Sunday and I wake up with blood results my first thought. I go downstairs make drinks and return to bed with my phone. Still no blood results, so it will be after midnight if at all now. I weigh myself more in hope than any sense of earnt reduction. I weigh in at 96.3 kilos. That’s a decrease of 1.5 kilos. I have no idea how that has happened, I cannot believe that two sessions on the rower have made this difference. So starts the Sunday clear up, kitchen followed by some hoovering, I wonder if Tolstoy or Alan Ginsberg or even Tempest do or did their own hoovering. Any way its probably a comment on my lack of creative urge at the moment. So my partner and have a late breakfast bacon sandwich and then crack on with house organisation. I undertake a complete stock take of my quartermasters stores complete with clip board. I discover that there are some very out of date cans which I pop into a bag There will be a sort out and those still in date can go to the Sainsburys food donations. I am eerily fascinated what someone would do with a can of five bean salad and a tin of prunes. I suspect these are hangovers from the COVID Boris boxes we received. Anyway by the time I’m finished there is a list and I am clear about what we have a surfeit of (tinned tomatoes) and what we require (baked beans). I was gratified to find a Christmas pudding, which means I’m ahead of the game for the coming one. I might now hunt around for bargain crackers and other Xmas goodies, if I play my cards right I could have the festive season sorted by the end of July.

I’m knackered by the mornings efforts, I suddenly run out of spoons so I retreat to the sofa and Glastonbury on BBC i-player. First up is Haim, who are cracking and a band I a would go and see live. George Erza follows in a surprise appearance, average and then Celeste, not my cup of tea and finally Wet Leg do a short gig, energetic but middle range. Declan Mc Kenna follows in what looks like a scout uniform and strange shades, with a drummer that looks like an old colleague who is actually at Glastonbury selling fish finger sandwiches. Life can be strange but true. Diana Ross bless her, such a strong back catalogue but unfortunately she now sings flat but hey at 78 who gives a toss, certainly no one in the mainly pissed, stoned and tuned in crowd. Truly more karaoke than smooth superstar. Whilst watching my eldest daughter plaits my hair for me.

So I continue to watch through Elbow and drift into the evening. My sister calls and lets me know she is going in to hospital tomorrow for a minor routine procedure but might be in over night. She is letting me know what is going on and to tell me that on the paper work I am named as her next of kin. I guess this is a necessary piece of medical bureaucracy. She also tells me that she will not be signing a DNR as she wants them to do everything to save her if anything goes wrong. Noted. I wish her luck and promises to ring me when she gets home . I head into the evening unclear about what I will be doing except intermittently checking to see if my bloods are in. My evening passes with light drama followed by Kelly Holmes documentary about being gay in an army that viewed it as illegal. I like to think things have changed. I make one final check to see if my blood results are in. They are! I’ve not got the time to check things in detail but my eGFR is 61 the highest its been since November 2019, that’s unexpected. Crucially my PSA has dropped again for the third time in a row. It’s down 0.2 to 0.8, the lowest its been for a year, another surprise but very welcome. The rest of the results seem to be there or there about. I am surprised these are better than I had hoped for given my recent COVID and infections. I go to bed to hopefully sleep more easy.

Saturday. I waited up till gone midnight last night waiting for my blood results. They did not get posted so I went to bed. I woke this morning to a cup of coffee and immediately look for my blood results, still not posted. My partner goes to the hairdresser, my daughter goes to the gym, I eat breakfast on the patio while my washing gets done. I read, I do puzzles, I hang my washing out on the line, I re-tighten the toilet seat, you can see how desperate I am. In the end I start to draft the blog and think about training and spending the afternoon in the Shed. Still no blood results, I guess there will not be now till midnight at the earliest.

In the end I watch two tennis finals, go shopping at the garden centre and return to an evening of two films and Paul McCartney at Glastonbury. I do find time to feed the hedgehog and check to see if my blood results have been posted. They are still not available. The kitchen will be cleared and I will do the post midnight check of the test results before I go to bed. All this is working my way towards Monday when I shall start my new regime of eating a more sensible diet and continuing my training sessions. The adjustment to being re-retired is taking time and has been tricky given how I have responded to this months injection.

