Thrills, pills and a headscarf

I love an inspirational quote. I'm a bit of a sucker for a nice little line to pick up my mood. As some of you may have noticed, Alice in Wonderland is a particular favourite of mine. However there's one line I see quite regularly that I just can't abide - the "This too shall pass" phenomenon. Something about this one really winds me up. I think it's the naivety of it. The truth is, not everything does pass. I got diagnosed with cancer over three years ago. Initially I thought I would take chemotherapy pills for two years and then I'd be done. It would pass. That was naive. Once you've been diagnosed with cancer it doesn't pass. Even if you recover and get the all clear, it doesn't pass. You get to live with the knowledge that you can be attacked from within your body, without knowledge, at any time. I would say for the majority of people who have had or have cancer, you live with a heightened suspicion of everything you feel. It wasn't...

These last few weeks I’ve been waging mental war against the demons that like to creep in from time to time. This presents itself in many ways, a lot of which can go unnoticed by others and rely on me to take action. I can struggle with motivation, have trouble keeping a positive frame of mind, get annoyed by small things and struggle with eating – either not wanting food or not eating well. I have the ability to acknowledge that there are many reasons this could happen. I’m still waiting to find out what will happen with treatment (almost two months of not knowing); I’ve been very sick with a virus which knocked my more fragile body about and this has stopped me doing things I would like to have done. Not being active or social are immediate red flags for diminishing mental health for me and I know I need to work harder when these things are limited. I often get comments about how happy I am. How I almost always have a smile and am so positive about such an unfortunate illne...

I like to think I was a fairly present person before this cancer diagnosis. I like to think a lot of things.  What I can say is this diagnosis has made me a far more present person, in so many ways, than ever before. Even with that wonderful chemo brain that makes me unbelievably forgetful, with the fatigue, nausea and tendency to space out (particularly when I'm low on blood sugars) I believe I'm learning the art of being more present. Note I say learning, not have learnt. (If we ever think we've reached perfection then we've failed ourselves - a hangover from my Learning and Development days) Something I realised after being told I may have less time than many is that I wanted my family and friends to know just how much they mean to me. For my nephews and nieces to know that as long as they continue being the wonderful people they are and never hurt anyone I will always think the world of them, that they are amazing and I couldn't ask for anyone better to...

I've always said that travelling gave me an education I could never buy. One that could never be taught in schools or universities; that simply needs to be learnt as each opportunity presents itself. Those opportunities could be great fun or amazingly challenging. All of them important to deal with. I feel so thankful to have had another four weeks to continue my education in life and as slow as I've been on my blogs I want to share some of those learnings. Some useful, some not. Language is great in it's ambiguity: I thought I spoke Spanish to a point. I guess that's still strictly true but we had some fun experiences with it. It was quite empowering to realise I was still able to get by in Spanish, speak to people and get done what I needed to get done even if it wasn't perfect. What I did learn was there are many more differences between the Castellano I have learnt and South American Spanish. In some of many language confusions we established that ...

"I used to think time was a thief. But you give before you take. Time is a gift. Every minute. Every Second."  - Alice Kingsliegh from Alice through the Looking Glass. This quote really resonated with me the other day when watching the film for the second time (the first time thinking I was perfectly healthy and had decades left in my life). It made me really think about my appreciation of the time I have and the people and opportunities I have or have had in my life. About a month ago I took another blow to my already "not great" diagnosis. My treatment plan is out the window and lots of question marks started flying around my medical teams. What did I do in response to this news? Insisted we had dinner by the waterfront and the next morning I went to the beach. Sitting on the beach I was happy. Not a feeling many people might expect me to feel the day after that news but I felt so fortunate to be able to take myself to the beach, feel the sun shining do...