee and goes for a shower to wash London off. I ring a local printer about cards to inform people about my sisters death and then finish unpacking. The family decide to have an easy chippy evening meal and I try to catch up with my food/training diary, I also try to catch up with my accounts. With that done its time to draft the blog while the TV provides wallpaper. Tonight I need to sleep as tomorrow I am having bloods done for Tuesdays oncology review. And so life moves on.

Wednesday, and I wake up in a hotel bed yet again. Before getting up I email a registrar of deaths and then its off to breakfast and a very busy day. Rather than labour through the day here is what was achieved:

• Registered my sisters death.
• Collected the death certificate and copies.
• Met with the solicitor and organised, new locks, house evaluations, contents valuation, house cleaning and tidying and was read the will.
• Visited the funeral directors and booked a funeral slot and made initial arrangements.
• Provided the funeral directors with the relevant “green form”
• Sorted through some papers for the solicitor.
• Activated the government “tell us once” process.
• Acquired the mail redirection form required for special circumstances.

By 6:30 in the evening me and my partner are exceedingly tired and are just pleased to stop and eat an early meal. We retire to our hotel room and I watch a football match on the TV and then draft the blog. It is going to be an early night. Tomorrow more documents will be taken to the solicitors before I visit the house once more to look for documents and then return home. I need to train and get ready for Fridays bloods.

This is a tiring time both physically and emotionally but it feels as if I am moving forward.

Tuesday and I wake up and finish Stardust before getting up for breakfast. Its my usual muesli and morning meds meal. At 10:30 I set off with my youngest daughter to pick up her new car. There is much paper work and generally speaking it goes smoothly. There was a bit of a hiccup digging out anything that could pass as a service history. In the end a service in 2018 and 20220 had to suffice. My daughter drove me home in her new car. We sat outside the house in it having a preliminary play with the toys. She was able to pair her phone with it in the blink of an eye. We also discovered that most of the radio stations list were Christian ones which we decided explained the low mileage. Why a car with a Christian owner would do less miles I am not sure but that is where we got to. We ate celebratory bacon sandwiches before my youngest daughter and I both drove to the garage to fill with petrol and to check the tyres. I waved my youngest daughter off home and I returned to feed the hedgehog and fill the bird feeders before driving my partner and I to London.

We did the journey with only one stop at Feltham services where we decided to have coffee and I chose to have a toasted ham and cheese sandwich. It was foul. Whatever it was they called cheese was a milky, gooey blob, which dribbled out and onto my trousers and shoes. We left and head to my sisters house. The coroner called me while on the move and told me that the GP was content for the cause of death to be heart failure and I was asked if I was all right with that. I was of course but wondered what would happen if I wasn’t. He told us about getting a death certificate and that he would email the email address that I needed to contact. So far today he hasn’t. On arrival we collected the keys from the neighbour, who handed us a condolence card and the keys. I had not realised that the keys had been used to gain entry. In my head the police had broken in, but apparently the neighbour was present with the keys. He never told me that when he texted me at the time. I open the front door and I am confronted with a scene of utter chaos. It is as if the house has been squatted in. I am appalled by what I see and I am furious that my sister could let herself live in this state, especially when she had told me more or less to fuck off when I tried to gently suggest that she might get some support or help. I am out faced by the state of the place. My partner and I start to look for paper work. The solicitor has given me a list of things they need. There is a sea of paper everywhere adn we try and recycle a lot of the advertising adn inconsequential stuff. My partner empties the fridge while I look for the required documents. I am aware that there are specific things that my sister bequeathed to specific people but we can find no sign of the items. we end up with boxes of paper work, address books, family history documents. By 6:30 we are both knackered. We load the car, lock up and drive to the hotel.

We check in at the hotel and get to our room, unpack and freshen up. We then go of fin search of something simple and tasty to eat. We walk all the way to Chiswick before we find an Italian. Lots of other nationalities of food bit not to our fancy. The Italian is packed, probably because of its rarity but we are found a place. For the next couple of hours we eat delicious food and try to ignore the over raucous diners at a large table and the general loud hubbub of the restaurant. Intriguingly the male of the couple sitting the other side of the lemon tree that grew in the centre of our table, (it poncey London what else would you expect) spent the entire time finding new ways to grope his girlfriends chest with varying degrees of success. I assume that this is a new dining ritual for courting couples. We paid our bill and walked back to the hotel were we both collapsed on the bed and I drafted the blog. My intention was to eat and then sort out some of the paper work we found for the solicitor but I am too tired to even think about it.

