Feeling good this morning, ahead of household tasks and so have some time to make a long overdue blog update. I'm already thinking that today is Sunday though so the rest of the week will therefore be a shock, more later...
To kick-off with, a couple of things in the news that I've seen various tweets about and can hold my tongue no longer.
First BP. Indisputably one of the worse environmental disasters instigated by man. Undoubtedly BP have a responsibility and much apologising to do especially after the somewhat blasé remarks when the CEO first went public. A question though, is BP entirely culpable though?
BP were renting the Deepwater Horizon rig so does some responsibility lay with Transocean (the renters) or Hyundai Heavy Industries (who built it). E.g. do these things have a "service life" whereby they are not safe for rental after so many drilling hours, are there regular "check-ups" of the equipment before re-renting?
Who allowed drilling to happen there in the first place? Someone must have authorised it and given the highly risky nature of such an undertaking, what precautionary and insurance measures were stipulated ahead of authorisation?
I heard on the radio (I think) that this is getting so much publicity because it is happening so close to the US. Don't get me wrong, it's a disaster and I feel for the people affected as well as being saddened to the huge environmental impact but if this happened off a 3rd world country coast or mid-ocean, would it be so reported?
Maybe my questions are naive but I think there is more to this than just pointing the finger at one source and surely now more than ever, alternatives to oil dependency must be relentlessly pursued.
David Laws. Hmmm. To start off with I was rather annoyed with the twittersphere for all the anti-Telegraph sentiment for breaking this story as it struck me as somewhat hypocritical (I don't think there would have been as much furore were the individual a Tory or Labour MP).
However, having just seen the BBC News article suggesting that the Telegraph are now pursuing Laws' replacement, I do wonder what the heck that paper is up to. Yes, they are Conservative supporting but wake-up you guys - we are at a new dawn of politics, a real coalition. Please let's give it a chance, we all know (or should know) that we are in for a rough ride - let's get some genuine talent therefore at the helm to steer the best path possible and stop sniping at the government so that they can get on with what needs doing.
So back to David Laws. He was wrong. But he admitted it and did an honourable thing. IMHO though his resignation should have been refused by Cameron and Clegg. Based on his stupendous education and background, I think Laws is the sort of person we need at this time of economic crisis. As such, as painful as it probably is for him (he is a very private person AIUI and this is what lead to the whole fiasco) he (and Cameron/Clegg) should do what's best for the country and get him re-involved, maybe not as a central "mouth-piece" figure, but certainly central to getting this country back on the right economic footing.
As a regular Tory voter (no, I'm not sorry) in the spirit of coalition I find myself siding with those on Twitter who are supporting David Laws.
Okay - enough of that but one more serious thing: I'm still in remission! I got the results from my 9 month biopsy back when I went to Oxford the other day. Blood counts are generally good and the BCR-ABL level was 0%, excellent news! My anniversary biopsy is scheduled in for 12th July, so fingers crossed for that too.
Physically I'm seem to be doing well, I'm putting on the weight again (need to convert more to muscle though!), full head of hair and starting to look normal again. Problems seem to be dry skin and bloody painful feet. Makes it an issue walking big distances but I've been given the all-clear for swimming so am looking forward to not just watching my sons at the local pool but literally diving in and enjoying the fun!
Finally chores...
Tomorrow will see me become a fully fledged house-husband. Sarah re-starts full-time 9-5 June 1st (congratulations again my love!) which means that I will take over the duties of cleaning, laundry, cooking, cleaning (there's a lot of it hence the double mention!) and school-runs/looking after Jake & Luke in the evenings. Oh yeah and looking for a job at the same time!
If anyone has any tips to stop me from going nuts, it would be greatly appreciated!! Having got a stack of ironing out of the way this morning, I can safely say that it is essential to fold clothes after taking them off the line/out of the tumble dryer as it massively reduces the effort. Also, the best ironing music by far has to be "You Can't Stop The Beat" from Hairspray, a surprisingly entertaining movie with a stellar performance by John Travolta. Boy can that man dance!
Enjoy.
Showing posts with label Thoughts and Feelings. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Thoughts and Feelings. Show all posts
Monday, 31 May 2010
Thursday, 28 January 2010
Day +198: First blog of the year...
