There are swallows and there are swallows. I’m talking about the swallowing type of swallow. The one which requires a little gulp at the end and if it’s a very special one (perhaps birthday or Golden Wedding Anniversary) comes with kisses and maybe a nice card to keep from Moonpig or similar.
That bodily function that, for most of us, happens without even thinking about it. It’s so innocuous, some of us, and I include myself in this, can do it whilst doing other bodily functions simultaneously. For example, try swallowing now, whilst reading this and at the same time, pop out a little poop. Readers of a certain age, may I suggest you do not try this unless you are entirely alone.
There you go. See. It’s a doddle. I’m sure some reading this blog could find more spectacular ways to illustrate swallowing whilst doing other things simultaneously, but I’ll leave those until I’m back on top form in some boozer with a pint in my hand!
And so, to swallowing. Or not to swallow. No. This is not a rhetorical question and there is absolutely no need or expectation to write in and answer this (though a cheeky thumbs up may be taken as a hint).
Until yesterday, I’d swallow just for fun. I’d walk down the street going ‘gulp, gulp, gulp’ with a slightly camp skip in my step and a big fucking smile on my face.
Sadly, the gulping and smiles have gone, leaving me somewhat disabled with an unexplained camp skip and now I have bulging eyes. The radiotherapy treatment has incrementally caused the reduction in saliva which in turn has instigated what I suspect is possibly oral thrush. And it’s painful.
Ulcers are springing up like wild crocuses on a badly maintained KIrklees roundabout and any morsel of food I dare put in there seems to behave like a pinball in one of those machines that makes a lot of noise. Each contact with the gum or, worse, the tongue, sends it accelerating across the roof of the mouth with excruciating pain until it disappears down an ever-decreasing hole at the back and into a burning oesophagus.
Whilst doing my best to hum ‘Tommy’ in my head and ignore the pain, I am failing badly.
To add to this, all sense of taste has just about gone.
My recent homemade bolognese was so insipid, it ended up with more salt than meat as I stupidly tried to give it some flavour.
If I’m not careful, this blog could easily become a long list of your favourite treats sabotaged by my wicked take on how it actually feels to swallow right now.
But that’s not fair. I’d rather this blog ends with a call to action.
Stuff your faces! Eat and drink whatever makes you happy because for every mouthful you enjoy, you’re having mine too.
The green mist descends whilst those around turn up the volume and align the laser to within a hair’s breadth of a voice spent.
Clicks one and two ensue followed by five more as I keep the score. The eyelids are squeezed tightly to the curvature of the ball beneath it and the brow drags down from the crown to the frown.
The lips speak no more and the cheeks have puffed their last as they too are compressed, sealed tight within the mask.
The heart beats quicker as the mind begins to flicker. Racing from A to Z via an algorithm or some made up trigonometry in my head.
Holidays from years gone by come and go as the clock ticks down and still you lie there afraid to move a muscle let alone frown.
There’s no room to look up nor down and your ears strain to every change in the sounds around. And still you count.
Keep the count going but not backwards as that leads to disappointment when you reach the end and still no one transcends.
The feet are now sore as they too are clamped to the table and their only escape is to curl around the sharp edges around which they are disabled.
And still you count, now in French, Italian or any other tongue just to kill more time until those footsteps start to come.
Like ballet dancers tap, tap, tapping on a pulsing heart, one more click and it’s now over. Just for one day. Please God, when will my recovery start? When will this green mist rise for the last time?
It’s 2:30am and I’m wide awake. I’ve actually slept really well for a solid 4 hours. I have to be on court at 10am to compete in the club doubles tournament, semi finals. I had not expected to be in any position to play so win or lose, it’s a bonus just to get back on court.
If I only grab another hour or so of sleep tonight, that’s fine. I’m no Margaret Thatcher, I do need my sleep, but I do not stress about where or when I get it.
And so, I’ll use this quiet time to analyse my approach to the treatment and try to capture what it takes to retain a positive mental attitude in the face of what many would consider adversity or worse.
So let’s peel back the onion…
I guess one’s childhood has much to do with how we are shaped for the rest of our lives. Who was it that said, “Give me the child at 7 and I will give you the man?”
Mine was not a ‘perfect’ childhood and though I was the only kid at St Joseph’s Junior School to wear bell bottoms, they came at a price.
Having been born in Dalton, Huddersfield, I was then brought up in a beautiful windmill converted into a hotel in northern Italy where I and my sister attended a convent school for a couple of years, Italian was my first language and nuns were my first teachers and the Romany gypsies who camped nearby, were my first fascination.
The wonderlust in me today probably came from the fear of being ‘stolen’ by the gypsies and the hidden desire to be stolen whilst witnessing the very public breakdown of my parent’s marriage.
By the age of 7, I was the first kid at St Joseph’s to be from a divorced family. A scar for life? I’ve never ‘fitted into a box’ and perhaps that was why. Or maybe coming from Dalton and being called ‘Nadio’ had something to do with it. I was never going to fit in anywhere with a name like that!
