Kick that Uterus into Touch

 Today was the day of my scheduled colonoscopy. I am amazed at how many of my friends have told me that they’ve undergone this procedure! Young and old alike..... I had one 15 years ago, and could remember the horrors of the bowel prep, which then I was instructed to take for the 48 hours prior to the procedure.  This time, I was told to drink 2 litres of Moviprep at 5 pm and at 8 pm, the evening before, having had nothing to eat since breakfast at 9 am. As well as this, I was encouraged to drink at least 500mls of clear fluid as well as the laxative. I couldn’t manage the full second litre, by that time, the novelty of lemon  sherbert flavouring and aspartame had worn off, and each sip was making me retch and gag........ and of course, every time I gagged or coughed or retched, there was a reflex response at the opposite end of the torso............ (poo emoji should be inserted here) Nothing happened really until around 10.30 pm - but after that, I had the most awful ni...

  On Monday I went up to the Royal Marsden for a Covid test. This is a routine screening test because I am having the colonoscopy procedure tomorrow (Thursday). It was an unusual journey for me because I had to pay for my travel as it was before the ‘old’ people are allowed to use their oysters (shock horror!). All went well until I arrived at Victoria where the ticket barrier refused to accept the card I use for Apple Pay on my phone. For some reason, it was declined and I had to actually speak to the customer service man at the barrier  - cue dismissive attitude and patronising response.... resulting in me scrambling about in my bag to find my purse which held my real plastic bank card. I walked through Belgravia, as is my chosen method of travel to Chelsea, marvelling as ever as I passed by estate agent windows, and watching the ‘other half living their lives’ and  walking their wee children to select private schools.   Arriving at the endoscopy suite early, I sa...

 Today I was scheduled to meet with my new consultant (in the colorectal team). Last week, a lovely nurse told me that she hoped I'd be 'under' Mr Rasheed "because he's lovely..." and I was! SO that was my first fortuitous bit of news.  Yesterday I had a horrible gastric upset, and it took me all day to work out the reason.... mackerel pate that I made (I thought on Saturday, but realised that it was actually on Friday)... I had finished this off on my marmite crackers (thank you Hayley Merdita, who hates Marmite!) and boy! did I pay for it..... on and off the loo for about 12 hours, with the most awful cramps imaginable. Grim. I was just relieved that it was better today, so that I was able to go for my follow up appointment. (The positive side of me would like to report that I lost about 4 pounds) I normally travel to the Chelsea Marsden on the train, and then walk from Victoria, through Belgravia, which takes less than half an hour and means not worrying ab...

Why is it that the last forty years has scooted past me in the blink of an eye, but forty minutes in an MRI machine seemed to be interminable!?  How can this be?  In this strange time zone I find myself in at the moment, there are some days that stretch out, and others which flash by...... let’s hope that when I go to work tomorrow for a ten hour stretch, that flashes by too!    When I last wrote, I had just had the consultation with the Gynae registrar telling me about my “unexpected” CT findings. He promised that I would be referred to a new team, the colorectal specialism....  and would probably be called for a colonoscopy and a biopsy (if there was anything to see)..... all this seemed very vague to me as I walked back to Victoria, and pondered my change in circumstances. I wondered if the referral would happen quickly, or might I be virtually sitting in an out tray for a while, or even worse, fallen behind the radiator!  The next two days passed with n...

 It’s almost 17 months since my last blog. Life had returned pretty much to normal, and most days I had completely forgotten about the fact that my life had been put on hold by the endometrial cancer in late 2018. I was making plans for retirement, planning a move, nagging Peter to get on with the outstanding jobs....... At the start of the financial year, I dropped my hours down to 20 per week, which constituted 2 long days at work, which I’ve been enjoying (until the massive cock up which resulted in an overpayment of £1000 which was demanded back over 3 months..........long story, now hopefully resolved) Throughout the pandemic, my contacts with the Royal Marsden have been telephone consultations, and then it was deemed appropriate that I should have a CT scan (just to check all is well). I had the CT scan last month, with a booked telephone consultation for the following week. When the consultant herself called me the alarm bells weren’t triggered immediately, but as the words ...