I find myself a toxic mixture of fury and sadness. The fury has many levels and will need time to be resolved, the sadness is that anyone’s life should come down to where this chaos lives. I know that it is unlikely that the things I need to do will fall neatly into line but I am anticipating much frustration and a hell of a lot of admin in the coming weeks.

Monday and I am knackered before I even get to the evening. Despite reading for a bit before getting up and trying to maintain a calm and reasonable pace the day feels hectic. After a muesli breakfast and morning meds I start the required round of phone calls to solicitors, coroners, neighbours and GP surgery. I have started a log to record who and when I’ve talked to people and what information they impart. Eventually there is breathing space and I and my youngest drive to the garden centre to indulge in scones and hot chocolate or tea before buying a fresh pie for tea tonight. Home again and there is some preparation work to be done so that we can collect my youngest daughters new car tomorrow. I get a car report and we work out the mileage history and the MOT history. It seems that our car find is a genuine good buy. Its 17000 mile history is true and even over its history. My partner and I juggle money from account to account until it nestles in my youngest daughters account ready to pay for the car tomorrow. At last there is a moment to feed the hedgehog whose bowls are empty from my neglect. I fill them up and after a final bit of admin, including my next lot of drugs and Mondays injection I sit on the sofa and start to draft the blog. So here I am knackered, with no other intention than eat my fresh pie tea, read and go to bed early.

During the day I have had messages and calls from friends asking how I am and offering to help if they can. People are good and even better when the chips are down and there is a need for support. In this respect I am blessed. I have few friends but the ones I have are the just the best. I am despite everything a very lucky and rich person to have such family and friends.

Saturday. A difficult day. My sisters neighbours tell me they cannot get a response for her and her mail is still in the letter box. I cannot delay action any longer and I request an urgent welfare call to her. I go to meet a group for a meal and on the way one of my sisters neighbours texts me that the police have gained access to her house. Then there is silence. I meet my friends and have a meal. I return home to find the police talking to my partner and daughters My sister has been found dead. The police leave and I ring the responsible officer and get the numbers I need and an update on the situation. The evening is filled with messages and some preliminary thank yous. I take my night meds and go to bed to sleep fitfully with the thought of how sad dying alone is and was for my sister.

Sunday starts with coffee in bed and some reflection. The household rouses and breakfasts collectively. I top up the oil level in my youngest’s car. My youngest daughter and partner along with me drive off to car dealerships in search of a new car for my youngest. We abandon one dealership as they no longer have what was on their website and head for another. We look at a couple of cars and end up test driving one. It would be possible to spend a life time looking at cars but the more we considered the one we test drove the more it ticked the boxes. Low millage, 5 door, petrol, real spare wheel, large boot, smooth drive, rear leg room and pulled up hill very well. Both my partner and I have previously owned this make and model back in the day and had really good experiences with them. The deal is done, including a good trade in and so we will return on Tuesday to collect my youngest daughter’s new car. It is particularly pleasing to know that she will have a safe and reliable car to go to work in and see her through to motherhood. We return home and indulge in celebratory ham sandwiches and a rugby match.

The family slide into the evening and the usual Sunday tasks like a Tesco order and preparing for work tomorrow. For me I will begin the journey of putting my sister to rest and sorting out all her affairs. It feels like a turning point, new challenges to be faced. Of course there are pre oncology review bloods to be done this week so there are some odd threads of my cancer reality to continue with.

Friday and I wake up in a hotel room again. Its a strange sense listening to a hotel wake up around me and I follow suit. I shower and make my way down to breakfast. It feels a quite chaotic set up but in essence I am left to graze on anything I want in any order. It is very much a refuelling experience. I return to my room to pack and organise myself for the journey back. I do not rush and take my time till I feel ready to drive. In the midst of this I receive a message that a hospital is trying to contact my sister. I make calls and send messages and texts. I leave York not knowing what the situation is.

In reality my drive back was smooth. I restocked my wine gum and water stocks at the first garage and then drive smartly home. Back home I unpack and return to messaging my sister. I get a phone call from the hospital asking if my sister was coming to her appointment as it was past time for her appointment today. I suspect that there is a story to all this and that most of it will be communication misunderstandings. The family return home and we catch up. Its Friday and we are all tired and decide it will be a good day to have fish and chips. My eldest daughter and I walk over to the chippy and find that due to the earthquake in Turkey the chippy is closed for a week. So plan B was put into action and we dined on Indian takeaway. I start to read my latest Neil Gaiman novel. Stardust. More fairies and strange folk. The evening has TV and drafting the blog in it. By the time Graham Norton comes round I am out of energy, take my meds and retreat to bed.