OK - so not the 1st of January and no "Happy New Year" except for that one of course ;-) but just making it by the skin of my teeth to provide an update in the first month of the new decade...
Can't believe my last (progress) update was October '09 but as you may recall from that, things were looking good and I was starting to live a "normal" life. However, late November & early December I took a turn for the worse and was laid low with my temperature spiking all over the place and I was getting worried that I'd have to be re-admitted again. It was very stressful as clearly I didn't want to spend Christmas in hospital.
Fortunately that passed - it could have been a combination of GvHD or the re-balance of medication we were trying but Christmas was at home with the family and was fantastic although tough. I managed to prepare much of the traditional lunch for Sarah, the boys and Sarah's parents.
We had friends come round to see in the New Year which was a real boost and on New Year's day we went to Sarah's parents and spent a few nights there; that seemed to "flick a switch" in me that revived me in so many ways and things have been going great guns since.
Consequently blogging has taken a back seat but at least Twitter let's me send quick updates...
Anyhow, looking back at my last progress blog coincidentally that was the time of my first biopsy post transplant, the 3 month baseline marker. Tomorrow (Mon 1st Feb) is my 6 month biopsy. I'm apprehensive because of the procedure/sedation etc.
I should remain positive though, I saw the consultant last Wednesday - he's very happy with progress (as am I to be honest):
Blood counts etc. also mean that I'm able to eat out more often and generally "be ordinary" - it's great!
However, if I'm truthful, with such good results from the last biopsy I'm a little scared that they won't be as good this time. I'm also due to have my Hickman line taken out (after nearly a year of having it in, how scary is that??) so with that, the number of colds going around and the side effects I seemed to have from last time, I'm nervous and know that this coming week is going to be tricky, so bear with me!
Can't believe my last (progress) update was October '09 but as you may recall from that, things were looking good and I was starting to live a "normal" life. However, late November & early December I took a turn for the worse and was laid low with my temperature spiking all over the place and I was getting worried that I'd have to be re-admitted again. It was very stressful as clearly I didn't want to spend Christmas in hospital.
Fortunately that passed - it could have been a combination of GvHD or the re-balance of medication we were trying but Christmas was at home with the family and was fantastic although tough. I managed to prepare much of the traditional lunch for Sarah, the boys and Sarah's parents.
We had friends come round to see in the New Year which was a real boost and on New Year's day we went to Sarah's parents and spent a few nights there; that seemed to "flick a switch" in me that revived me in so many ways and things have been going great guns since.
Consequently blogging has taken a back seat but at least Twitter let's me send quick updates...
Anyhow, looking back at my last progress blog coincidentally that was the time of my first biopsy post transplant, the 3 month baseline marker. Tomorrow (Mon 1st Feb) is my 6 month biopsy. I'm apprehensive because of the procedure/sedation etc.
I should remain positive though, I saw the consultant last Wednesday - he's very happy with progress (as am I to be honest):
- I'm finally starting to put on weight (rather than just maintaining a level)
- Some muscle is coming back (I'm doing more stairs and slightly heavier lifting at home)
- Still getting tired, but this is more to do with trying to get my sleep pattern back in order plus I'm doing loads more around the house now
- Skin, Hair, Nails - all seem to be growing more normally now
- Been to the office a few times to catch up with folks, fix a few remote access problems and discuss with HR & my manager about returning to work...
Blood counts etc. also mean that I'm able to eat out more often and generally "be ordinary" - it's great!
However, if I'm truthful, with such good results from the last biopsy I'm a little scared that they won't be as good this time. I'm also due to have my Hickman line taken out (after nearly a year of having it in, how scary is that??) so with that, the number of colds going around and the side effects I seemed to have from last time, I'm nervous and know that this coming week is going to be tricky, so bear with me!
Thursday, 5 November 2009
Day +111: Goodbye October, hello new life...
Well it's been a while again since I've blogged a decent update but at least I've been tweeting!
October was a mixed month in that the first 4weeks (long month) were great - being home helping out etc. but the back end was a nightmare.