Friday and its vampire day so I am up and ready to trot off to the GP surgery to get my blood sample done. My partner makes me a coffee while I get myself together. I don’t want to sound whingey but my injection site from Monday is sore, hard and definitely bruised. I get to the GP surgery, sign in and notice the guy sitting in front of me is clutching a box of FIRMAGON. A fellow prostate cancer sufferer waiting to go in and get his jab. There was a moment when I thought I might tap him on the shoulder and introduce myself and suggest we form a club, but being English of course I do not. I do notice that he is slightly limping with his hand in his pocket when he reappears and books a doctor appointment with the receptionist. I get called in and flourish my bloods form and bare my arm. The nurse who does bloods is extraordinary, she has the needle in my arm in a flash, no pain, no sharp scratch, and bleeds me with expert precision. In no time at all I have a fluffy cloud taped on my arm and I am on my way. So starts the wat for the results.

I buy a paper on the way home and read it over a fried egg sandwich and coffee on the patio. I read and do puzzles. I am engrossed but become aware of a new sound. I look up and there is one of this years squirrels taking peanuts out of the box and feasting. I sit rock still for ages and watch the little animal feed himself full. On occasions I assist my new small friend by gently shooing away the wood pigeon that tries to intrude. Lunch time comes around and I begin to get myself ready to train. I take my time and get myself comfortable and then start another half hour row. It goes okay and there is an improvement over yesterday.

I have a few minutes rest after the effort I go and shower. Before I get into the shower I dip test my urine and get a positive result for blood although there is nothing to be seen by the naked eye. I note the result and get on with my shower. Its been a while since I gave my hair a good wash and dry. By the time I’ve finished drying my hair the garden guy has arrived. I make him coffee, pay him and then excuse myself as I need to go and collect my eldest daughter from a police station where she is collecting data for her doctorate. I’m on time and sit outside the police station till she appears. All is well and we drive home.

My evening is a strange mixture of Indian take away, NCIS, women’s international football (it like real football only the goal keepers are famously crap), and Billie Eilish at Glastonbury. Eilish is a product of home schooling, fact. As I listen to the Eilish I also draft the blog. Mostly I am waiting for the witching hour when my blood results will get posted. No matter how I feel, no matter how many dip tests I do or how much research on google I do it is the science that is the marker for how well I am or not. Given the bout of COVID, the UTI and the kidney infection I’ve had I’ve no idea what my results will look like. I’ve had so much washing around inside me I’ve no idea how my results will go. To top it all my injection this month has been the worst its ever been in terms of prolonged soreness, bruising and lumpiness. I keep trying to balance resting and reactivation but its a frustrating process that leaves me irritable and difficult to live with, fuelled mostly by the anxiety of no longer trusting my body and wondering what is going to happen next.

Thursday and I sleep late. A brief breakfast and a pot of berry tea on the patio sees me start my day. I get stuck into some puzzles and I find one has an error. I immediately switch into “outraged of Leicester” mode and smartly send my findings to the publishers. I doubt I will get any kind of response but I’ve enjoyed the diversion. Time for a celebratory Whitby lemon iced bun! For those of you who have a nerdy streak here is the proof.

My partner and I eat lunch on the patio. A friend rings and we are able to chat for a while about families and the the perils of changing school years as a child. After a suitable break I get myself ready to train for the first time after 36 days of no training at all. I am apprehensive as I prepare but I make my way to the garage and get on the rowing machine. I set the level at 4 and the duration for 30 minutes. I set off carefully. It goes okay, I survive. So thank you to all those people that sent me messages of encouragement over the last couple of days.

I climb off the rower and return to the house. I run a bath and let myself soak. I’m not sure how things have gone yet, but I get myself to the sofa and update the blog before tea. My evening is going to be gentle and slow, tomorrow is a bloods day so I shall be up early to take myself to the GP surgery to have my blood taken. This is in preparation for my oncology appointment on Tuesday. It feels that so far my re-retirement has been hijacked by COVID and my cancer, its making the transition more bumpy than I anticipated.