My subsequent youth was spent climbing trees, playing footy and hiding from my too frequent scoldings for having a ‘bad attitude’ … a habit that would appear to have stayed with me until now some might contest.
And so, I left home on my 16th birthday to move into an attic ‘apartment’ in a Victorian terrace house on the edge of Huddersfield town centre. It was 7th February 1980. Kenny Rogers’ Coward of the County was number one. I was freezing cold, lonely, frightened, unqualified, uneducated but free. Free. (I have to repeat it even now as I relive that adrenaline rush for one more time).
By this time, dad had already built a successful restaurant business with his business partner and my first and most cherished ‘mentor’, Mario Bortoletto. And so, I left school and embarked on a career in the only thing I knew I could do and by May I was already working in a large brigade of chefs in a hotel in northern Sardinia.
I was lost, useless, lonely and had the shits.
By the end of week 2, the Head chef who had utter hatred for anything or anyone English (especially the hotel guests!), uttered the words that sent me rigid with fear, “Inglese bastardo. Ci non parle Italiano al fine de questo settimana, ti mando a casa!!!”
I cried.
I literally ran through the pine forrest (yes, the hotel was The Pineta Beach Hotel, set in acres of beautiful pine forrest) to the bungalow housing some of the senior chefs.
They took me in and promised never to speak English to me again in front of the chef and taught me Italian every spare minute of every day for the remainder of the summer season.
When the hotel closed its doors for winter, the Head Chef and his wife invited me, the only apprentice that season, to do the winter season with them at Cortina D’Ampezzo.
Thanks, but no thanks. Italiano bastardo!
I came back to Huddersfield to do a year at The Pennine President (Cedar Court), before heading to Bali (where I hung out with a certain Boris Johnson) then on to Australia for a year followed by a year cycling with my then girlfriend (and wife of 28 years) from Huddersfield to southern Egypt and back and then set up Nadio’s Pizza and Pastas in Huddersfield.
After 18 successful years, and now with three beautiful children, I decided to get those qualifications I’d missed out on by leaving school at 16 and subsequently attended night classes for three years and gained my Masters in Marketing Management. I sold my businesses to my managers and then embarked on a new career in marketing which has lead me to London where I happily find myself, on my houseboat, writing this blog.
Phew, 30 years in one sentence!
So, what’s the relevancy? Why am I boring you with all this?
Because, if life has taught me nothing else, it’s taught me ‘resilience’. It’s taught me to equip myself for the roughest of rides because that’s my destiny and I need to be able to take whatever comes my way.
And so, at 8:34am this Monday, when I’m next going under the mask (it’s actually 7 clamps, not 4 as I previously blogged) … I will be ready. I hate it. But it symbolises the mountain which I must climb, alone, to get to the other side.
It’s my mountain, nobody else’s. Will the grass be any greener on the other side? Well, is it ever?
At least in this scenario there is no other route. There is only one way and it’s up and over that mountain. There are footholds and ropes, metaphorically, and you, my family, friends, acquaintances are my Sherpas*. You lighten my load and steer me in the right direction and when I may stumble you will not let me fall.
Some Sherpas, like the ‘impact sub’ are not yet on the pitch. But. I KNOW you are there and I KNOW I can call on you when needed.
A steep (let’s keep the association going a tad longer) learning curve for me was when I arrived in ‘Base Camp’.
My ‘rucksack’ was weak and I’d not packed it well. It would never have coped with the rigours of the journey so it needed to be abandoned and I found a tougher, more resolute me. Out went the low grade climbing equipment and in came less, but more resilient kit.
But. I’m not there yet. We’re only beyond the tree line and to be quite honest, whilst it’s had its challenges, I’m damned sure they are nothing compared to what’s to come and so I still do not know if I have the equipment required. But it’s all I have and if for that reason alone, it’s got to be good enough.
Thank you for indulging me by reading thus far. It is cathartic to be able to write my thoughts as I proceed on this journey and any comments or thumbs up all help.
Onwards and forever upwards. Nad x
Saturday 5th June 2021
* Thanks to my friend in life and cancer, Mandy Taylor for introducing me to the concept of my virtual Sherpas. Hopefully, we will get to write more on this together one day soon
Yes, I make no apology, dealing with cancer requires a great memory bank. Why? Let me explain …
Having made it to Day 5 out of 30 treatments, I’m still not qualified to detail what happens next. I think I know, but there are so many trip hazards on the way that even for someone as carefree and ‘happy go lucky’ as me, it’s become painfully (I chose that word on purpose), obvious that no two journeys are the same.
Any form of injury, including such minor things as a shaving cut or bitten lip can soon turn into an infection and there begins the cycle of more discomfort and pain.
So far, I’ve managed to keep reasonably healthy apart from a slight infection around my peg. It’s red and inflamed but seems to be under control.
