Tuesday and I wake groggy but to the sound of a lawn mower in the front garden. My partner brings me toast and then takes my eldest daughter to the local physio. My GP rings me to tell me he has talked to the Prostate Cancer nurse who is going to ring. No sooner than he as put the phone down than the nurse rings me. We have a chat and at the end of it she books me into see their urology “stone” specialist. So next week I am off to see the urologists. I get up and make coffee for my garden guy. Its a quick chat before I get on with making the drawings for the garden after the drive and patio work is done in April. I take my meds and by the time my partner returns I have completed the garden drawings to give to garden guy.

My problems with my pains on going to the toilet seem to have eased but me being me I start a chart and start recording frequency and intensity of pain on a ten point scale. I try to settle down and rest. During this the family pursue the brick and slab samples that will be used to upgrade the patio. After some discussion we make our choices. My partner goes to tell the neighbours about the work and returns to say they are okay with it, not that the work will impinge upon them apart from noise and dust for a period of time. There is a period of everyone resting and finding a space.

While sipping warm drinks and nibbling biscuits my eldest daughter goes off with her niece to the cinema and I and my partner sort out a takeaway. My partner and I are still very disappointed that we had to abort our Spa break yesterday and are trying to balance rest and continuing to find things that we can do. The evening starts with the wait for our food and then we settle down for a quiet evening of more Designated Survivor. I take my night chemo and go to bed. Despite my tiredness I am pleased that I have got through the day without pain killers, perhaps the antibiotics have kicked in. It all feels like a rollercoaster at the moment.

Monday and its an early start as my partner and I are going for four nights to a Spar. The day starts with hot water and toast, measuring my vitals and the final packing. When I go to toilet I get a twinge of pain but I am relying on the antibiotics and paracetamol to kick in and see me through. We pack the car, I take a pre-emptive pee and then I drive us to the Spa.

On arrival our bags are taken from us, our car is parked for us and we start our morning and so does my bladder. We laze for the morning having drinks and cake and talking, but I am going for a piss every 30 minutes, then twenty minutes and it’s painful. We have lunch and then get into our room and unpack. I continue to piss painfully every twenty minutes. My partner goes for a swim while I try to rest, answer emails and settle myself. I try to distract myself with emails and end up signing off the final draft of my next poetry collection and the cover design, which my partner likes when she sees it later. My partner returns and I am no better, worse in fact and quite distressed. We decide to leave, we pack, get a porter to collect the bags and load the car. Pain an piss has stopped play. I feel guilty and useless, this was supposed to be my partners much needed rest. My partner drives us home. By luck my eldest daughter is talking to our GP and I am able to talk to him.

He asks me loads of questions and pulls up all my recent scans and reports and out of the blue tells me that I have a large stone in my bladder, something the oncology boys have missed. He is not surprised that I am getting repeat infections, pain and passing blood. He undertakes to talk to oncology for me and prescribes stronger pain control and some stuff to make sure I do not get constipated. I am incandescent that my oncologist either missed the stone in my bladder or chose not to share that with me. My partner and eldest go into the night to get them for me from a late night chemist. They return and hand me my new drugs as I am drafting the blog. My partner makes me pasta before I take my new pain relief. So its been a shit day in more than several ways so I shall stop here because I do not know how I’m going to be on the new pain relief. One thing to celebrate is that my son messaged me to say he has got the job he went for. So something good to cheer the day.

Sunday, a real difficult day. It started fine after a reasonable night. Then I go for a piss and get pain again. I am immediately thrown into anxiety and start drinking a lot of water and taking paracetamol. I battle it for a while trying to get on with things. I hook up the battery charger on my car and test the PC speakers that have been playing, but eventually it gets to me and my symptoms worsen. I ring 111 and talk to them. The upshot is I am referred to the out of hours clinic at our nearby sports centre, but not until 4:30. I try to keep busy or at least do things, like test out my new battery tester and charge up the newly delivered jump starter. All this time I am drinking pints of water and taking paracetamol. With time getting on I have a shower. I think my symptoms are easing but its time to go to the clinic.