Wednesday and I wake up early as the plumber is coming. I’m not feeling great but hey that’s how it is at the moment. I do a toast and marmalade breakfast but dump coffee in favour of my fruit teas. I get my lovely glass tea pot out and make a pot of very berry to wash the toast down with. I had forgotten how much I liked the fruit brew. The plumber arrives on time and I show him through to the kitchen. He looks , he sighs and then begins the job. Of course it is not straight forward, he will need to chop the pipe work and run new isolation hoses into place. I retreat to the sofa and start todays blog. As I write I’ve no idea what this is going to cost me, the plumber that is, I might have to break into my 50p piggy bank. After much sawing, wrenching and fiddling the new tap is in. Once again we have hot running water in the kitchen and no annoying drip drip drip of a leaking tap.

So I pay the plumber and then get on with a great deal of doing absolutely nothing. All I want is for the soreness of my injection site to wear off, its a real pain literally. Apart from bringing in the bins, reading Owen Meany and doing the odd puzzle I’ve done a glorious bugger all today. I napped at lunchtime, had soup and read some more. In the end I resort to pain killers to relieve the soreness, not something I usually do on day three after a jab. Mid afternoon is a highlight, my partner returns from her walk and we indulge in the just delivered Whitby Lemon Iced Buns. A true indulgence washed down with my first coffee of the day.

The buns went down well. As I say a real indulgence but an example of making the world come to me. Tea time comes around and I clear away the bun debris and blog for a bit as the evening approaches. Today is Great British Sewing Bee day so that is what I shall watch tonight, once I have popped out and feed the hedgehog. Tomorrow I am determined to train, I have to over come my anxieties about passing blood if I train. Wish me luck.

Monday, and its one of “those” Mondays. Its a jab Monday. Having bathed last night my body is ready for clean socks and pants as is traditional when visiting a GP surgery, with which I duly obliged coupled with easy slip down waist and trousers to facilitate the jabbing. Peanut butter toast, coffee and pre jab paracetamol are taken. Without any more to do I walk down to the surgery. I book myself in and wait, occupying myself by reading the information board.

Its mostly joyous news that no matter what you are suffering from their are people to help by telling you that you are not alone. Does this help, I suppose it must. As a psychologist I spent my entire professional life trying to get people to talk about the difficult stuff and I have to admit that sense of Universality that Yalom writes about so well did appear to be a powerful factor in some peoples progress. For others not so much. My cancer is my cancer and knowing that others have it is little comfort to me, I’ve read the survival curves. Neither does it help when my malady is turned in to a TV industry of advertising. A campaign that has gone from one in four having cancer in a life time to 1 in 2, in just under three years. That cannot be right, so who is telling the truth and who is bending it to induce sufficient fear to donate?

I get called in and hand over my jab kit to the nurse and we chat about how shit COVID is while she makes up the solution to go into me. There is a lot of “stuff” to pump into me and it needs to be done slowly or it clumps and forms a lump in my abdomen, its one of the side effects. So nurse pumps it in, pops on a taped down fluffy cloud and checks the date and time for the next one. I am then dispatched to the world again and already I can feel that this is not going to be a good month.

Home and I fill my medication wallets for the next two weeks before tackling the challenge ahead of me. The dead tumble dryer is sitting in the facilities area doing nothing except support a swathe of filled washing baskets. How can one household produce so much? I do one load a week and that’s me done, what lays before me is the evidence of over fussiness and too many clothes to choose from. Anyway I remove the baskets and begin my surgery on the dryer. Diagnosis is not good as all the usual things like filters and water tank are okay. I check the heat exchanger and find it clogged with lint and damp fluff, no air could possibly get through that coating. I remove the offending layer of felt and then stick the hair dryer into the vent and give it a good blast. I am hoping that this will dry out the whole heat exchanger and the connecting pipes. I test the machine, no drum movement. It lights up and does all the digital noises for selection but when the go button gets pushed there is nothing. Its time for surgery. I don my head torch and grab my tool kit and I am unscrewing the back panel toot sweet. It comes away to reveal the impeller fan, which is linked to the drum. It appears to be stuck and my gentle probing of it is not doing anything. So as all good engineers do I give it a tap and voila it comes free. A judicious application of special silicone WD40 and it turns freely and the drum starts to move. I run a test on the mains and it works, if a little noisy. I put the back plate back on and test run the machine, it works, go me! I replace the laundry to its former glory and sit down for a coffee. By now my injection site is bloody sore and giving me gyp so I down more paracetamol. I once read the possible side effects of paracetamol and immediately stored it in a locked part of my mind.