Each day starts with an energy level that may or may not be similar to the day before. Getting off the settee to make a cuppa was a planned task two days ago. It took a massive amount of effort and whilst I was standing up, I added a couple of other chores so I’d not have to stand again for a few hours.
Yesterday, I walked 2 miles, cooked a BBQ for guests and could have danced the Hokey Pokey around the Marina for a lap or two!
Every day seems to be different and my attitude is about making the most of the good times because I’m damned sure there’s going to be some tough days to come.
And so, to making memories…
I’m a huge fan of the Pay it Forward concept. If someone does you a good dead, then you repay that by doing a good dead for someone else. And so it goes on.
Pay It Forward
It’s particularly effective in places like coffee shops where you may pay for an extra coffee and if someone comes in without the means to pay for a coffee, there’s one already waiting for them. Paid for.
I believe the same concept helps when dealing with adversity. And so, it is vitally important to ‘bank’ the good times thereby giving you something to draw down on in less good times.
This works particularly well when going under the mask. I’m still not used to it and even yesterday we had to abort and start again. It really does require ‘mind over matter’ and no matter how chirpy I might feel when I arrive at the treatment table, it only takes a momentary lack of concentration to fill my head with anxious thoughts and the panic starts to well up immediately.
So. To counter this. I try to focus on a ‘happy place”. For some, that might be the beach or some other idyllic holiday. Mine vary but tend to be more about people than places.
And so, last week I exhausted myself with visits from my niece, my old school friend Brendan and a lovely lunch with my daughter Gabriella, her partner Marc and baby Zadie.
I was exhausted and felt quite despondent after my 9am treatment on Bank Holiday Monday because I could not see how I could drive to Marlow just 40 minutes away. I was too exhausted and didn’t feel safe driving. But, it was a golden opportunity to meet in a beautiful place and I was not going to miss out. FOMO is not good when you’re under that mask!
But, a quick call to my old mate Kev and I was sorted. Without hesitation he offered to pick me up and drive me there and I knew I’d be able to get my own way home.
And so, memories were made. Walks along the river, past a guy playing ‘Here Comes The Sun’ (my last song in my treatment playlist), had me almost at bursting point with emotion. Linking arm in arm whilst pushing the pram through a gorgeous park … is an indescribable memory to take back to the treatment table.
Smelling the spring blossom. Eating great food and savouring every morsel before it makes it’s damaging way down the progressively sore throat are all memories to put in the bank.
And so, if we do bump into each other, and I give you a bigger squeeze than normal (social distancing allowed), and insist on a photograph, then please forgive me. Normal service will resume shortly ha!
One for the album Kev?A flying visit on the way to Windsor. Come back soon guys!
My tennis partner, friend and ace person. Patrick is also Chairman of Barnes Tennis Club
Sport: noun
an activity involving physical exertion and skill in which an individual or team competes against another or others for entertainment.
Some people say that “it’s not the winning that matters but the taking part”.
Bollocks!
Day 4 started early. So early, it was actually Day 3 when I fell asleep, awoke, fell asleep and reawoke finally to the sound of the morning geese doing their very noisy and rather annoying thing.
Another interrupted night but a little better than the previous night as I am getting more used to sleeping sat up in bed, allowing whatever has been consumed, to stay at least below the threshold of my inserted peg. It would seem that if I can achieve this position for at least 3 to 4 hours then I’m relatively rested and ready for the next day.
And so, as planned, I headed out to Barnes, to my local tennis club to play a doubles match to make up for the one I’d lost the day before.
This was important.
A turning point if I lost and a landmark victory if I won.
Getting an uber to go just one mile is possibly extravagant. Not today. I needed to preserve all my strength and shoved decadence up its own arse.
Like a pumped up cameo of a rather aging and plump ‘Confessions of a Tennis Player’, I rocked up early, hydrated and focused.
My tennis partner (and hero) Patrick, arrived shortly afterwards and we were soon warming up with the opposition.
Now don’t get me wrong. This was no club competition match. It was not Wimbledon. There was NOTHING riding on it. But I had to win. I just had to.
Keeping the warm up short, I called out ‘Rough or smooth?” We won the right to serve first. I Stumbled at the back of the court as I passed the balls to my partner to start us off. This was ominous. But one thing you do not do in sport is let the opposition know when you’re not at your best. I chose not to let my partner know too, though I guess he already knew.
1-0
1-1
1-2 I lost my serve. Aaaaarrgh.
2-2 We broke back
Serving at 5-4 I took a little longer in the turn of ends. Engaging the opposition in conversation is often a useful distraction and sometimes very necessary. I used all the old tricks I’d learnt from the great days back at my home club, Oakfield plus some new ones picked up on the road.
Dragging myself to the back of the now sun drenched court, I eyed the bastards (no offence guys) up. The only way I was going to win this match was to look at the opposition as though they were the evil within me.