My partner drives me to the clinic where after a shot wait I am ushered into the clinic room. The medic takes details and checks my records and takes my vitals. She tests my urine sample which looks clear to me but she is certain that there is blood in it. I am prescribed antibiotics and sent on my way. My partner drives me to the chemist where the prescription has been sent and then drives me home. I am just about out of energy, I am anxious and edgy so waste no time in getting my first dose of antibiotics down me. I try to relax while I do the Tesco order for my eldest daughter for next week and then eat tea. I have yet to pack for the four nights away at the Spa and I need to check my car tyre pressures. My efforts to get my car battery up to speed has worked. The blog gets drafted early before I pack and watch the last in the series of Death in Paradise. There are night meds to take and then bed in the hope that all the pills inside me are working. Today has been a real challenge, the worst of it is the levels of anxiety that the return of my symptoms induces in me. Its a real gut response, my head knows what its about and I access my coping strategies but frankly they do not work very well. The bottom line is that I just need to tough it out and get on with things and where better than in a spa.

Friday was a busy day. I washed the car, started to charge its battery when I found my master warning light came on. I tried ringing my local garage who said they were booked for weeks ahead and to ring my breakdown service. On ringing them all they did was read my cars manual and offer to tow my car to Loughborough. It was at this point I Googled information on my car and decided to give charging the battery a go. I collected my monthly drugs and walked into the village and to the chippy. I did the final edit of my next collection of poems. There was more research of cottages and apartments in an attempt to organise a family holiday. I briefly tried to sort out the computer speakers before taking my eldest daughter to the chiropodist. By the evening I was very tired and settled into continuing to watch Nominated Survivor. By the time I had taken my night meds I was exhausted and felt that I had done a lot with my day.

Saturday was going to be a busy day I had a largish “to do” list in my head. I needed to be up early as the builder guy who is redoing our front drive and rear patio was due to arrive with samples for the patio walls and paving. However as I getup early and go to the toilet I am in a great deal of pain, like a UTI. Not only that but I am shaky with anxiety. It is clear I am going nowhere today. I cancel going out to meet friends for lunch. My partner goes to the hairdressers and I deal with the builder when he arrives with arms full of building samples. He doesn’t stay long as its obvious that I am not well. I start to drink copious amounts of water and take paracetamol and retreat to the recliner. It is time to do my fortnightly filling of my drugs wallets, which I do more as a distraction. My day then is drinking water and monitoring how I am every time I go to the toilet. Slowly I seem to return to normal. I keep drinking pints of water and taking paracetamol whilst watching rugby and football matches on TV. By the evening it feels like I am functioning better so I draft the blog and continue to watch TV with my feet up. I take my evening meds and go to bed wondering how I will be in the morning, I need to be well enough to pack and prepare for going away for four days. These are not easy days, filled with anxiety and uncertainty, all I can do is progress with caution.

Thursday and I wake early and run through my pre getting up rituals quite quickly before making breakfast and taking my morning meds. My morning is spent researching possible holiday venues for June and circulating the information to the family. I read for a while before lunch and then do some more work on the poetry collections. By mid afternoon I have started to draft the blog but I can feel myself losing concentration and energy, it is clearly one of those days where I did not start out with much energy. I might nap.

My evening arrives and I eat and watch half a film while my partner has her singing lesson. The rest of the evening disappears into Designated Survivor until I take my night chemo, which nearly choked me, and finish todays blog. At the last moment the final draft of my poetry collection comes through. I am desperately tired and need to rest.

Wednesday and I wake up feeling groggy again so I take my time to do my vitals and and check my cyber litter on my phone. The only thing I find is an email from the Americans with the first full draft of my second poem collection, The Travelling Years. I get up and make breakfast and then retreat to the sofa donning my “I am Out! baseball cap to start the detailed edit of the draft book. I find that there are a lot of issues with the draft. The editors have used the first line of every poem as the tittle and in some cases omitted the line from the poem itself. It is a bit of a mess and so I get my head down and work my way thorough it all. Before long my partner is standing in front of me with a note saying “Do you want a bacon sandwich?” It proves my “I am In” and “I am Out” hat system works. I give a thumbs up and soon I am eating a bacon sandwich.

My partner goes to see her mother and I continue to edit the draft. I get calls from a friend who is out and about preparing Easter for her family and trying to balance all the elements of a young family life and returning to work. It is really good to hear hear her out and about as I know what an effort it is and how much rest she will need to recover on a day to day basis. I finally finish the editing and send it attached to as polite an email as I can. I breath a sigh of relief and get myself together to walk down to the chemist to collect her antibiotics. When I get there I arrive in the middle of several drugs deliveries, unfortunately the drugs I had come to collect, and was told would be there, are not. They try to ring another pharmacy at the next village but they do not have any either, I by a potion for a sore mouth and take them at their word that the antibiotics will be there tomorrow. I walk home feeling ropey and deliver the potion and the news to my eldest daughter.

