Lisa C Hinsley
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Doubt

27/4/2014

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Short word, big impact, deep meaning: doubt. Roll it around your mouth and think what it means to you. Everyone is plagued by doubt at some point in their life, if not on a daily basis. Small feathers of doubt tickling your feet as you stand before the sandwich counter trying to decide which one the other half will want. Then there’s that elephant in the room as you jump into a new job, one you’re not sure you can do, and failure is so easy, success never a given.

My friend Graham noticed that I’d been a bit quiet lately. I’ve not been posting on Facebook. I’ve not put up any new blogs. I’ve hardly been responding to messages and emails. I’ve turned ostrich, my head is stuck in the sand and I am trying to pretend there’s nothing wrong here. It’s easier that way, to pretend. As children we grow up in a land of make believe. As a writer, I have chosen to continue on that path and it’s so much easier to dip into a made-up world and pretend everything is okay.

Problem is, that little word doubt, coming back to haunt me. That’s what Graham asked me. He understands me better than most.  He’s had bowel cancer, been treated and come out the other side, hopefully free of the disease for the rest of his life. But he remembers that doubt, my guess is before every check-up and follow-up scan as part of his care, he worries himself silly – will this scan be the one that tells the doc it’s back?

I’m in the middle of my course of chemo, three cycles down, three to go. My body is tired and my immunity is struggling. I’ve had number four chemo postponed twice now as the docs wait for my bloods to come back to some semblance of normality. It’s now that my mind is taken over with the thought: is it worth it? There is every possibility that I am going through all of this and the tumours inside me are growing regardless. There’s also the possibility that they are being beaten back. But the second possibility only visits on rare occasions. Mostly I worry that the headaches that have been plaguing me mean it’s gone to my brain. Or the ache in my leg means it’s gone to my bones.

A little while ago another friend of mine, Tricia, alerted me to this article in The Guardian: link.

George Orwell has always been a bit of an authorly hero to me. I read 1984 at a young age, and it really affected me. This passage stuck out at me as I read the article:

Richard Blair (speaking about George Orwell) believes that his father was given excessive doses of the new wonder drug. The side effects were horrific (throat ulcers, blisters in the mouth, hair loss, peeling skin and the disintegration of toe and fingernails) but in March 1948, after a three-month course, the TB symptoms had disappeared. "It's all over now, and evidently the drug has done its stuff," Orwell told his publisher. "It's rather like sinking the ship to get rid of the rats, but worth it if it works."

Orwell is long dead, but his words can still make a difference. He gave me something I really needed, the opposite to that horrible word, doubt. He gave me hope. If not for me, for the people of the future, people who will look back at the suffering of people like me and shake off a chill as they pop a pill that cures their cancer in weeks. Because that time will come. To be honest, my chemo is not the worst out there; I am actually quite lucky with my treatments. Doesn’t make the drugs they give me any less horrific, doesn’t take away that snappy attitude that comes over me in the days leading up to my next session of chemo, it doesn’t make me dread going to the hospital any less, and it doesn’t make me forget that I’ve now had twenty-four sessions of chemotherapy.

But in the middle of all this grimness, I have remembered about hope, one of the things that has kept humans going for so many thousands of years. There are days when I feel like I am that sinking ship, too many days plagued with doubt. All I can hope is before I am completely sunk that the rats disappear. I expected him to get out his pack of fags. Instead he rested his arms on his knees and his head on his hands and very quietly began to sob. I didn't know if I should stop and comfort him or leave him alone. I'm not sure I would have helped, I would have been crying along with him. I hate cancer so much.

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Lebetephile

6/2/2014

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I’ve been forced to make up a word. I am sure there is already one out there, fit for purpose, but I couldn’t find it. If anyone knows of a legitimate word for my definition, please let me know!

So what is the definition in question? A lover of kettles. Yup, that’s what I felt so strongly about I had to make up a word.

I’ve been having on-going issues with my guts for months now. In August 2013 I had SIRTs – an internal radiotherapy – to my liver. That in turn gave me gastritis, a surprisingly painful and horrible condition. It’s the inflammation of the stomach lining. Because of that I went to a dietician in November who put me on two Ensure drinks a day and recommended cutting out wheat, processed meats, sugar, and anything that made things worse (using a trial and error system). She also recommended cutting out milk, but I love my tea so she suggested lactose free milk.

For some time I have been using goats milk, but dutifully swapped over to lactose free cow’s milk and eliminated all the suggested things. I researched the bland diet and settled into a limited range of foods.

The problem was I wasn’t getting any better. I still had uncomfortable bloating, even the tiniest sip of alcohol gave me maddening heartburn. Bread is simply not worth sneaking into my diet. Fruit was a big no-no which has been tough, I love my fruit. I even swapped over to decaffeinated tea and a couple of weeks ago on a whim drank mostly green tea for a day.

Now green tea, for those unfamiliar with it is taken without milk. I happen to like it with a splash of apple juice. So what does all this have to do with kettle love, or to coin a word, being a lebetephile?

Green tea doesn’t taste good with freshly boiled water. The heat brings out a bitter taste that makes me think of green tea as a medicine to be suffered through. There are a slew of health benefits, especially to people with cancer. That’s why I mix in some apple juice. It makes it just about palatable, and I have my s-i-l Pat to thank for that idea.

The other way of making green tea more consumable is to let the water cool before dropping in the tea bag. But I have the worst short term memory now, I blame all the chemo etc. This means unless I set a timer, I wander off and come back to a too-cool kettle, and have to restart the process.

So why is that all so important, you might ask? I still haven’t answered why I’m in love with my kettle. I am getting there, I promise. I had heard on the Beating Bowel Cancer forum about a multi-temperature kettle. They aren’t cheap so I’ve never entertained the notion of buying one for very long. But here’s the thing – cutting out dairy for a day (and that was all it took) made my insides feel noticeably better. They next day I was on Amazon, that love-to-hate website. I found a Cuisinart kettle that had good reviews and seemed to fit the bill. I ordered it with the free 3-5 day shipping and was happily surprised when it arrived early.

Here’s where I hope you feel the love. The kettle is heavy, I think that is the only slight downside. It’s got fancy blue back-lighting for the dials and tells you the current temperature of the water. There’s an 85deg button to press for cooler hot water. There’s a 100deg button for black tea. You can also go up by 5deg at a time should you wish to. And it makes the best cup of green tea ever. I am now completely off dairy. I feel like my guts are finally healing after months and months of misery. I survive almost exclusively on green tea. It’s not a medicine now; it’s a viable substitute for my much loved cup of tea with milk.

I go in the kitchen and smile at my kettle. People come in and are drawn to it (I think that blue back-lighting helps there). I wish I’d bought a multi-temperature kettle years ago. Not only am I finally getting the health benefits of green tea (which you can read about here) but I’ve ditched the dairy and am feeling fab without it.


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