I snarled and hissed under my drying breath as I put every ounce of effort into the toss. It was high. Very high. Straight. Whack!
15-0
15-15
15-30 My destiny was facing me. I needed this point to get even. Another high toss but this time I sliced the ball with the venom of a thousand swords. Spinning to the opposition’s wide forehand, he drove it back. Right at me. Until, from nowhere, Patrick stepped across and volleyed it away.
30-30 My energy levels now almost totally depleted, I managed to serve so wide that the ball caught the edge of the service line and put off the opposition who distractedly sliced it into the net.
Match Point: first serve goes into the net. “Slow down Nadio. Slow the fuck down”. I have a word with myself.
The serve was in but slow and short. The opposition lobbed my hero but I saw it coming and threw everything into one last, cross-court backhand drive. Obscured slightly by my partner, the opposition had no chance.
We won.
We fucking won!
The customary handshakes (covid tap of rackets) ensued. Pleasantries were exchanged and congratulations and compliments were duly shared out.
But nobody could know how much that win meant to me.
It may be some time before I enter the courts again. But that does not matter. I’ve finished up on a win and though I am writing this with a banging headache, utterly exhausted and ready for a 9pm bedtime, I am an absolute winner.
Me and my mate Brendan … laughing. Sharing stories and watching our sun’s go down. Great therapy.
Until now, it’s fair to say that almost my entire focus has been on the actual treatments received at the point of receiving them … than the effects.
From the slightly squeamish moment when the GP rolled her delicate fingers around the hitherto small lump in the neck and gave me that slightly concerned look, to the progressively more uncomfortable 40 minutes of ultrasound prodding and probing, to the six needles stuck into various incriminating places in the neck in the early biopsy and the many tubes through nostrils, throat and finally the Mother of all Bitches, the peg into the stomach.
All invasions.
All unwelcome.
All painful, more or less. But, all relatively temporary in themselves and therefore bearable.
Even the 60 minute MRI scan, with my head anchored to a frame within the bowels of the colossus of the noisiest machine ever allowed to get that close to the human head, it was only for one hour and therefore bearable, just. Only just. (I am actually shaking whilst remembering this bit).
But today, things have developed. Like the changing tide on which I live my rather random life as a ‘live aboard’ houseboater on the Thames, the shift in cause and effect, has already begun.
The first signs started yesterday morning, Day 2, when the predicted nausea from the chemotherapy raised its ugly head. By 5am I was already gulping back acid reflux and immediately jumped out of bed and grabbed for the anti sickness tablets I’d been prescribed, “just in case”, they said.
Right! It’s nailed on there will be some discomfort, but I just didn’t believe those nice people at the hospital in their white coats.
To be fair, it’s nowhere near as bad as that of a decent hangover type of nausea, of which I have had far, far too many in my over-sociable lifetime. Or a nausea caused by vertigo. No sir.
This is just a sort of internal uprising, a mini revolution going on down there and the occasional rebel trying to make a run for it and exit back through the place it once entered, the mouth.
Within minutes of swallowing the tiny prescribed pill, the troublemakers are quite quickly subdued and I rested comfortably until the next uprising about four hours later.
Tempted to recommend this miracle cure to Boris, I managed to go back to sleep and dream of what shit storm is heading his way next and why I’m so happy I never did succumb to any temptations to become a politician. Did it really take a dose of cancer to learn that lesson too? I think the almost inevitable risk of any public scandals I might have gotten myself into also prevented me from any further interest in such a career, but that was Devine intervention, not cancer!
And now on to the next symptom that something is really not quite right with me. Yes readers, this is ALL about me, me, me.
Surrounding yourself with loved ones when embarking on ones’s ‘cancer journey’, is, without doubt, the single most therapeutic treatment in the world. To be able to see the tiny face of giggling Zadie, my first grandchild, on zoom, practically on demand, is sheer joy.
To have my iPad screen filled with the faces of my distant (logistically, not lovingly) family, eyeball to eyeball, tear to tear, is both frequent, indescribably more than I deserve and often deeply emotional. But I wouldn’t want it any other way.
And so to be a Northerner and live in a marina in Chiswick, west London, slightly ‘off grid’ amongst other likeminded souls, is actually turning into a beautiful blessing.
Not least are my neighbours kind and caring, they are tough, funny and pragmatic. When I recently rang one at 3am whilst shivering like a demented dog and seeking her help, she promptly told me to “Drink water, go back to sleep and you’ll be ok. I’ll check on you when the sun comes up”.
Not one to be argued with, (she has accomplished many things, not least sailing her newly purchased, first ever boat, a 130 year old barge across to west London from Holland).
I went back to sleep, stopped shivering and realised it was a reaction to my second covid jab and not the cancer. Probably significantly affected by the red wine and shots I’d downed at the party we’d all been at earlier. I lived to fight another day. Phew!
And so on my second day of treatment I was delighted to host one of my best and longest standing friends from school, Bren Robinson. Anybody who is reading this and who knows Brendan, will already be right in their thinking.