I make a drink grab a doughnut and do the crosswords, slowly, feeling less than bouncy but I persevere until success is mine and my partner returns. I start to draft the blog but I find I get restless and have difficulty continuing. The effort of the editing has got to me and I can do no more. I slip into evening. The evening sees me become addicted to Designated Survivor. Basically the Capitol Hill gets blown to bits and kills the President and both houses of parliament leaving the Designated Survivor, the minister for housing, to become president. Four episodes I watch before downing my chemo meds, help clear the kitchen and go to bed clutching my Hiro Arikawa book. I’m fascinated to see if the Americans can work as fast as I can.

Tuesday and I wake to my partner going to work and a quite house. I cannot dawdle this morning as Tesco are going to deliver today early so I do not check my cyber litter or my vitals, its straight to the kitchen and breakfast making for me. While I nibble away I check my messages and sort out my work space. My eldest daughter goes off in an Uber to see the doctor and then Tesco arrives with the order they failed to deliver yesterday. I unload and squirrel the goodies away. My eldest daughter returns with prescriptions so I head for the chemists before they close for lunch time and do the required juggling. The antibiotics are not available till later so I will have to wait and see, but I do get a prepaid card in case there is a need for repeat prescriptions. I get a call from a friend who is out and about doing chores after birthday that meant treating the family for nits. It is one she will not forget in a hurry. We chat for a while comparing notes about raising daughters who are a few years apart and that awkward period where the age gap makes a difference to so many things. I just finish the call when the garden guy turns up so there is coffee to make and a conversation to be had about moving things about to accommodate the the drive way work we are having done. I agree to draw pictures of what will go where to give him a plan and offer him more tine to do it in one go if he wants to. I leave him to get on with trimming the bamboo and get myself lunch.

On my trip out I have acquired a paper so I settle down to do the crosswords and have lunch. During the afternoon my friend rings again for a short chat before she goes to collect one of her daughters. I read for a while, my new gifted book, The Travelling Cat Chronicles by Hiro Arikawa. At some point I jot a new poem. It is a struggle to maintain my concentration so I watch another episode of Shogun before my partner returns from work to be followed shortly by her friend who is staying overnight. The outstanding prescription for my eldest daughter has not come in so I go to the shop to buy mouth friendly food as the infected mouth ulcer is giving her pain. Once I have returned home my partner and friend go out for a meal to be followed shortly by my eldest daughter, who goes for a drink with a friend. So I am alone for the evening which I fill with pasta and appallingly bad film.

Eventually everyone returns and I finish drafting the blog, take my night meds and go to bed to read. There was a lot I intended to do today but it feels like to day has been one of keeping things organised. Even the simple thing of installing the replacement extension lead for the laptops have taken time. A day of the ordinary maintenance things that make up the mundane can drain me of energy spoons. So I go to bed to take my vitals, read and slip into the ocean of sleep hoping for time tomorrow to write letters, sort out laptop speakers and map the garden and the movement of plants. The blessing of the day is that my cancer did not impinge as much as usual and that makes it a good day, I am hopeful that tomorrow is similar.

Monday and I wake quite chipper after my early night. A quick check of my cyber messages and litter followed by taking my vitals. I get up to make breakfast, pop in my Monday washing load and then begins my wrestle with technology and power cords. I had settled to read when my partner reports a problem with the office extension cord. I swap things around and get to a workable solution but the external speakers of the main system remain a problem. With that done I listen to some Tim Minchin to lift me again but I do not want to interfere with my partner working on line in the office. I decide to my ear buds so I try to pair them with my laptop. will they pair will they buggery. I spend ages trying to get them to work. I fail, so I try to pair again with my phone, which just doubled my frustration. My partner provides cheese on toast for lunch while I continue with my techno wrestle. In the end I manage it but I’m in a real bate by this time, so I say fuck it and go upstairs with my book tucked under my arm.

I settle down on the bed and start to read my book and there I stay. I friend rings on her birthday and it is lovely to be able to wish her a happy birthday, We chat about how she has celebrated and the quirkiness of what needs to be done this day before some celebratory evening time. Its really good to catch up and its a shame I had to forego going to York to be able to wish her happy birthday in person. I return to my book and I keep reading to the early evening until I finish my book. It’s a thought provoking book and one I will will send to people who like their relationship with books, and might occasionally hear things talk to them.

Evening arrives and with time to gather up my dried washing and eat tea, Then follows quiz night on TV or as I like to think of it, “know your own ignorance night”. But I m already eyeing my next book given to me by my book gifting friend.

