On the way I had Red Dragon radio on in the car and was singing along and I thought, God, I haven’t had a music station on for years other than Radio Three. The sun was shining and my window was down and I was singing my head off and it felt bloody great to be alive. Rosie loved my new hair and red lipstick. I have gone commando – my wig has gone into retirement!
I dyed my hair last night and went to the garage to get petrol without my wig on. Out of the context of the cancer hospital I will look like someone with very short hair, not someone who has had chemotherapy. I have been grateful for my wig and I feel almost as if I am being disloyal, leaving it behind. My hair is still very short but I have had enough of hiding behind my wig. I want my own hair back. I don’t really care any more what people will think of my hair. I asked Rhodri and he said I looked fine and it wasn’t too short, but it is very short so I asked the most brutally honest person in the house – Elis – and he said, ‘Mum, you look fine,’ and I knew if I didn’t he would tell me – he has no agendas. Short as it is, I just think I have battled with cancer and I have come through the other end. The last thing in the world I am worrying about is whether people will be looking at my hair and thinking it is too short.
I am a cancer survivor. I’ve said it – I have survived cancer – and now I am crying because up until this point I have been terrified of even thinking that. I am going to live, I am NOT going to be a statistic.
March 28, Wednesday
Christine, Elis’s childminder, is also having radiotherapy at the moment at the same clinic as me. I have been seeing her most mornings with Steve her husband. Before Christine came to the clinic I didn’t speak to anyone else. This isn’t because I am stand-offish or anything but merely because I do not like people telling me about their illnesses. Not that I don’t care, of course I do, but it frightens me, in truth.
I assumed that the women were in for breast cancer but they do all types of cancers and the lady I spoke to, when we were waiting for two hours once when they had forgotten about us, told me intimate details of her cancer which was in her rectum. I then went away thinking, God, you can get cancer in your rectum. I don’t know why I thought you couldn’t, because you can get it anywhere presumably. Then I thought, That’s one more cancer to worry about.
So, if I don’t speak to people then I won’t know what is wrong with them and we can all be blissfully unaware of the horrible ‘other’ cancers lurking out there, that we would only worry about. However, since Christine has come to the clinic we are discussing the intricate details of our cancers and putting the world to rights. Christine does her knitting and we chatter away for all the world as if we are waiting for a bus and not having radiotherapy in order to save our lives.
Elis has had his glasses. On the way to pick them up he said, ‘I’ve changed my mind. I don’t want the Pepsi ones any more, I want the plain ones.’ I explained that they had made the Pepsi ones especially for him and he couldn’t change his mind. I have bought a spare pair for him, which are plain, because I thought he’d break the Pepsi ones; something would happen to them, guaranteed. I didn’t realise that the ‘something’ would be before we had even left the car park. He managed to slide off the piece that goes over your ears, leaving a potentially fatal spike, so I had to go back and get them to heat it up and put it back on. I now have to write to Miss Smith, Elis’s teacher, to explain that he has to wear them.
Rhodri and Elis went to the Wales v San Marino (don’t know where that is, probably should) match in the Millennium Stadium with Alison and Jay and Peter and Jonah. Wales won, so they were triumphant upon return.
March 29, Thursday
I had my mammogram today. The day I thought would be a lifetime coming came and went. It was quite painful on the breast that I am having radiotherapy on, but apart from that it was fine. I was desperately trying to look at the images but couldn’t see them. I have an appointment in two weeks for the results as I am away at the caravan the week they will get them. I figure that if anything was wrong Gill would call me, but maybe it doesn’t work like that. I might ring and ask her to call me with the results, otherwise I’ll be worrying on my holidays and it will just be another thing hanging over me until I know the results.
March 30, Friday
Elis had a sleepover at Ben’s house, so it was just me, Rhodri and Osh. We were going to get a Chinese takeaway but decided to go to the restaurant we went to on my birthday. I thought it was slightly mad after our last trip, but was prepared to give it a go. Osh was perfection. If you told him not to do something, he didn’t, he sat and ate and we had a really nice time. I think Elis and Osh wind each other up in restaurants.
Apparently I am an inspiration, which is always good to know. There’s another woman having radiotherapy and I was waiting in the inner room ready for my turn and she came out and didn’t have her wig on. It’s a bit like mine, but blonde. It took me a few seconds to register who she was without her wig. She said, ‘Your hair is fantastic.’ I said, ‘Thanks. I was just so fed up with wearing that wig, I want my own hair back now.’ She asked me if her hair was shorter than mine and I thought it was actually a bit longer. ‘You’ve inspired me to go without it,’ she said. Yeah, sisters doing it for themselves!
March 31, Saturday
I was supposed to go to a Welsh away-day today but I didn’t go. I am so tired and didn’t get to bed until late, and Osh didn’t get up until about nine, which was great, so I just couldn’t get out of bed. I am feeling very tired at the moment. It does take its toll on you, the radiotherapy, I just want it to be all over – and it will be, next Wednesday. I want my life free of hospital appointments and treatments. I want to get my strength back together in preparation for returning to work. I’ve got nine weeks after the radiotherapy finishes to do this.