Fundamentally that was the reason for "going dark" both in terms of keeping in touch but also mood and general well being. Basically I spiked a temperature and that meant I had to go back in to hospital on to the ward, I think it may have been triggered from the hip biopsy I had on the 16th October.
Frankly it was depressing after being back at home but the temperature came down quickly thanks to strong antibiotics and I was able to negotiate going home after just one night's observation so at least I was home Sunday evening.
However, the antibiotics combined with suspected mild GvHD meant lots of diarrhoea. This lasted probably a week and a half in total and as you can imagine was incredibly debilitating, humiliating, tiring and depressing to be blunt.
The depression was quite bad and really it was the patience of Sarah, kind words from my Dad plus various messages and calls from people that came in out of the blue and generally thinking about all the folks that have been routing for me that saw me through.
On the plus side, I learned though through talking to the hospital staff that:
Hopefully this information is of use to others then to help them when they're feeling blue, even if you are generally healthy - tiredness is a problem:
Obviously this still needs to be monitored, biopsies will be conducted every 3 months, I am still on a lot of meds etc. but this is clearly amazing news and hopefully gives comfort to others that all of the above can work if you keep the faith, follow the professionals' advice, take your meds etc. and generally try and get on with things as normally as possible (i.e. being positive).
So I just wanted to let you know, thank-you all and obviously ask you to still keep me in your thoughts(!) so that this may continue and I can start real recuperation now.
I probably won't be be blogging anything significant from here on in, as to be honest I find that doing stuff around the home, helping Sarah with copious admin, staying on top of work/personal e-mails and of course helping with the boys is starting to turn full time again and quite tiring!!
I will be tweeting the usual mundane stuff about hospital visits etc. :-) but will include general updates on status etc. as part of that. Plus geek boy that I am will likely start turning some attention to interesting (well to me anyway) technology & gadgets...
Any please stay tuned if you can, thank-you again, love and peace to you, your families and all.
Chris.
October was a mixed month in that the first 4weeks (long month) were great - being home helping out etc. but the back end was a nightmare.
Fundamentally that was the reason for "going dark" both in terms of keeping in touch but also mood and general well being. Basically I spiked a temperature and that meant I had to go back in to hospital on to the ward, I think it may have been triggered from the hip biopsy I had on the 16th October.
Frankly it was depressing after being back at home but the temperature came down quickly thanks to strong antibiotics and I was able to negotiate going home after just one night's observation so at least I was home Sunday evening.
However, the antibiotics combined with suspected mild GvHD meant lots of diarrhoea. This lasted probably a week and a half in total and as you can imagine was incredibly debilitating, humiliating, tiring and depressing to be blunt.
The depression was quite bad and really it was the patience of Sarah, kind words from my Dad plus various messages and calls from people that came in out of the blue and generally thinking about all the folks that have been routing for me that saw me through.
THANK-YOU ALL!
On the plus side, I learned though through talking to the hospital staff that:
- TBI causes extreme lethargy that can come back and haunt you
- Fatigue affects coping mechanisms you may have developed
- Steroids cause mood swings
Hopefully this information is of use to others then to help them when they're feeling blue, even if you are generally healthy - tiredness is a problem:
- Take time out & relax
- Find time for yourself, re-focus and start again
- Talk to people, be open & honest and rely on the support of friends & family you trust
- The world will go on either without you for a day or two or with you working at a reduced pace
- Visual under the microscope, crude but showed things looked quite good
- FISH test, a genetic test that was looking for the Philadelphia +ve gene that added complications to my leukaemia. The result from that indicated that things look good
- Molecular test - this is the most in depth test and showed 0% leukaemia cells
Obviously this still needs to be monitored, biopsies will be conducted every 3 months, I am still on a lot of meds etc. but this is clearly amazing news and hopefully gives comfort to others that all of the above can work if you keep the faith, follow the professionals' advice, take your meds etc. and generally try and get on with things as normally as possible (i.e. being positive).
So I just wanted to let you know, thank-you all and obviously ask you to still keep me in your thoughts(!) so that this may continue and I can start real recuperation now.
