Is that a pump around your waist, or are you just happy to see me?

I feel terrific! I have never felt healthier or more well in my life. Since the dietary changes, my food tastes amazing. I crave vegetables, they taste so alive and indeed, life- giving. Almond milk on our morning muesli! Homemade rye bread, ( but only a bit!) no coffee, one cup of English tea with cow's milk in the morning, (couldn't give that one up). Herbal teas the rest of the day. A whirlwind of positive, exciting changes!

And then Chemo Day! Kind of like D-Day, except spelled with the letter, 'C'. I felt like I was under attack, sitting -in an admittedly rather comfy chair-  in the Chemo Suite being attacked by -admittedly - loving nurses who were going to fill me with the Deadly Serum: Oxaliplatin and Folinic Acid, and to finish it off an 800mg bolus dose of Fluorouracil (5-FU). (I wonder what the "FU" stands for?)  At least they didn't smile all of the time. 

I wasn't alone. An older gentleman in the chair next was on his third round of chemo for the same dis-ease as myself. The last round failed him. Not encouraging. 

But that's the thing:  cancer is as individual as the individual. These are my cells gone awry, not something that has been placed there. Can't blame terrorists on this one. "Cells behaving badly" as one author put it. I have to look to my own within for the answers I need. Sara and I have been living, eating, breathing my cancer. Bless her; her GP signed her off for 2 weeks so that she could help me with appointments, Chemo Day, by cooking nourishing food. She has been my stalwart, my Companion of the Way, my light at the end of each dark tunnel I passed through. She is my Gift from God.

Almost time to leave the Chemo Suite. Just one more thing: a 46 hour pump, small, discrete (yeah right, not very: if I wear it under my shirt it looks like I need a hernia op, if I wear it any lower, well, read the above title...) So, pump jauntily positioned  inoffensively off to one side of my waist, I leave the Oncology department wrapping my face up in a scarf. Why a scarf? Apparently the chemo can send you into laryngospasm if you go out into the cold unprotected, or even drink cold liquids. My Recovery friends will be well acquainted with laryngospasm. The Oncology department's advice? Drink a cup of warm tea.

 Is that before or after I  lose my airway?