One of the toughest things about cancer for me.

Tags

cancer, chemotheropy, comfort, Compassion, courage, fatigue, giving, hope, love

I don’t know how to say this, but I am pretty sure I can articulate it well enough in a post. When I had cancer once, my eyes were not opened as much as what they are now. Although the ABVD treatment was horrific, it was only a snippet of what have ICE chemo BEAM and then a Bone marrow transplant is like. People can’t understand what it’s like, for that I am grateful. It’s quite easy for me to be relieved that a person has not had to have just one of the treatments I have had. Because when I say “I would not wish it on my worst enemy” I really mean just that.

  
I find it a struggle these days to know of someone having to have treatment, I don’t mind telling you, it makes me weep and drop to my knees and pray for that person. The compassion I feel for the person is overwhelming, and a real emotional roller coaster. When I set out on this journey of writing my blog 365 times in 365 day, I had a lot of time on my hands and no energy. I remember not being able to pick up my I pad even, I don’t expect you to believe me. It’s not possible to understand unless you have been through it yourself. A friend reminded me how hard it was today as she shared some of what her BMT (bone marrow transplant) was like. It took me back, to not being able to write, but guess what I did. I wrote. Why, because I wanted the world to know how it was for me in there. How feeling unable but doing anyway felt. How hard life really is, that in comparissum to a parking issue my life was in the balance and I was fighting for it.

It’s really difficult for me not to be emotional these days when I learn someone has to have any kind of treatment. I have empathy and compassion in massive amounts. It’s tough having that much compassion you know it really is. All I hope is that it’s not you, that by reading what I have written in my blog that you realise that life is more precious than you ever thought it was before reading my blog. Each day I awake is a bonus, I say thank you audibly to God for each day I have. On Saturday someone said to me how they enjoyed my blogs, that they come across well. Someone else told me off for not writing everyday. I can only apologise to you all, I have been busy. My wife wants a conservatory so I am making that happen for her. For me I don’t care what it takes, if I can make my wife happy then at least I have some purpose to this life I have been allowed to live. 

  
It’s been a funny old week, I have seen a man cry who remembered another’s journey. I have seen compassion in people beyond belief. I have seen a friend smile whilst we went out for a trundle in my TVR seemingly small things, but things I never thought would happen again. So when you know someone is in treatment, treat them. Give them something to smile about. Even if it’s just a visit, a home made cake, what ever it is. Trust me that persons day will be better, and you will of made a difference in their life. Is that not amazing that you CAN make a differance in someone’s life. Wow that for me although the best is the toughest thing to do, to reach out to someone in treatment. Yet it means so much to the person. There is no rule book, we are not supposed to know what to say or do. But to show love to someone in that lonely time of treatment is unforgettable to the person, and something that gives you fuel for your day.

  
I will always find it hard because I know what they face, but that’s given me a love for people that will never ever wilt. I hope you all have a great week, give to someone this week you have never given to before. Be grateful for the life you have what ever you face. It could always be worse, so why not choose to makes someone’s better.

Fonz

http://www.fonzandcancer.com

Follow me on Twitter

@fonzmark

Email – fonzicloud@icloud.com

Our support group on our FB

Cancer stories (people helping people through experience) 

It’s a group where people’s experiences are used to encourage others. 

Everything you read are based on my own experience and my own opinions. I express them here to encourage you. Please share with others, if it meant something to you it will to someone else. All images are from a Google search. Or my own.

Copyright © 2016

Tiredness people don’t understand.

Tags

chemotheropy, cheo, fatigue, healthy, hope, love, passion, radiothearopy, tirdness

This post is for anyone who wants to understand, what tiredness means to someone in recovery, or indeed in treatment. For me this well built strong man, does not accept weakness well. Tired was never something I had surcome to, it was a feeling I would brush off and continue on with my day. Tiredness to me was something and nothing, so what I would carry on regardless. Even doing to 2 in the morning then getting up early enough to hear the birds tweeting. I would think nothing of getting up at 4 am to drive to who knows where for a meeting with who knows who. My life was energetic full on and interesting. That was until I was 40, I am now 47. You see what a normal person feels as tired, you can recover from with a lye in on a Saturday or a Sunday. Or both.

  
This is not the case for someone who has had high dose chemothearopy. Many people, in fact I would say all people. Comment on how well I look, how amazingly normal I look concideringnthis time last year I had no hair what so ever. (Apart from my eye brows)  I looked falown, pail and at deaths door. I was of course and I shut my family and friends away from my life and me and Andie got on with what needed to be done. I want you to know, that it’s ok to be tired, that YOU are NOT  weak because you are tired. What you are is recovering, you are finding new boundaries that were not what you were used to before you need to have treatment.