I probably won't be be blogging anything significant from here on in, as to be honest I find that doing stuff around the home, helping Sarah with copious admin, staying on top of work/personal e-mails and of course helping with the boys is starting to turn full time again and quite tiring!!
I will be tweeting the usual mundane stuff about hospital visits etc. :-) but will include general updates on status etc. as part of that. Plus geek boy that I am will likely start turning some attention to interesting (well to me anyway) technology & gadgets...
Any please stay tuned if you can, thank-you again, love and peace to you, your families and all.
Chris.
Wednesday, 24 June 2009
Transplant postponed
Having geared myself up psychologically for going into hospital tomorrow and received some wonderful words of encouragement and warm wishes from folks (many thanks for those!) I got a call earlier this evening at about 18:40 from the hospital with some bad news.
You probably recall that I was due to receive cells from a single umbilical cord (normally two cords are used owing to the size of cords and the number of cells they contain versus those required). It was received in Oxford today and apparently was transported in 2 halves; one bag split.
Although half the cord is still usable it is not enough to carry out the procedure and a new cord needs to be found, the team in the hospital is searching for one again through the Anthony Nolan Trust.
Effectively everything has been postponed 2-3 weeks as radiotherapy will need to be rescheduled amongst other things.
All in all not the news I wanted to hear this afternoon but trying to be philosophical about it, I get more time with the family, more time to build up my strength ahead of chemo etc. and who knows, maybe an even better match may be found.
You probably recall that I was due to receive cells from a single umbilical cord (normally two cords are used owing to the size of cords and the number of cells they contain versus those required). It was received in Oxford today and apparently was transported in 2 halves; one bag split.
Although half the cord is still usable it is not enough to carry out the procedure and a new cord needs to be found, the team in the hospital is searching for one again through the Anthony Nolan Trust.
Effectively everything has been postponed 2-3 weeks as radiotherapy will need to be rescheduled amongst other things.
All in all not the news I wanted to hear this afternoon but trying to be philosophical about it, I get more time with the family, more time to build up my strength ahead of chemo etc. and who knows, maybe an even better match may be found.
Wednesday, 3 June 2009
What happened to May???
May for me simply fell off the calendar thanks to numerous hospital trips both planned and unplanned totally knocking me out.
Thanks again particularly to Sarah and my Dad for standing by me so much through this with countless trips and visits but also thanks to Sarah's parents and the many wonderful friends back in Maidenhead who've helped look after the boys at a moment's notice.
I’ve provided some updates as to what’s happened since the last blog update back at the end of April and will provide a view of what's coming up when things have solidified a bit more.
Thanks again particularly to Sarah and my Dad for standing by me so much through this with countless trips and visits but also thanks to Sarah's parents and the many wonderful friends back in Maidenhead who've helped look after the boys at a moment's notice.
I’ve provided some updates as to what’s happened since the last blog update back at the end of April and will provide a view of what's coming up when things have solidified a bit more.
Monday, 6 April 2009
Apologies for the lack of updates
Just wanted to blog a quick update about the lack of updates - steroid withdrawal (I'm assuming it is this that's causing it) is really knocking me out. I'm not sleeping well at night and find it difficult to sleep during the day, consequently I'm pretty tired and feel spaced out a lot.
As well I'm feeling quite sick - either bloated sick, hungry sick, tired sick or some combination...
Have been feeling a bit low (physically) then and not really up to social networking duties! Plus to be honest when I have had sessions of feeling bright & with it, I've elected to spend time with family and/or sit outside to enjoy the time I have to myself.
Will definitely start catching up soon though - hope you understand!
As well I'm feeling quite sick - either bloated sick, hungry sick, tired sick or some combination...
Have been feeling a bit low (physically) then and not really up to social networking duties! Plus to be honest when I have had sessions of feeling bright & with it, I've elected to spend time with family and/or sit outside to enjoy the time I have to myself.
Will definitely start catching up soon though - hope you understand!
Tuesday, 24 March 2009
A "cancer free weekend"
So following on from the General Progress update, I'd get it off of my chest the more personal side to this last weekend.
Firstly, I want to make it clear that I am extraordinarily grateful to everyone for their love and support - I do not take it for granted and indeed draw on it as my reserve for when things are low; I just don't want the following to be taken out of context or misconstrued.