We have had a blast!
One of the funniest, cleverest, warmest and cuddliest people I’ve ever met in my life, and I’ve met a few!
And so, in between my various hospital visits, client calls and presentations, the sun has come out and we have managed to walk several miles of beautiful Thames towpath, visited a few of the nearby picture postcard riverside pubs and last night we BBQ’d on the boat with my old neighbour and German crime screenwriter, Captain Umlout (you guessed it, not his real name!).
Brendan and Otto were immediately in cahoots, on great form, taking the piss out of me from every which angle. And I loved it! Probably deserved it too if I’m honest.
However, like all things, even the best of reunion parties have to come to an end and as the sun started to fall into the red carpet it casts across the beautiful Thames, the last sips of red wine began to hurt the throat as it made its way down to the bubbling uprising meeting it on its way up.
The incorrigible rebels had become an army and the red wine only temporarily subdued their evasion long enough for me to reach for a double dose of the anti-sickness miracle cure.
As we watched the sun go down, I KNEW this was going to be one of my last enjoyable tipples for weeks, possibly months, hopefully not years and definitely not ever as my sense of taste and smell is annihilated by the forthcoming treatment. I could do with losing some weight anyway! (Cue the Monty Python, “Always look on the bright side of life … dedum, dedum dedum dedum”.
River Thames alongside Chiswick Quay Marina with Kew Gardens just beyond the bend
Quietly and without ceremony, we said goodbye to the dapper Captain Umlout, chuckling at one more last quip, and duly descended into the hull of my boat to end the evening with a modest cup of Yorkshire tea (courtesy of Mel), chocolate biscuit and our somewhat embarrassing bedtime dose of tablets, which, I’m rather concerned to say, Brendan trumps me by a mile!
But. And here’s the nub of the story… that cuppa hurt. The throat is already tender and each small sip burns as it heads past the throat and into the drowsing battlefield below.
Taking another sip of the now tepid tea, I test the theory again. And again. One more time. Nope. They were right, I was wrong, this treatment is going to affect me just as much as the next person.
It’s suddenly got real.
By the time we had one more bromanced cuddle and a bedtime pledge to get up early to squeeze a short visit to Richmond Park and catch sight of the deer in the early morning, mist, the battlefield was at full cry and I went to bed somewhat humbled and a little scared by the prospect of what is coming next.
It’s now 4:30am on the morning of Day 4. The throat is warm but not burning. The stomach is hiccuping but not convulsing and the tinnitus is just doing it’s thing. Fucking tinnitus … you can rely on that bastard ailment to turn up at the party when you least need it!
Come on Brendan, wake up, let’s make the most of this beautiful day before you head back to God’s own country and leave me alone to reminisce so many great times we have shared over the years, not least these past two chaotic, sun blessed fucking funny days. And do come back soon.
And so the day finally arrives. And when I say ‘finally’, please do not read into that any sense of complaint or angst at the speed in which I have received treatment. Hell no!
From discovering a small lump, similar in size and shape to my Adam’s Apple (should that be in capitals, it’s not an actual town or city lol)… just on my left of said apple, at the end of February to my first day of treatment, has been a whirlwind. Eighty six days to be precise, including weekends. I’m too knackered to break this down but suffice to say it’s been quick and felt even quicker!
I’d also say this. I feel special. I feel like every time I walk into a hospital I’m wearing some sort of huge hat that says, “Make room for this guy. He goes before you. But do not envy him or patronise in any way or he’ll punch your face in. You have been warned!”
Seriously … the attention to every single need and enquiry has been fucking brilliant. Bearing in mind that this includes:
⁃ Change of GP due to my laziness in not updating my original GP records with my move to my boat
⁃ Covid jabs in two different health authorities
⁃ Covid tests (over a dozen, and still counting) in random places such as a carpark overlooking Wormwood Scrubs prison and storage cupboards
⁃ MRI scan, CAT scan, Ultrasound scans and other tests at at least three different London hospitals
So, back to the radiotherapy session. I knew what to expect because I have already been in the Radiotherapy Department about three weeks ago to get my mask made. This involved me laying on a bed, on my back (obvs!) feet trapped against a clamp and my head rested on a hard plastic chopping board type thingy.
I was then treated to three nurses placing this fluorescent green rubber-like sheet perforated with pencil point sized holes, across my face and shoulders. It was warmed to a temperature which made it malleable without burning the skin. Just.
What followed then was a cross between a facial and a pillow fight. Gently and with lots of explanations, each nurse expertly moulded the sheet into my ageing crevasses to form a perfect bust. So far, so good.
Next, if I remember correctly, the bust was removed for a couple of minutes whilst they kindly explained what was coming next. As someone who suffers mildly from claustrophobia, I guessed this was going to trump the MRI scan by a mile. I wasn’t wrong.
