late summer 99, So I’ve just have found out that I have cancer – it wasn’t easy to get my head around. Over the previous six months i have been diagnosed with everything from: flee / Aids and everything in-between.  Doctors are using lots of different, names and medical terms to describe what’s going on in my body, there trying to get me to answer how im feeling. (Truth is im feeling like im on the old roundabout in the school playground, I remember once as kids i sat on the outside of the roundabout while a friend lay under it using his feet to propel it faster and faster, eventually we are going so fast, im feeling dizzy sick confused cant stand.) So I’m feeling overwhelmed and don’t know where to start with all the information they are piling toward me. what i here is your going to die. well we all know people die from cancer.

My reaction was to stop everything and ask who this guy is, who is speaking through me to my family. One thing i hate as an uneducated geordie in the south is the way people asume bieng from the north makes you unable to comunicate. turns out he is a doctor and he brought his boss along with him. I quickly and un politely dismiss him and engage the boss. who seems rather shocked following the dismissal of his junior. however we manage to find out I have cancer Hodgkin lymphoma 4B. Terminal. not quite understanding the conversation after hearing the words “cancer and terminal” in the same sentance my mind wanders off into al-sorts of dark places I had never thought existed. the oncologist keeps rattling on about this and that, when I hear a spanish nurse (shall be known as teflon) advise my wife she should get my affairs in order, and get a sample. They expect me to pass away within 3 – 4 weeks. “Ok so now lets stop the ride i want to get off / WTF a month 28 days”……

On that helpful note my mind simply switched off and I became numb to those and the world around me. I was very angry and cried a lot. thinking about the people family and my newly married wife. nothing to date has ever been as painful, as that day. I even asked for a shotgun at one point thinking it better to get it over and done with than put up with the pain and mental anguish of the next four weeks. anyway the doctors all disappear with my wife and family in tow. dinieying my request for a shotgun or uthanasia, es i asked if i could go to sweeden and get put to sleep. god knows why. its a good job my Wife wouldnt sign the papers.

Please keep in mind I have a temprature of 40+ and am on strong medication, don’t relay understand what’s going on so for me im in hell right now after that meeting. all I relay understand is I have 4 weeks and im dying of cancer. my life has just been extinguished, apart from the few tears from family nothing ells can be done. all this mis diagnoses and trips to other specialists seem pointless. As im crying and somehow managing to not to go on a rampage, a lady rolls up to the ward I immediately notice something different about her uniform.

Nurses usually where light blue or stripey Janet is in a dark blue and people are avoiding her like the plague, little did i know why but people didnt talk to her like everyone ells, doctors walked around her, even stepping out of her way. how did someone 5 foot tall, skinny and jolly manage that.. OMG she looking over at me, she starts walking toward me. Ohh she obviousley after the crazy guy next to me who used to lock up the houses of parlament. and she want to use my chair. Nope she wants me, she introduces herself im Jannet and asked me a few questions about items in the news and enquirers about my mental health. after a few minutes she informs me she from the chemotherapy unit and has come to talk me through the process. well I say talk it was more like nag, but with a friendly caring tone. one of the first things she said to me “you’ll be OK good people die young you’ll be fine” sorry love how Fing old do you think i am?. She continued to speek to me about everything, made sure i was understanding the information and checking that i was happy with her as my nurse.

so she makes an appointment to come back at 2pm the next day for the first treatment like i would not be there, waiting to die. she added i must drink a lot in preparation. after a small disagreement i gave in and agreed to drink mike as everything ells was either boring nasty or just dam right undrinkable. did i mention i had a temperature above 40 milk tasted like banana. so off i go like the sort of moron trying to drink life back into me dead body suddenly after a few pints i start feeling sick so i decide to make the journy to the bathroom and i had my first proper realization of death. and my first real lesson in heat. Milk curdles when its hot much to my horror as a lump of it gets stuck in my throat and i cant breathe flaying around like a mad man eventually managing to throw up i can breathe again. my body taught me alot that day don’t make several trips to throw up just get it over and done with is one of them.

The rest of the day pans out as every other except that i saw my father crying in the hallways something i had never seen ever. my Dad was the true hard case im sure he did cry just to himself inside. something he taught me well. but seeing this giant man i had known all my life cry was like the signing of my death warrent. Later that night my new wife and love of my life to this day walked in and lay beside me for what seemed like hours. little did i know that that night woould be the start of my life rather than the end.

If you are caring for someone with cancer then your relationship needs to be nurtured. You need together to become more aware of the dynamics of your relationship so that the negative processes can be minimised (eliminated is probably too much to hope for) and the positive processes maximised. I think it is fair to say that the person with cancer should be allowed to call the shots – (as a survivor myself) well, most of them. This can be a very painful process, especially if the person with cancer is doing things that you feel are unwise – or not doing things that you think would be beneficial.

The second piece of advice that I have is that the person with cancer should be encouraged to contemplate how he/she feels. What is the gut feeling that arises at three o’clock in the morning. I have a great respect for the power of the promptings of the unconscious which are also called intuitions. My feeling is that in the case of cancer treatment we rush too quickly into taking an attitude about what we want to do about it. The moment we are faced with a positive diagnosis there seems to be tremendous pressure to make the `right decision’.