Before I had my treatment, I was wondering if it was too long, but now I don’t think so. It takes about two to three weeks after the treatment finishes for the effects to wear off, so then I’ll have just over a month to get back to normal again.
My breast is very painful now; it’s not excruciating but if you poked it I would probably be on the ceiling. It feels rather like when your breast milk is drying up; it is very red and has a rash on it, but all in all it’s bearable, especially as I know that in about two weeks it will start to settle down.
I don’t think I’ll be able to take Elis swimming though, when I’m in Tenby on my own as I’m worried that the rash, which has some sores on it, might get infected.
Osh has gone up to the farm; my mother is going to look after him while I do my Welsh day, as Rhodri and Elis are going to watch Cardiff together tomorrow. I ended up taking Osh up there and then going on a charity shop trawl with my mother – our favourite pastime.
April 1, Sunday
I hadn’t realised it was April Fools Day or I would have been larking about all morning. Took Elis to Llandeilo to Owain’s house. Rhodri’s parents met us there to take him up to Aberystwyth for a week’s holiday. Rhodri has man’s flu and while I know I should try to be a bit more tolerant, I do find it very difficult. I think I’ve gone through months of cancer treatment and hardly ever complained (I am a martyr); he gets a cold and everybody knows about it.
He was like a bear with a sore head and said he couldn’t possibly drive to Llandeilo and that there was no point him going and in any case he was too ill. So I ended up taking Elis myself, which I didn’t really want to do, as it’s two hours’ driving and I am very tired. Eva was not there and Rhodri’s mother said she was on a hen night. Owain corrected her and said it wasn’t a hen night; the woman was going to get married yesterday but had found out that the boyfriend had been having an affair. So the wedding was called off and they all met up on the day to have a girls’ night out. Rhodri’s mother wasn’t so sure it was a good idea and asked me what I would do. I said, ‘I would thank my effing lucky stars I’d had such a lucky escape and be dancing in the street, especially after leaving my miserable git of a husband this mo
rning.’ I actually forgot for a moment there he was her son, but she found it amusing anyway. Elis was raring to go off with them.
Osh was coming back this afternoon; however, my mother put him in the car and as my father was about to drive off, he threw up everywhere so my mother is keeping him up there until Wednesday when my treatment finishes. Rhodri pulled a face at this.
I said, ‘OK, we’ll get him back and when I have my treatment you can come back and look after him.’
‘Better leave him there then,’ he said. Heaven forbid he should have to look after his own child.
April 2, Monday
Went to Richard E’s house last night. One of the programmes they worked on in the summer was on the telly so they had a bit of a get-together with the people who made the programme. It was all really lovely and the food was the most fantastic I have ever tasted. Richard’s wife, Monserrat, is Catalan and cooks these amazing dishes. I am salivating thinking about it. I have invited them over for lunch in the next few weeks. Not quite sure how I can compete – well, actually I just can’t, so will have to think of something lovely to prepare – or something lovely for Rhodri to prepare as I will grudgingly admit that he is a better cook than me; plus if it is not nice, Rhodri has cooked it, not me.
When Rhodri woke up this morning, I was sitting at the computer reading the news on-line. ‘How are you feeling today, Rhods?’ he said out loud. I, having completely forgotten about his man’s flu, especially as he was knocking back the drinks at Richard’s and was the life and soul of the party, said, ‘Oh, yes, how are you feeling today?’ He went into a laborious description of how he is actually feeling which, in truth, I am not actually interested in, then said, at the end, sarcastically, ‘Thanks for asking.’ So I lost my patience and said, ‘I’ve just gone through bloody chemotherapy for four months and I don’t recall you asking me every day how I was.’ He ignored this as he knows I will always out-trump him on illness, or will bring out childbirth which he can never ever, compete with, but I duly toddled off to the shop to get him some Lemsip because nothing else would do, apparently
Without two children in the house, Rhodri and I went for a long walk by the river in the evening; it was lovely and sunny. I had put one of his jumpers on and have to admit that, without my red lippy and with his man’s top, I did look like a bloke. I have come to terms with the fact that I am never going to look like the pint-sized princess of pop, so I will just have to live with me and will my hair to grow quickly.
April 3, Tuesday
Tomorrow is my last radiotherapy appointment; after nearly nine months of treatment it is finally going to be over. When you are going through it, right in the middle of it, all you feel is that it is never-ending. You are wishing the days away because each day means one less of having to walk down those long corridors, seeing all those sick people, knowing that you are one of them.
I used to think that perhaps people thought I was one of the staff, not one of the patients, not one of the people with cancer, but now my hair is so short that in a cancer hospital I couldn’t be anything else. I am still quite young to be there as a lot of people are much older than me, but I am one of them and will stand alongside them because I am proud of myself to have come through this. I don’t need to pretend that I am not a cancer patient because I am, and although it has been bloody hard I’ve come through the other end.
So I will hold my head up high and look the world in the face and smile a great big bloody smile because cancer has changed me for ever and I will NOT be afraid of it.