I watch the clever people being clever as I draft the blog and await the Tesco order to be delivered. I wait and wait. Then I wait some more. I ring the support line and press all the right buttons and get to talk to a helpful girl who puts me on hold to talk to the driver. I get cut off. I do the whole thing again and get through to a helpful bloke who rings the shop manager while I am on hold. When he returns apparently there has been a problem with the vans and he will rearrange the delivery for tomorrow morning and give me a ten pound voucher. God knows what the truth is, I doubt I will ever know, but as long as the order turns up tomorrow morning life will be tickety boo. There is some more TV and reading before I down my chemo meds for the night and take myself to an early bed again. Tomorrow I must grit my techno teeth and try and sort out the external speakers on the house computer system. I foresee frustration, but in a good cause. Whether Tesco turns up or not could of course be another frustration. The day started so well and went down hill fairly quickly.

Saturday. I wake up feeling less than perky after my heavy spoon day yesterday. The visit to the theatre ended up being a real pleasure but was a challenge. So Saturday morning finds me slow and sloth like. I get up for breakfast with the family and enjoy the company of my grandson and his parents as a start to the day. My partner takes her grandson and parents to a local farm that has animals to see and feed. While they are out on a trip I go online and attend my poetry Stanza meeting. For once I am pleased with the response to my poem, “God Bless America”, that is a celebration of my collection of poems being published. The family returns and I finish with the Stanza.

The family comes together for my youngest daughters birthday meal. There is pink champagne, delicious food and chocolate birthday cake to enjoy. Of course there is also present giving and chat. The grandson goes to bed as good as gold and I watch the international rugby match. As the evening goes on the family drifts off to bed, I stay up and take my night chemo meds and think about the day. I rue the fact that I did not have enough energy today to go with the family to the farm trip but it seems to have gone well. I noticed today that the cherry blossom has come out on the trees, a sure sign that Spring has arrived. It makes me frustrated that I do not have energy at the moment, I try to make a contribution to keeping the home organised and a functional one for all of us. I have to judge it from day to day.

Sunday, I wake to the sound of the family down stairs and breakfast being prepared. I get myself dressed and join them at the dining table. The family eat together and my Grandson gets introduced to his big white fluffy Easter bunny and he likes it. Late breakfast over the visiting family pack up the numerous bags and gadgets needed to bring an eight month old small person on the trip. We are gradually acquiring various bits of equipment to accommodate our grandson when he visits and this time we are left with bibs and bowls. The visitors car gets loaded up and we got to see them squeeze everything in and finally buckle up and then set off.

I’ve cleared the kitchen and set Daisy Dishwasher going and then I get to the end of the sofa feeling that I am leaking energy quite quickly. It s a football quarter final day so I am able to rest whilst watching and ultimately to start drafting the blog. I am trying to have a quiet Sunday, to try and recoup some energy to start the week with. There are things to organise like the Tesco delivery, a week away in June with the family and some Easter goodies. I make tuna pasta for my partner and my tea as we settle down to an evening of TV and an early night. With Death in Paradise over, I clear the kitchen, take my chemo meds and go to bed to conclude tomorrows Tesco order and read for a while. Tomorrow has to be a start again Monday. I’m missing out on too much and I need to climb back.

Friday, a long day. Up early to prepare the house for the arrival of my youngest daughter, her partner and their young son, our youngest grandson. My partner has gone food shopping so I get up and putter intensely so that by the time she returns the decks have been cleared. I am flagging and take a short time out before our visitors arrive.

Our visitors arrive and in no time at all I am sitting with my grandson on my lap and I am feeding him a bottle. It been a while since I’ve done that and he rewards me with a hearty belch. The family eats a hearty roast lunch together and clears away and prepares to go out in the evening to see The Life of Pi at our local theatre, The Curve. We Uber it to the theatre. I settle in to my seat and have real trouble getting to grips with an auditorium with its noise and crowds, for a while I wish I had ear loops, I understand now why people use them . The first half of the performance I am preoccupied by how I am feeling quite queasy. I forego the usual interval ice cream. The second half is much better, I have settled and appreciate the puppetry and staging. The more I relax the better it gets. By the end I am fully engaged and enjoying it. We Uber home and I eat supper while drafting the blog. I am tired, vey tired, this has been a long day and taken me beyond my available spoons. I take my meds and go to bed hoping for renewal as tomorrow is my youngest daughters birthday. I am sure there is lots more to say but I am exhausted.