With the physical effects of the chemo (nausea, fatigue) came a general depression and a whole feeling of being thoroughly fed up with this whole thing - stuck in the house and mainly the bedroom, not being able to help out, missing the lovely weather & going out as a family, not popping into a cafe or McDonalds for a little treat, even washing the car, DIY or grocery shopping.
Also, for 4 weeks now, so much focus has been on me and people asking how I'm doing it all got too much and it just made me want to scream!
Like I say, I don't want to sound selfish/ungrateful but ordinarily being quite a private person I just felt so overwhelmed and wanted to get away from it all to the point where I just didn't want to talk about it to anyone and tried to deflect questions back to the other person as to how they were doing and what's new in their life.
I wouldn't call it denial of the situation but I think it was just my general coping strategy to try and take more control and be "normal" again.
The other thing I tried to do was set myself some little goals to aim for - as Sunday was Mothering Sunday in the UK, I made an effort to get up early with the boys and bring Sarah breakfast in bed and the cards/presents they had made. It gave me a great deal of satisfaction to do that one small gesture but again helped make things feel normal.
It seemed to work for me as well as talking about how I was feeling to my Dad and to Sarah, the worse part was trying to explain to the boys why I was feeling the way I was but they are resilient and seemed happy to go off and play and be boys that it wasn't so bad (I hope).
Anyways, that's that off of my chest - physically I feel better today, yesterday I learned that what I experienced was to be expected and so feel brighter again.
Bottom line I guess is that we all have a dark moments of doubt, depression, despair - everyone is different but for me figuring a coping strategy as quick as possible, sticking to it and being open & honest with those that you love and trust to share your feelings and concerns seemed to work for me.
Of course, knowing so many people are rooting for you and doing what they can too is always in the back of my mind and helps enormously - thank-you!
Firstly, I want to make it clear that I am extraordinarily grateful to everyone for their love and support - I do not take it for granted and indeed draw on it as my reserve for when things are low; I just don't want the following to be taken out of context or misconstrued.
With the physical effects of the chemo (nausea, fatigue) came a general depression and a whole feeling of being thoroughly fed up with this whole thing - stuck in the house and mainly the bedroom, not being able to help out, missing the lovely weather & going out as a family, not popping into a cafe or McDonalds for a little treat, even washing the car, DIY or grocery shopping.
Also, for 4 weeks now, so much focus has been on me and people asking how I'm doing it all got too much and it just made me want to scream!
Like I say, I don't want to sound selfish/ungrateful but ordinarily being quite a private person I just felt so overwhelmed and wanted to get away from it all to the point where I just didn't want to talk about it to anyone and tried to deflect questions back to the other person as to how they were doing and what's new in their life.
I wouldn't call it denial of the situation but I think it was just my general coping strategy to try and take more control and be "normal" again.
The other thing I tried to do was set myself some little goals to aim for - as Sunday was Mothering Sunday in the UK, I made an effort to get up early with the boys and bring Sarah breakfast in bed and the cards/presents they had made. It gave me a great deal of satisfaction to do that one small gesture but again helped make things feel normal.
It seemed to work for me as well as talking about how I was feeling to my Dad and to Sarah, the worse part was trying to explain to the boys why I was feeling the way I was but they are resilient and seemed happy to go off and play and be boys that it wasn't so bad (I hope).
Anyways, that's that off of my chest - physically I feel better today, yesterday I learned that what I experienced was to be expected and so feel brighter again.
Bottom line I guess is that we all have a dark moments of doubt, depression, despair - everyone is different but for me figuring a coping strategy as quick as possible, sticking to it and being open & honest with those that you love and trust to share your feelings and concerns seemed to work for me.
Of course, knowing so many people are rooting for you and doing what they can too is always in the back of my mind and helps enormously - thank-you!
Thursday, 19 March 2009
You've got a what in your chest?!?!
A tube - or more accurately a Hickman Line...
Most people probably know that I am awful with things medical (injections, having blood taken etc.) - not just having the procedures done but people talking about on themselves or sometimes in general as I have a completely irrational thing of imagining it happening to me as they speak, I know weird.