The now solid mask is placed back onto the face and shoulders and then bolted to the bed with four or six bolts (I tried my hardest not to count them).
The bed is then mechanically repositioned within the scanner which then digitally (obvs, Polaroids would be useless!) photographs the whole landscape whilst the radiotherapists record key anchor points.
The whole process takes about forty minutes and my, how good did it feel when those clamps got released. Fooook that was tough!
And finally, to the first treatment session. Very similar to the above but without the need to make the mask.
I was told what to expect and though I’d already been through the worse part with the fitting, I’d forgotten how tight that mask fits against the face. The nose is the first protrusion to be squeezed into place, then the lips and shoulders. My eyes could open, but only half way. I decided it was better not to look anyway.
A little pep talk, Beatles playlist turned up and the bolts fastened.
Click.
Click.
Click.
Click.
STOP!!!
Waving my hands as advised, I halted proceedings.
“Sorry guys. I’d forgotten how tight this mother is. Let’s go again”.
Click.
Click.
Click.
STOP!!!
“Wowzer (sic). I need to frame myself (Yorkshire for ‘grow some balls’).
At this point the senior radiotherapist offered to move a spacer from the chopping board headpiece thereby giving a fraction more tolerance. To be honest, I wonder if this is true or it is a type of placebo technique. Anyway, full credit to her as this time we made it.
Some of the longest twenty minutes of my life later, the lead sealed door to the radiotherapy room was unlocked and beauty tiny footsteps could be heard along with “Here comes the sun, dooba dooba. Here comes the sun. And it’s alright right now … doooba bedooba bedum”.
Click.
Click.
Click.
Click.
Click.
Click.
PHEW!!!!!!!
We’d made it. And I mean ‘WE’ because these girls made it happen. Their expertise gave me utter confidence in everything they do, it was my job just to man up and get on with it.
The thoughts that got me through it? In no particular order ( the mind races when you are too lazy or stupid to stop it, note to self!);
⁃ This is doing me good
⁃ I’ve got to be fit to see the birth of Luke and Lauren’s baby. How great will he/she be as a friend for Zadie
⁃ Sorry for being an arse
⁃ I hope I don’t forget that half eaten tuna sandwich in my bag
⁃ You’ve got a VERY SPECIAL wedding to attend in October, so sort yourself out
⁃ I wish I’d asked Nicholas (my youngest) to meet me afterwards
⁃ Can’t wait to see my old mate Brendan Robinson tomorrow
⁃ How brave is Mandy Taylor
⁃ “Remember to breath” all my children at various times of gorgeous zoom calls
⁃ Images of baby Zadie, my first grandchild
⁃ You’ve got to deliver a PowerPoint presentation tomorrow, so get a move on!
And to finish off …
I subsequently left the hospital, forgetting to collect my prescription at the pharmacy for some antibiotic cream to treat my slightly sore peg plus the anti-sickness tablet and other meds in case needed due to the chemotherapy session in the morning. I’m such a dope!
I then grabbed an electric bike and cycled the 3 miles along the Thames back to my boat in Chiswick Marina, whilst filming with one hand.
The movie sound quality is poor, but there’s some very funny moments.
I am writing this early morning the day after the treatments and apart from a slight hangover from the welcome home party, I feel fine.
Next session today at 16:48 but I expect it to be all done and dusted in 25 mins max. Then only 28 more to go (I promise not to blog about ALL of them!)
The mechanical sound of life ringing all around. Beeping its warnings.
Rushing. Rushing. Everyone rushing around. Trolleys rattling along the ground. Monitors beeping, a cold, callous sound.
Plastic everywhere. Wrappings on wrappings … a sort of sinister pass the parcel taking place all around.
Face masks hiding the smiles or the frowns of those unlike me who have suffered for such a long while.
And still the beeps continue. Alerts to those who care whilst we can only sit here in wonder and stare.
The cold drip of poison cools the palm and tingles the finger tips. Drip, drip, dripping its toxic poison into our veins, making its journey to the bastard within us.
And still we sit and stare. In silent prayer some will call out their God’s name. Let this poison do it’s magic so they may live another day.
My first impressions were, ‘It’s so cold in here’. That’s nothing to do with the temperature but with the pale blue walls, white matt ceiling and dark blue paper curtains drawn around the four or five bays. Surely a lick of sunflower yellow would brighten the place up and not feel like we were being preserved in some sort of human fridge.
Foot (not to be confused with an erection)
Having been escorted by a nurse from a neighbouring ward, one where I was originally assigned to, familiar with because I’d taken the time to do a recci last Sunday when I was summoned at short notice to ‘give bloods’; I was a little disconcerted by the change of location. Why did they not want me on the assigned ward? Your mind plays many tricks in these circumstances. Was I too ill? Not ill enough? Too young? Too old? Not paid enough NI contributions. I don’t know. Perhaps it’s a case of Imposter Syndrome creeping into proceedings. Perhaps it’s my frustration at always seeming to rock up at the wrong place at the wrong time. Never standing in the right queue for the hospital lifts or even turning up at the wrong hospital. It would be so nice to turn up somewhere, at least once, and a familiar face say, “Hi Nadio, great to see you. We were expecting you”. Alas, as I am now no longer referred to as Nadio ( I hate Pierre!) and I’m never in the right place, that’s not happening anytime soon!