I become restless with the soreness of the jab site and I am not quite sure what I am going to do. In the end I feed the hedgehog and retreat to the Shed. I write a letter as is my way and take a trip to the post box, moving my car so that Tesco can deliver later. Tesco duly rock up on time and the family scamper about stowing the goodies, I note that I need to tidy the “quartermasters” store where I keep all the back up goods, like toilet rolls, kitchen rolls and baked beans. I am done now. I have run out of energy spoons and I collapse on the sofa and very appreciatively eat the tuna pasta my partner makes. There is some NCIS but I am restless and sore so go for a bath using the unicorn poo bath bomb my son sent me for fathers day. I laze for over an hour with my ear buds in listening to music. Once out I find I have absolutely no energy at all and go to bed.

Tuesday, I wake up early and sore, I knew this was going to be a bad month for lumpy jab pain. I get up, do breakfast and then dress ready to take my daughter to a police station. She is collecting data for her doctorate this week and as the rail unions have decided to strike this week, (I am not sure how I feel about that yet) I have agreed to drive her there. The journey goes well and I drop her off and she attempts to use her “multipass” to get into the police station. She has not rung so I assume she is now busily coding the content of interviews. Beyond that I cannot say what is going on. I drive home, empty the dishwasher, make coffee and settle on the patio to catch up with the blog.

The post arrives and in it a lovely surprise. A friend has sent me a book in response to pleas for ideas of what to read. It is John Irving’s A Prayer for Owen Meany. I am really happy as this is a book that I read when it first came out. Of course being me I read all I could get my hands on as I like it so much. But this gift has prompted me to research him again and of course he has written many more books now. So I have the joy of rereading Owen Meany and then acquiring his more recent books. Its lovely to rediscover such an interesting writer. Its a super gift. I have much reading before me. It is also an interesting experience to find my reading history catching up with me. This book was new out and the trendy, on point, book to read when I first read it and here it is a gain. It is a peculiar feeling especially as at about the same time I was reading Herman Hesse and was recently thinking about rereading the Glass Bead Game. So is this what retirement is for; the rereading of ones literary history. If it is I am in for a treat and all those books on my shelves will be dusted down and appreciated again. I wonder what I will find new in old friends.

I eat lunch with my partner on the sunny patio and then it is time to wrestle the cardboard mountain that my eldest daughter has created. If I say it myself I am good at compacting the recycle bin and get the maximum into it. So I set to work on the mountain and soon I have the pile of packaging in the bin. Its a strange kind of satisfaction over coming the recycling, tomorrow it will be gone, no longer my circus or my monkeys. I top up the blog draft and contemplate more paracetamol prior to a walk. I must try to keep some movement in my day till I feel able to train again.

The village walk goes well and my partner and I do our steps and return home to put the bins out and settle in for the evening. We eat on the patio and I ring my daughter, who tells me how her day has gone. I then slip into the evening of blogging and reading Owen Meany. My jab site is still sore and hard so I shall take more paracetamol tonight but I have a rule that after day two I do not take anything. So I hope for a good nights sleep and to wake up less sore in the morning.

Sunday, its Fathers Day, for me it is also an important date today because three years ago someone looked me in the eye and told me I have metastatic prostate cancer. So here I am three years on having gone through various stages and still trying to fight and live a curious and interesting life. So today I celebrate, quietly. I get up late and make a marmalade toast and coffee breakfast, which I polish off while watching a cookery programe and move onto start the blog.