If you are a bit prone to this yourself, you may want to skip this posting.
True story - the height of my infamy on this front was probably when Alien 3 opened back in 1992. There is a scene where an autopsy is carried out on a little girl, you don't see anything but you see the prep, the tools and you hear it when the chest is being cracked open. First time I saw it no problem as I didn't know it was coming, however I ended up seeing it again with my housemates at the time and seriously, I quietly passed out in the cinema - what a nightmare!!!
So, with the amount of blood that needs to be taken to check levels, chemo going in etc. this whole thing is a bit of a nightmare and this is where the Hickman Line comes into it. Essentially it's a main line to the heart, the picture gives an idea as to how...
The procedure takes a while and a specialist team of nurses (certainly at the John Radcliffe, not sure for other hospitals) performs it in the ward.
Some people have it done with just with local anaesthetic but I know that would be beyond me to as there was an option to be sedated that 's what I did and so slept through the most of it but was awake for the final bit.
Being absolutely honest - I am still a bit freaked out about it even after a couple of weeks now and I try not to look at it, however the benefits are immense as blood is taken and drugs administered without you feeling a thing saves your arm veins getting shot to pieces.
So, I'll stop at this point as I was hoping that writing about it would make me come to terms with it a bit more but unfortunately not that much :-(
If any one has ideas as to how to get over this nonsense - leave a comment!
Most people probably know that I am awful with things medical (injections, having blood taken etc.) - not just having the procedures done but people talking about on themselves or sometimes in general as I have a completely irrational thing of imagining it happening to me as they speak, I know weird.
If you are a bit prone to this yourself, you may want to skip this posting.
True story - the height of my infamy on this front was probably when Alien 3 opened back in 1992. There is a scene where an autopsy is carried out on a little girl, you don't see anything but you see the prep, the tools and you hear it when the chest is being cracked open. First time I saw it no problem as I didn't know it was coming, however I ended up seeing it again with my housemates at the time and seriously, I quietly passed out in the cinema - what a nightmare!!!
So, with the amount of blood that needs to be taken to check levels, chemo going in etc. this whole thing is a bit of a nightmare and this is where the Hickman Line comes into it. Essentially it's a main line to the heart, the picture gives an idea as to how...
The procedure takes a while and a specialist team of nurses (certainly at the John Radcliffe, not sure for other hospitals) performs it in the ward.
Some people have it done with just with local anaesthetic but I know that would be beyond me to as there was an option to be sedated that 's what I did and so slept through the most of it but was awake for the final bit.
Being absolutely honest - I am still a bit freaked out about it even after a couple of weeks now and I try not to look at it, however the benefits are immense as blood is taken and drugs administered without you feeling a thing saves your arm veins getting shot to pieces.
So, I'll stop at this point as I was hoping that writing about it would make me come to terms with it a bit more but unfortunately not that much :-(
If any one has ideas as to how to get over this nonsense - leave a comment!
Monday, 16 March 2009
Taking the news...
I'm not a deeply religious person (I'm a lapsed Catholic I guess) so I'm not intending this particular post to be profound or anything like that - in fact those who know me will probably see this as part of my general pragmatism! Here goes...
To be honest, I knew something wasn't right when I was asked to go to Wexham Park - having to go to hospital for a follow-up on the blood test made me suspect something was coming and when I arrived at the Eden Day Unit, I knew something BIG was coming owing to the number of posters around the place indicating support groups for things like Lymphoma.
Mentally/sub-consciously then I think I was gearing myself up for significant news and so when the diagnosis was confirmed I actually felt huge relief that the ailment was at last identified as it completely explained all of my symptoms and made me feel "normal" in that the weird nose-bleeds, feeling tired and achy were not necessarily down to stress, over-exercise or me being an idiot but there was actually something really wrong!
In all honesty I didn't find the news difficult to take - partly because of the above, partly because the medical staff were extremely professional and didn't beat around the bush in presenting the news and partially, I feel, owing to my "let's get on with it" nature; as far as I'm concerned, we know what the problem is so how do we go about fixing it?