But things got better. A steady stream of people in white coats came to take my temperature, more bloods, forms to sign and same questions to answer seemingly on reapeat. Then the real action begins.
A trolley arrives with dozens of little packets and the very kind staff nurse Mikhala approaches. She has a tray overflowing with stuff not unlike those little packages you get with the flat pack you buy from IKEA. Expertly she unpacks everything and places it in an orderly manner across her tray.
She generously offers me the choice of which procedure I’d prefer first. Not having had the previous experience of either, I let her decide. I trusted her.
With the care of a saint and the dexterity of an angel, she swiftly found a welcoming vein in my forearm into which she inserted yet another needle but this time with a nasty bit of wire attached. Fuck did that hurt!
Alas, as painful as it was, it was relatively temporary (isn’t everything in life ‘relative’ these days?) compared to the next procedure.
Again, she gave me options, “Left nostril or right?” as she casually and yet professionally sized up my nostrils. Deciding to go right (good choice!), she then cut some pipe to length, allowing a little extra for wriggle room (more about this later).
Without so much as, “Is Mikhala Russian for Michelle” … this Transalvanian answer to Mother Theresa (is that an oxymoron?), started inserting this bastard pipe up said nostril. Hitting a little bone on the way up, she scarcely blinked as she calmly but without a hint of choice, uttered those immortal words, with that hitherto unconfirmed eastern twang, “Swallow Pierre”.
Somehow removing myself from any notion that she was addressing me personally, and with no other option, I swallowed.
“Again!”
Gulp
“Quick!”
Gulp. Gulp. Gulp.
And before my eyes could completely fill up with unrestrained tears, her job was done. The pipe had successfully and without any anaesthetic, arrived at its intended destination, the pit of my stomach.
Leaving me to dry my eyes and feeling like I’d got the most itchiest of unscratchable itches ever invented, she congratulated me on my gulping and promptly moved on to her next victim.
As if I had now been fully entered into the club, the other three guys in the ward each introduced themselves. I was now one of them.
But not quite.
You see, I am one of the lucky ones. My treatment is relatively (that word again), minor. I have a beginning (Tuesday), a middle and an end. They don’t, and yet they are strong. When Nick (spinal cancer) turns 2 inches to his left, without any assistance, he’s had a good morning. When the Croatian (bone cancer) stops vomiting long enough to be taken down for a dose of chemotherapy, he’s one step closer to recovery.
When the beautiful Indian guy (colon cancer) in the corner learns he has another day to live, he’s happy.
And so, with my itchiness and slight discomforts, I am expertly steered out of the ward and raced through the hospital towards the operating room. Speeding past an endless parade of onlookers and down corridors now familiar to me, I’m now one of ‘them’. I’m that person I too stared at and wondered where they were going. What is wrong with them. What will happen to them.
Holding back the urge to wave, smile or say, “Hey. I’m ok. Seriously, don’t worry about me. Look after YOU,” I soon arrived at my destination.
A little similar to taking the car in for a service, I was parked in a holding bay, number 4 if I remember correctly.
Directly in front of me was a door that required security cards to enter. It was hectic and no one who went in came back out again. Evidently this was the ‘Control Room’. The epicentre of this monolith in the centre of Hammersmith. The place where good is done and bad is eradicated, or at least treated.
Patiently the patient waited. My barcodes were checked. My name, birthdate and address (“yes, I do live on a houseboat”) was repeated and more heart rates were recorded. Lovely, smiley people all around. Busy. Rushing around. So, so busy. In lockdown I’d not seen so many people in one place. All masked. All in gowns. All important.
“Hi Nadio. My name is BLUR and I’ll be operating on you today. I just need to run through some checks, make sure you are happy to proceed and then ask you to sign the consent form then we are good to go”.
I hid my phone under the sheets, making myself unavailable to the outside world and uninterested. We went in.
Past the busy door, around a ridiculously tight bend (my tennis friend Karen used to design hospitals until she died of a brain tumour last year, she wouldn’t have put that tight bend there, RIP). We were in.
Painlessly and without any help, I slid off my trolley bed and onto the operating table. The kind surgeon who reads the small print reappeared as she described what was to happen next. And then, turning from ‘carer’ to ‘surgeon’ in the blink of a weepy eye, she took control.
“There are lots of us here today. Let’s introduce ourselves. I’m doctor BLUR. I’ll be performing the gastrostomy. Starting with you …” and the team duly obliged. The formalities done, the team took their positions and the procedure began.