I laze unashamedly and open my fathers day cards and presents, I am touched, its always nice to be validated spontaneously. I have a face time call with my youngest daughter who is busy decorating and preparing for Glastonbury next week. I continue to laze until my partner and I go for a walk around the village. On our way we collect some food from the shop before returning home where I watch a rugby match. I preload with paracetamol before tomorrows injection, and then eat dinner before sliding into another evening. I note that I am feeling better, but have yet to get myself training, I guess that’s my priority hurdle right now before my weight and lack of fitness get totally out of hand. If I want another three years there is work to be done.

Saturday and I get up to a lazy marmalade toast breakfast. Last nights sleep was grim, I kept waking up extremely hot and restless. So as a result I potter the morning away trying to get myself started. In the end I decide that what is required is a hot bath and take myself off to wallow for ages. My partner brings me a bacon sandwich lunch as I lay and get wrinkled. Of course eventually I start to get cold so get myself dry and dressed in time to watch Leicester Tigers beat Saracens to win the Premier Rugby Championship. A great game and a last minute drop goal the difference. As the day goes by I exchange messages with friends some of whom are taking part in Pride. Dinner comes and goes and I take the opportunity to feed the hedgehog before settling down to a film: The Ghost Writer. Time to draft the blog. So that’s been my day but underneath it all is my not feeling that well and knowing that tomorrow I need to start taking paracetamol to counter the effects of my Monday jab. Its that time in my meds cycle so I am apprehensive about how I am going to be this coming week. Tomorrow is Fathers Day, I know I have cards. I like the acknowledgement of my part in bring in new life into being. Ideally I like to think I was there in the raising of my children but the reality is that I wasn’t for large parts. So I think all those fathers that were deserve recognition of that.

Friday, the first full day of re-retirement. It starts quite early with the usual meds and the sun shining. I laze for a bit and do puzzles but soon get bored and make a toast breakfast and coffee, which gets taken out onto the patio. I sit and eat and ponder. Later my partner joins me and I then open up the Shed and settle down to write letters. My eldest daughter invites me to the local bird world but she is going early and I do not feel up to it at all so I decline the opportunity. I am sad about that but I am still not right after COVID and today is going to be the hottest day of the year so far. I can not face it. I write for along time pausing only to hang washing out. At eleven o’clock a friend rings and we chat for fifty minutes. We have not talked to each other for ages so there is a lot of catching up to do. We talk about all sorts of things but mostly families until it is clear that my friend is tired, her long COVID is still very much in play and it is clear that being on the phone to me for this long has been tiring.

I continue to write letters until lunchtime when my partner makes me a sandwich, which I eat in the Shed. The day is getting hotter and more washing is added to the line to dry. My partner and I decide that we need to get some food for the weekend, there are sausage craving to be assuaged, so we get ready adn go to the local garden centre that houses a good butcher. We arrive to find the place empty and are soon filling our bags with lovely fresh meat and other goodies. While I stow these away my partner starts the veg and fruit shopping with the trader outside. So having got everything we need we go home. There is a flurry of unpacking, washing rearranging and Shed organising. I realise that I have not posted todays letters so I make a quick trip to the post office. I return to read on the patio. My eldest daughter returns with ice lollies, a delicious treat which go down very well. I am begging to fade, I can feel my spoons ebb away. An Amazon parcel arrives, it is a hygrometer. I set it up and check it is working okay. Tonight we will give the humidifier a go and see if it improves my partners quality of sleep. I feed the hedgehog and lock up the Shed, retreating inside to begin to draft the blog. I’m rapidly losing spoons and feel tired so I am hoping for a lazy Friday night and an early night, perhaps even a restorative bath. So re-retirement has started okay ,I just need to get healthier and stronger, unfortunately its this Monday that I have my monthly jab, which means paracetamol from Sunday to counter act the reaction I sometimes get to it. I’m sure it will get better, maybe.