At the same time though I'm not pretending that I was unemotional about it, being faced with your own mortality brings things into acute perspective and there were tears especially when I saw how the news was affecting my wife who was able to come back from work by that time - it is easy to forget how the news impacts others in a situation like this.
My main breakdown though was the thought that this was something I was going to pass on to my children - the thought of me tainting their lives preyed heavy on my mind and it was an enormous emotional relief when I was told that this is not hereditary (in either direction) - that helped me open up, from that point on it was "right, what's next?"
So all in all, in a very strange way, this seemingly total random event has actually been good for me; strangely I feel happy again - it has slowed me down and brought me closer to family, friends and even my faith. It has helped me realise what's really important in life - little things like making and hearing your children laugh and having the genuine love & support from amazing friends and family.
I feel blessed therefore that this will ultimately be a genuine life-changing event.
There are numerous examples/models of dealing with change management (as people I've had the fortune and pleasure to be their manager or mentor/coach well know!), but one I've just found seems to be the root research the The Kübler-Ross grief cycle
I think throughout my life/career I've been very fortunate to move on to the acceptance phase pretty quickly, maybe I'm daft in not spending more time on the other phases but as far as I'm concerned, things are what they are and you have to make best of the situation - I'm sure others have differing opinions, please feel free to comment!
Everyone is different though and people will of course react differently. However from my perspective though, I just want people (especially immediate family) to know that I have never felt angry about this or that someone or something was to blame - my philosophy is that energy is far better spent on looking to the positives and focusing on how to move things forward.
I believe Positive Mental Attitude is key and I want to thank friends, family & professionals for the awesome support being shown to help maintain this.
To be honest, I knew something wasn't right when I was asked to go to Wexham Park - having to go to hospital for a follow-up on the blood test made me suspect something was coming and when I arrived at the Eden Day Unit, I knew something BIG was coming owing to the number of posters around the place indicating support groups for things like Lymphoma.
Mentally/sub-consciously then I think I was gearing myself up for significant news and so when the diagnosis was confirmed I actually felt huge relief that the ailment was at last identified as it completely explained all of my symptoms and made me feel "normal" in that the weird nose-bleeds, feeling tired and achy were not necessarily down to stress, over-exercise or me being an idiot but there was actually something really wrong!
In all honesty I didn't find the news difficult to take - partly because of the above, partly because the medical staff were extremely professional and didn't beat around the bush in presenting the news and partially, I feel, owing to my "let's get on with it" nature; as far as I'm concerned, we know what the problem is so how do we go about fixing it?
At the same time though I'm not pretending that I was unemotional about it, being faced with your own mortality brings things into acute perspective and there were tears especially when I saw how the news was affecting my wife who was able to come back from work by that time - it is easy to forget how the news impacts others in a situation like this.
My main breakdown though was the thought that this was something I was going to pass on to my children - the thought of me tainting their lives preyed heavy on my mind and it was an enormous emotional relief when I was told that this is not hereditary (in either direction) - that helped me open up, from that point on it was "right, what's next?"
So all in all, in a very strange way, this seemingly total random event has actually been good for me; strangely I feel happy again - it has slowed me down and brought me closer to family, friends and even my faith. It has helped me realise what's really important in life - little things like making and hearing your children laugh and having the genuine love & support from amazing friends and family.
I feel blessed therefore that this will ultimately be a genuine life-changing event.
There are numerous examples/models of dealing with change management (as people I've had the fortune and pleasure to be their manager or mentor/coach well know!), but one I've just found seems to be the root research the The Kübler-Ross grief cycle
I think throughout my life/career I've been very fortunate to move on to the acceptance phase pretty quickly, maybe I'm daft in not spending more time on the other phases but as far as I'm concerned, things are what they are and you have to make best of the situation - I'm sure others have differing opinions, please feel free to comment!
Everyone is different though and people will of course react differently. However from my perspective though, I just want people (especially immediate family) to know that I have never felt angry about this or that someone or something was to blame - my philosophy is that energy is far better spent on looking to the positives and focusing on how to move things forward.
I believe Positive Mental Attitude is key and I want to thank friends, family & professionals for the awesome support being shown to help maintain this.
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