April 4, Wednesday
My treatment has finished. For nine months of my life I’ve wanted this day to come. Nine months – the same amount of time you carry a baby, but with different expectations at the end. Or maybe not so different because a baby is a new life and for me this will be my new life – a rebirth, if you like.
I was so happy going to the hospital today, knowing the months of being treated, the sickness, the anguish, the fear would be over on THIS DAY. And on THIS DAY I would get my life back again.
I no longer have to plan my days around hospital appointments and treatments. It felt so weird, knowing this was it. I went in and the staff were their usual chatty selves. I gave them a box of Roses and said, ‘Thanks very much for zapping me.’
They are all so lovely! The staff at the hospital have a vocation and are really rather special people. They did their final zapping and we said our goodbyes and that was it, it was over.
I go back in two weeks for a check on my breast and the results of the mammogram, and then I do not have to come here for another year. Just over nine months of being treated for breast cancer and it is finished.
I left the hospital wanting to jump in the air, I was so happy, and I got in the car and put the radio on and I was beaming; I must have looked the picture of happiness if anyone could have seen me. As I drove off I started singing along to a song on the radio. I can’t remember what it was – I just know I was singing at the top of my voice, smiling away, and the next thing I knew, I was crying. It was just a tear or two at first and then before I knew it I was sobbing, great enormous sobs wracking my body, and I had to pull over into a side street because I was crying so much I couldn’t see.
I sat in the car slumped over the wheel and sobbed and sobbed until there was nothing left. I cried because the fucking nightmare was over and I didn’t have to pretend any more.
April 15, Sunday
I have just returned from ten days at the caravan with Rhodri, the children, and Sioned and Ali for some of the time. I spent the first three days arguing with Rhodri, then my period started. So I am not yet infertile: despite everything my body has gone through, I still have periods. It never ceases to amaze me how resilient the human body is.
I realised when Rhodri had gone home, and I was on my own with the children for a week, that I tend to view any argument or negative incident between us as if there is something fundamentally dysfunctional about our relationship. I need to realise that people do have rows, they are part of everyone’s relationships. I know that if I am pre-menstrual I have a very negative view of Rhodri – I will watch out for that in future. It is not him who changes, it is me.
Elis has a new lease of life. He found a friend Dylan, and for ten days they were inseparable. He has blossomed with his newfound freedom. He is able to ride around on his bike and go to the park, as long as he comes back to check with us now and again, and is not out when it is dark. He is really responsible; I realised that he has never had the opportunity to take much responsibility in his life up to now because when we are in Cardiff we are with him 24/7.
Osh was my little doting pal all holiday; like Elis and Dylan we were inseparable. I’ve felt a bit low since I came back this afternoon and I’m not sure why. I had such a fantastic ten days and the sun shone non-stop. I thought the children might be too much for me, but they weren’t, they were so good. I just loved every minute of being on holiday with them; they are such wonderful small human beings and I’ve missed them over the last nine months.
God, I’ve missed them.
I want to hold them in my arms for ever and ever, and never let them go. I think when we were down at the caravan, for the first time in months, with just me and my babies and with the sun shining, it was as if nothing had ever touched my life.
It was as if the cancer had never happened. I think I had forgotten what life was like before I had cancer. Being down at the caravan and feeling so well, I feel I have moved on and, moving on, I fear going back again, or maybe I fear going forward.
I have been in a bubble, a cocoon, for so long that the thought of going back into the real world of work is daunting.
I became friendly with Dylan’s nan Doreen and she looked so much like my own grandmother. I cried once when I thought about her. And I thought about my nanna Pitcher, who has died now, and I wanted her back there and then. My lovely calming grandmother with the reassuring touch. I wanted her to hold me in her arms and tel
l me she loved me, like she used to when I was a little girl. But I am not a little girl any more; at least not in years or looks, but there is a little girl still inside me who is afraid and sad sometimes, and needs someone to put their arms around her, just like I do with my babies, and tell her everything is going to be all right. I just want everything to be all right in my life.
April 16, Monday
Today is my little Oshy’s birthday. My not-so-little boy is three. He doesn’t really understand the concept of birthdays and kept giving me his presents and saying, ‘It’s your birthday, Mum.’ Every time he had a gift he would say so sincerely, ‘Thank you very much.’ He is so cute; he had a Scooby Doo cake and candles and he blew them out twice because he loved it so much the first time. I am so, so lucky to have two wonderful, healthy, beautiful children.
April 17, Tuesday
I had my mammogram results today and everything is fine. I am so relieved it is finally over. I have told all my friends and family and people at work, and everyone is so happy for me. For once I do feel that I can be happy, and that this is news worth celebrating. I am not cured, they do not use that word, but I am in remission. I will be monitored for at least the next five years and I will be on Tamoxifen for five years and have a mammogram every year. I am not going to let cancer blight my life with worry and wonder what might happen and if it might come back.
I am going forward thinking that it will NOT come back, and I will not be frightened to say that. I am asking the Cosmos for my health, and with a bit of help from me along the way, I am hoping the Cosmos will give it right back to me.
My Mummy Wears a Wig - Does Yours? A true and heart warming account of a journey through breast cancer Page 27