You will need to be in bed for longer in the morning possibly, need a sleep in the afternoon possibly. Then you may need a sleep in the evening to. Before going to bed and sleeping for a further 10-12 hours. It’s ok to do that, your body is healing whilst you sleep, DO NOT. Give yourself a hard time, it’s ok to make some food and feel exhausted, wash a car and feel exhausted. Mow the lawn and feel exhausted, weed a border and not able to do anything else for the rest of the day. You are not abnormal, you are not different to other people. I was a body builder at one point in my life, training every other day and having a BMI of 8 strong, and unshakable.

  
Some of us have read the side effects of the drugs we have had in our chemo, others just get on with it. I did the latter, my wife scared herself with all the side effects. I am finding out that people are still affected 5 years down the line, some bounce back quickly, some take longer. It’s ok to be where you are at, it’s ok and you should not beat yourself up. I smile as I write, because although I do my best to not give myself a hard time for being so tired. I do. But the purpose of this post is yo encourage you, that you are not alone. We, the people that have had treatment know how long we have been tired for. An operation under general can take a week to recover from, that’s ok to. But the tiredness you feel is so different to what tiredness used to feel like before cancer or what ever nasty you are now, or have been treated for.

  
Nutrition is very helpful, and the more of a stable diet you have IE 5 a day. The better you will feel, you may think. Well maybe not, because let’s not forget that the body needs nutrition to repair our bodies, and if we are eating well then our bodies will repair itself more. Which in turn makes us more tired, radiotherapy damages the body as does chemo. So don’t think that your tiredness because of Radio, your not entitled to. Because you are. Your body tells you to sleep to heal, allow your body to heal. Those that think you should be back to full health and working again, forgive them. They have no idea what it’s like to feel like you do, and for me I pray that they continue to have that ignorance. 

Maybe you are reading this and you have never been touched by chemo or alike, I just hope that this post has helped you to understand what someone who has had treatment still has to deal with.

If you have had treatment, I hope you feel encouraged. ITS OK TO FEEL TIRED.

Fonz

http://www.fonzandcancer.com

Follow me on Twitter

@fonzmark

Email – fonzicloud@icloud.com

Our support group on our FB

Cancer stories (people helping people through experience) 

It’s a group where people’s experiences are used to encourage others. 

Everything you read are based on my own experience and my own opinions. I express them here to encourage you. Please share with others, if it meant something to you it will to someone else. All images are from a Google search. Or my own.

Copyright © 2016

Fatigue

Tags

belief, business, cancer, cheomotheropy, depression, fatigue, feeling low, hope, love, tiredness

If your fortunate to have not had a life threatening illness or an arduous fight to stay alive. Having the very make up of your cells reformed then the word fatigue you will think is just tiredness . You will also think that a sleep will cure it. When I was a recovery driver I experienced what most parents would experience in terms of how really tired feels. Falling asleep after 26 hours work to be woken up after 10 mins to have to go to a broken down car that needs to be recovered 200 miles. I really do know what tiredness feels like. Fatigue however is very very different.

  
When your treatment finishes , people think it’s over for the person who was fighting. That they are all of a sudden when you here the words ‘remission’ or ‘cured’ that all of a sudden the side effects disappear and the fatigue disappears and we are all of a sudden well and fighting fit. Some people do not even realise what true tiredness really is. See fatigue is like a restriction, it’s like walking in mud, or treacle. Not that I have ever walked in treacle but I know how the spoon responds to it. Mud slows us right down and makes progress more of an effort.

Fatigue, makes everything a huge effort, it takes joy from your life even makes you feel low and down trodden which I always choose to be above. I choose everyday to do as apposed to wallowing in self pity because I have not the strength to get through a day. Fatigue is a really heavy rucksack full of lead on your back, it makes you want to cry. It makes you respond irrationally even. I have been careful to not respond with a knee jerk reaction, but to be considered in how I respond and not quickly. It’s difficult to get someone to understand how you feel, frustrating even that people think that there is nothing wrong with you.

  
How I turn things around in my mind is to listen to my surroundings, and thank God that I am at least alive. Even though the pain is so great that walking is a problem sometimes. Generally late at night or early in the morning is when it’s worst. I want people to understand what fatigue is, what true loss of energy is. Even typing sometimes is an effort, like your arms are in mud it’s that hard to move them sometimes. 