My stomach was discretely revealed, shaved and then painted a bright, incandescent orange. Monitors were attached and the bleeping sounds around us became all mine. The huge tv screen was rotated on its multiple cantilevered arms whilst I strangely thought to myself, “How many cantilevers does it take to move a tv?”
The student surgeon was moved back, out of the way (slightly tripping on some apparatus) whilst the nurse with the caring brown eyes told me in the most loveliest way that she was just about to inflate my stomach through the tube in my nose and that I should try not to burp. Curiously no one told me I should not fart, which I suspect could have scuppered the whole operation. They were safe. I made it my absolute focus to neither fart or burp for at least another 30 minutes.
Three pumps of the most rudimentary stomach pumping implement (“I’m sure I’ve seen those in Halfords), wasn’t enough. My surgeon asked for two more good, solid pumps.
Whilst putting the whole hospital at risk of a human explosion, the surgeon politely apologised for my discomfort but reassured me it was for my own good. Evidently a taught stomach makes for a better ‘fix’.
She then, with filled syringe in hand, told me to expect a sharp prick as she proceeded to numb the now huge stomach. I confess, whilst writing this I suspect I have these procedures in the wrong order as I’m damn sure that stomach would have exploded with so much as a nip!
What followed then was both extremely painful, funny and surreal. My heartbeat was falling, which I was told indicated that I was extremely relaxed and enjoying myself. I was then told off for laughing, as this releases air and the nurse with the kind brown eyes was instructed to apply two more small pumps, whilst pushing the tube a little deeper.
Back to my best inflated self, I heard the greasy gurgling sounds of my intestines being moved out of the way. A pathetic whine from me and a little additional anaesthetic was applied with an apology. I wasn’t meant to feel that.
The student surgeon was then invited to step closer as the gastrostomy tube was secured into place. Rogue intestines tucked back where they belong and I sensed a special sort of ‘high five’ moment as I was adorned with a 6 inch plastic tube dangling out of my stomach. A few sticking plasters applied, a little wipe of blood and the whole thing was finished.
Bloated but with a feeding tube attached, I was expertly slid off the operating table, reunited with my phone and transported back to my new friends.
Thank you NHS, you’re doing a great job!
Tomorrow I start with the chemo and radiotherapy. Eeek.
If you are reading this you are probably already thinking, ‘OMG’!
Actually, it’s not a horror story, yet. In fact, it’s been a wonderful experience and here’s why …
Background
I’m a marketing professional working in the Channel Partner and Alliance space across multiple ecosystems in hi-tech. My community includes senior professionals from the likes of Google, Salesforce, AWS, IBM … you get the picture.
I am a ‘newbie’ to this community, well, at least I thought I was until I met everyone else and then realised that apart from legends such as Mike Nevin, John McArdle, Barry Flaherty and the award-winning Jay McBay … most of my peers in this space have been here for less than the five years I have dedicated to the sector.
The need
I’m a ‘connector’. Or, as Malcolm Gladwell would say, a ‘maven’ (A maven (also mavin) is a trusted expert in a particular field, who seeks to pass timely and relevant knowledge on to others in the respective field), Wikipedia.
So I’m always looking for tools to help me help others. Why? It’s instinct. It’s what I do. It’s who I am.
But this isn’t about ‘me’, this is about ‘you’. Or more precisely, about ‘Clubhouse’.
The how
So, having totally ignored a conversation in my LinkedIn group some weeks ago about this ‘thing’ called ‘Clubhouse’, I went on to create my first Mighty Network account and was looking for a way to invite a specific group of my 15k plus LinkedIn connections, when I had a lightbulb moment and reached back out to Luca Benini who duly obliged by sending me my my all-important Clubhouse invitation.
I immediately signed up, connected my Twitter account and added my Instagram account, then dived into searching for others within my network to follow. Hardly surprisingly, there were very few. Approximately 120 clicks later, I then shared my miserly invitation allocation with 3 connections.
My 22 year old godson who’s just graduated and starting his career in fintech
My friend, marketing guru and all round top bloke, PR Smith
Agent Provocateur, powerhouse and leading light in the Age of Human, Steve Cook
Next, I swapped my prearranged zoom call with Paul to my first ever Clubhouse conversation.
Not too unlike previously mentioned adolescent encounters, a few fumbles and misplaced clicks followed before we were both in the full swing of things.
It was easy!
Next
Immediately I saw the power of this incredible communication tool and embarked on setting up my first Clubhouse event.
Click on the calendar symbol
Create ‘my event’
Confirmed date, time, theme and title
Copied link to Google calendar and shared calendar link in The ICE PARTNER MIGHTY NETWORK
At the allocated time, my iPhone alerted me to the opening of my room and I simply clicked on the link and waited only a matter of seconds before guests joined me
Permissions granted for guests to come on stage and we were instantly engaging. Brilliant!
And there you have it. It was quick, uncomplicated and effortless. Long may it continue!
Nadio Granata's Personal Blog 