Into week Five

When I set out on this journey and sat with Prof. Donde, and he went through the side effects, the pain, the uncomfortable fact that you can't eat anything, drink anything, I sat there and thought to myself, you know what, take the pain, be a big boy, thinking there are people far worse off than I can even imagine and then this weekend kicked in...OMG!!

The ulceration in my mouth is beyond, so eating is a non-starter, drinking is like a mission, headaches - god! never known anything like it, I can feel my mouth getting tighter and tighter, some may say well at least it will shut him up for a while LOL! but even laughing is killing me, anyway I look at it this way, I am into week 5, I have two more after this, and then DONE! although upto 3 weeks post the treatment can be very uncomfortable it can't be as bad as this. It can then take up to 3 months for the taste sensation to come back (I think I might be at about 75kgs by then lol!), in fact do you know what the worst thing is, I can smell food which generally smells delicious, but then tastes crap - so that is a real mind game...Not even Sir Alex or Wenger could better that! In fact my sense of smell is stronger than it has ever been - bizzare, oh and forget any nose jokes that maybe on the tip of your tasting tongue!!

So Carol flew back to the UK on Friday, watched Braderz play hockey on Saturday at school - he is in the 1st team so well done son (one of only 4 boys from the 5th form) and Orlanda has had the pain of looking after Dad, what can I say, not a good patient but she is doing great, although she did try to kill me on the SA roads yesterday, getting confused at a traffic light!! and turning right with a car steaming towards us, I must admit I did shriek a bit!! She started work today so she really is off and running down here now, it looks like she has joined a great team so good luck to her there....

Carol fly's back to Jo'burg on Wednesday with Lauren and will now be down for a few weeks, Lauren for about 6 weeks, before she goes travelling to SE Asia so it will be great to see them, in fact I can't wait for them to get here, its incredible how more uplifting having your family around you is, I didn't think it would be that crucial (stupid I know), but it is and to anyone who is struggling you need them with you, they just make you feel so much better, even if they're giving you grief about not eating or drinking enough, at the end of the day they are trying to help you...

Had my appointment with Dr Boyes-Varley today, he is such a kind man, you can tell he does his job for the passion, very caring and totally about his patient, anyhow he has a look which is seriously painful, tells me I have an infection which needs to get sorted so back on antibiotics, I also have a bit of mouth candida which also causes pain, so got some stuff for that, and told to start taking Vitamin E which will hopefully clean up the radiation free radicals. For anyone interested it is really important to keep your mouth clean during radiation treatment, because any infection can lead to serious complications which can be worse than the cancer itself, and because your mouth is so dry this is where infections such as Candida can take advantage.

Changing the subject though Spurs were a bit disappointing at the weekend 1-1 with Wolves at home um! although not as disappointing as any Arsenal fan must be feeling, oh dear! makes you realise getting a point there wasn't that bad? so I think if we can beat Man City this coming weekend I think we could be in with a real shout - Come on you Spurs!!

I have to thank everyone for the emails I have been getting, I really appreciate the support and I think the fact that you know friends and family are there supporting you is so key to getting through this, so thanks again it really helps