  
When I was in hospital I said to Andie, I hope what’s left of me is enough for you, I hope the drugs don’t take to much of me. I also said to my dad and my wife (Andie) ” It must NOT take my spirit ” what ever happened I had to hold on to my spirit because if I kept that I knew that I would always be able to be positive. That’s how I do it, my spirit is alive and strong and because of that I am able. It’s like my energy that I find in my spirit, your spirit that’s within us all is fed by things like, gratitude, thankfulness, helping others, positive thinking, and positive speech. Saying positive things when we don’t want to keeps your spirit full. That was what I clung onto for dear life, the spirit of who I am. Fatigue can do what it likes, but it will never take my spirit, people die when they lose their will to survive. That comes from the spirit within you, the power that comes from deep within us. We all have it because we are made in the image of God, it like a flame within us that we have to keep burning, some call it our inner strength. Say I can, and I will. Things happen then, but even so it’s far harder with fatigue holding you back, the foggy swamp is like a demon holding you back. 

That is what fatigue is like, I hope this helps some of you to understand it better. And reassures some of you who suffer it.

Fonz

Follow me, I will follow back. 😊
http://www.fonzandcancer.com

Follow me on Twitter

@fonzmark

Email – fonzicloud@icloud.com

Our support group on our FB

Cancer stories (people helping people through experience) 

It’s a group where people’s experiences are used to encourage others. 

Everything you read are based on my own experience and my own opinions. I express them here to encourage you. Please share with others, if it meant something to you it will to someone else. All images are from a Google search. Or my own.

Copyright © 2016

Time for some honesty.

Tags

Cancer stories, energy, fatigue, fulfilment, hope, living, love, reality, recovery, work

Dont think by the title of this that I am not honest with myself, because I most certainly am. The truth is though I have been feeling quite lonely, like I am a spare part. You see when your in treatment your busy, your visiting hospitals all the time. Your doctors become your friend, being woken up in the night because your pic line is wrapped around your neck becomes the norm. I don’t have any of that now, just this journey called recovery. It’s like life has come to a screeching halt, and after life was so packed full of visits, I need to do something more and I am starting to put pressure on myself to do that. That’s not good, I can’t feel stress like I used to, I can’t live my life in the rat race anymore. Why did I get cancer in the first place, well I think it was brought on by neighbours that drank till silly hours of the morning, when we both needed to be up for work the next day. Knocking on the walls, throwing bottles over the fence and sleeping in till ridiculous o’clock.

  
I like to sort problems out there and then, but there was non of that with these people they seemed to be on self destruct. My blood boiled every night, I had my fists clenched most evenings because of it. Their TV was mounted on the wall that was an adjoining wall, which always was at high volume. It was a horrific 4 years. The house we live in now has no such problems, we don’t have a connecting wall with a Nieghbour and feel fortunate to have good neighbours around us. Sometimes you have to make your own luck in life though don’t we,  we have to make a move that will make life easier and better. 

  
We have been very fortunate in my cancer journey, people from all over the world have supported us, as far away as Australia. When I think about going back to work ( it’s been a long time ) I can’t help thinking that helping people is where I need to be, comforting families and being compassionate towards others that are fighting. Really I need to be dedicating my life to doing that not building an empire. Putting pressure on myself to earn a decent income again, there are opportunities out there that I think I will have a go at, but have no exspectations of income.   

Even whilst on my own journey, I have reached out to others offering a helping hand. I actually found it helped me to reach out, I felt needed and appreciated. Now it just feels like I am being lazy, getting my strength back is so important. People are always commenting how healthy I look, how amazed they are at how well I look. That’s just the outside though, trust me it does not feel like that from inside. I still feel tired allot, and feel that walking is an effort, you won’t ever see that when you look at me. You will just see a determined man, doing his best to give the best of me to my wife. Cancer fatigue is like wading through thick mud as you step forwards, it’s not like a normal tired where a little sleep will sort you out. It’s hard to exsplain unless you have felt it yourself.

  
I just felt today that I needed to tell you how it is, that it’s not all as rosey as it may appear from the outside. That also if your feeling something similar to me, that you are not alone, that it’s normal. I most certainly need a new challenge but for now until I find that new challenge that fits in with my situation in recovery then I will continue to write here, I WILL continue to DO. I guess I give myself a hard time, but if I don’t who can. I am almost convincing myself writing this singular blog. To stop blogging and get back on with my book. I have not picked it up for a while because someone discourages me from writing it, saying no one will want to read about me. But you know what, it’s time to listen to myself. It’s time to complete what I set out to do, there are people out there that have encouraged me no matter what, and I should blank out the rest and just focus on the positives. Listen to the advice despensed in that blog called fonzandcancer. 

  
Forgive me for my ramblings. No prizes for guessing what I am doing today.

I hope you have a great day, and thanks for reading.

Mark

http://www.fonzandcancer.com
Follow me on Twitter
@fonzmark
Everything you read are based on my own experience and my own opinions. I express them here to encourage you. Please share with others, if it meant something to you it will to someone else. It took me an hour to write, but will take you a second to share.