Thursday the 16th , this is re-retirement day. I finally give up paid employment and any pretence of being a professional in private practice or a consultant in any way shape or form. I am a true pensioner now. What a time to chose to throw myself on the mercy of my pension , but I guess there is never a good time to do that. So in my last day of status and employment I get up and make a celebratory coffee and fried egg sandwich. One of my nieces messages to say she has got a Princes Trust Award to set up as an independent counsellor with support. She has already found a share of a consulting room in town in a good location. So as I close my career so hers begins to blossom. I like the synchronistic feel of this. Mr doctor rings and we discuss my back pain and decide it is something for the oncologist and I to discuss as I probably need to have another scan. In the conversation he tells me I am diabetic based on some tests that were done on my urine sample. I admit to a sweet tooth but I am a bit taken aback. Then he relooks at the results and it tells me that has confused me with another “Rowland”, spelt differently to me. I chuckle, so good news after all.

I sit on the patio and enjoy my sandwich as the rest of the household slumbers late. As it is my re-retirement day I recalculate some of the “days since” related to my health. They turn out as follows:

• DAYS SINCE HOSPIAL IN JAMACIA 1193
• DAYS SINCE CANCER DIAGNOSIS 1093
• DAYS SINCE FIRST ONCOLOGY 1039
• DAYS SINCE FIRST CHEMO 1017
• DAYS SINCE END CHEMO 891
• DAYS SINCE DVT 829
• DAYS SINCE COVID START 11

As I calculate my neighbour mows his lawn loudly. I do not know if its possible but I swear his mower sounds smug. Anyway I am pleased that I have moved into the thousand day mark for some of them. It gives me motivation to begin to think about training again after a break of 30 days. Given the lay off I am surprised that I weigh only 96.7 kilos, I was expecting more.

So I am on my patio, fed, coffee’d and listening to my garden and of course I start to write because that is what I do when left to myself with the universe. So this is what I wrote on my re-retirement day.

I am alone in my garden
Sun on my back
The air is still.
This is my last day
No more employment,
Being useful 
Making a contribution.
Today I stop being A forensic psychologist,
Professional,
Expert.
I  am alone in my garden
With days to fill,
A brain to feed
And all the the fears
That stopping brings.
There is no me out there
No place in the world.
So this is it.
I am alone in my garden
Somehow the words are sticky
The ink blotchy
The flow difficult.
There are ghosts in the garden
And fears budding,
Flowers going over.
A noisy neighbours mower,
I am alone in the garden.  

So that is the start of my day. Now its time to open the Shed and see where the rest of the family are. A drift to noon has been easy and now to continue in the Shed. I should add that I have acquired a new set of Bluetooth training ear buds which means I can move around with sounds in my ears if I choose. Perfect for blocking out the neighbours mower or other extraneous sounds with the luxury of them monitoring for calls and messages.

I never make the Shed but lunch with my partner who has slept all morning. I continue to potter until we go to the village shop to buy food, papers and essential Maltezers. My partner tries to collect a prescription from the chemist but they cannot find it. We dutifully trudge to the GP surgery and back to collect the prescription and have the chemist fill it. We return home with our well travelled vitals. Coffee and time with the newspaper puzzles before our garden guy arrives. I move a car so he can hack back the private in the drive and continue to solve puzzles. He does his work and goes and all the while I sit on the patio enjoying the warmth going out of the day. We will dine on the patio tonight. I would light the chimenea but I notice the fir tree is over hanging it and the last thing I want is an exciting fire incident to end the day with. Tomorrow I will trim said tree and then we can indulge tomorrow evening. My evening is going to be gentle and domestic. If my toggle collection arrives I shall be sewing replacement toggles on to my light weight trousers, of which I have several pairs and so my re-retirement will see me sewing clothes. Will I be ready for next years Great British Sewing Bee? I doubt it but it would be nice to be able to knock up the odd garment now and again. To date I think I could only manage a pair of gownless evening straps. I have missed my colleagues at the conference but they have sent me pictures of themselves and short videos to say hello and to tell me they miss me. It seems odd not to be part of the team any more but perhaps I will get an opportunity to say farewell properly at some point.