So we start again.

All the will in the world all the crossed fingers and legs and anything else that can be crossed didn't stop the consultation going the wrong way.

I was hoping for bird flu or even man flu. What we got was a 99.999999 percent probability of the lymphoma being back. The blood test which I had a week ago showed enough abnormalities to lend weight to the argument of it being back. Unfortunately with the other symptoms including the fluid on or around one of my lungs kinds of seals the deal.

The emotional result of this is the ar*e has fallen out of our world again. We told the girls which in all honesty was the hardest thing I have ever done in my life. We told them when we were told I was in remission that it had gone to sleep so telling them it's woken up should be easy. But their faces contorted with pain and worry and tears and anger and pure pure emotion was too much and it was confirmation, if needed, that we were back in the fight.

Telling people is rubbish, they answer their phones and are happy to hear your voice and then you give them the news. Their voices sink and you can hear them thinking of what to say, of which there is very little they can say. Then you leave that person holding that piece of news and you go and give the news to someone else, in a way it's the old 'a problem shared' but it's not really it's just cr*p.

One of the hardest was a skype call to New Zealand to tell Charlie and Veronica that we won't be at their wedding. I knew they'd understand but I wanted to be at their wedding we'd booked the flights and everything, even bought a Swedish phrase book as the wedding will be in Veronica's homeland, complicated yes but worth doing for people you love.

I phoned Jase (brother in law) as he can sometimes be a mushroom in the chain of information passing (kept in the dark and fed poo). His response was like many others, sorrow that it had returned and a wish that I get through this. We agreed to talk more that evening. What I didn't realise was that he and Anita pretty much dropped everything and came up to give us a hug.

I'm so lucky, it sounds very backwards and maybe I am but I'm so lucky to have so many people wishing us well and wanting to help and do stuff and praying for us and worrying for us. Perhaps I would never have realised all this without the journey that is cancer but I realise it now and it feels brilliant to have this amazing group of people that we can ring or see.

The person that I feel for the most is Wend, once again she has the prospect of looking after the girls and maybe me and a dog now. She has the worries of a wife looking at the person she loves going through treatment. And there's not a f*cking thing I can do about it. Sorry about the language but it's not fair, she worked so hard last year keeping everything together and kicking me when I needed it or loving me or just holding or stroking my hairless head. She deserves a medal for the way that she kept the girls lives as normal as she did, she deserves another one encrusted with diamonds for putting up with me. She doesn't deserve another round of uncertainty and worry. It's just not fair on her, she's so amazing I don't want her suffering because of me. Wendy I love you.

testing testing 123

Ok so the elbow thing is better, having spoken to a physio terrorist at a wedding and being told to sleep on my back the pain has completely gone in my left arm.

Unfortunately I now have a pain in my chest, I wake up with night sweats, I've lost a load more weight (just on the 16 stone marker ish), I have temperatures in the day, my breathing is ok depending on how I'm positioned, I have a severe lack of energy, my tastes have changed again and I don't like things like brown bread and pasta which I lived off before cancer, oh and I'm drinking like a fish but not weeing anything like enough. Maybe that's what the sweats are for!

So putting them all together and having been told I looked less that sparkling by some of my colleagues, they did ply me with coffee and chocolate though which was lovely, and Wendy saying you look peaky prompted a trip to the gp.

The gp didn't look in my throat or examine me just said well we'll take a blood test and get you back in in a week. I suggested that as once you're in at Weston park you're in, that I just phone them up. He was delighted!

So that's where Wendy and I have been today, Weston Park. I managed to get to see Georgia do her obstacle course for her sports day but then had to dash.

To cut a long story, well I could make it long, short I'll give the abridged version.

Waited, for a long time, got seen. Consultant wants blood tests doing and ct scans. If it were one or two of the symptoms above she'd put it down to side effects, which it may still be. It may also be a virus and lord knows there's plenty of them going round at school with the snotty little oiks. That's just the teachers! It may be something more sinister. Who knows, not us.

So we're back on the roller coaster that is cancer, I want normal not roller coaster. But having said that I feel less angry than I did which is odd. Ho hum I'm sure some shrink will figure it out.

In search of me.

Before cancer I felt on top of the world. my job was going well, my fitness was the best it had ever been including being a kid and my work life balance felt amazing. Wendy and I had time together, we had time with and without the kids and I had some time just being me.

I felt like I was chilled, that anything could come my way and I could work through it. I laughed at people cutting me up in the car and everything would be done when it was done. It felt brilliant.

After cancer I was trying to be that person, but that person had a routine of job and sport and family which I didn't have. But gradually I got more and more angry and crosser and crosser. At nothing in particular. The slightest little car incident would have me blowing the horn or gesticulating about the other person's inability to drive. The kids and Wendy were getting short shrift for no reason other than I could and the dog learned to stay out of the way!

It all came to a head recently when we'd been to see Wendy's Gran. She's the traditional matriarch and a lovely woman but she'd had a stroke recently and then we were all going over for her 90th birthday. We went over on the Sunday before going back to school and I just got so wound up that I was mean and sarcastic and just not the person I aspire to be.

Wendy let me know, there's only so much someone can take and she's taken way more than anyone should. We had a frank discussion and I have to find how to be Nick Hart before cancer again.

Walking round school I was in a real mess, if home isn't right then nothing is right. Talking to people helped I hope I didn't bore people as I try to leave things at home but I am a bit of an open book and people tend to know my emotions half way down a corridor sometimes.

I spoke to Belinda my little goddess of honesty and straight talking and she suggested flowers and /or chocolate. It had been ages since I had bought Wendy flowers and the girls had never had any so roses (flowers not chocolates) it was.

Bertie is a fabulously rubbish guard dog until you're trying to walk in with bunches of roses for the ladies you love. Sometimes words come and sometimes they don't, I gave the girls their single rose each and explained that I'd been so proud of them and that I don't feel like I've been a very good dad this last year. Not my fault I know but I should have been better. It set the waterworks off I was crying the girls were crying Wend was crying and it was such a release. Such a release of emotion of thoughts of nick after cancer. It was my starting point.

Less negativity......

The last post needed saying and I said it. But it probably didn't read very positively, my life is awesome, it's bloody brilliant being me.

Last weekend we were invited to Gareth and Julia's wedding at Borrowdale youth hostel in the lakes. Gareth is a good friend and neighbour and I was proud to be an usher even though I had to wear way too much wool on the hottest day of the year!

We had a brilliant weekend and Gareth and Julia just looked so happy and it all looked right. It reminded me of our wedding, a hot but wonderful day were everything went right and Wendy looked stunning. Being in the lakes was very relaxing and made me so incredibly happy. We'll be back one day, with or without the kids I'm not sure, I'd like to do both we will see.

Anyhow photos say so much I'll let them do the talking.

The one with the head!

My gran couldn't remember my name when mum called in on her the other day so I'm the one with the head. Not sure if the rest of the family are headless but mines been a little distinctive recently!

The brain is an incredible thing. It controls our bodies for a start, it enables us to walk, to judge distance/speed/beauty, it allows our mouths to work (sometimes) to utter the words I love you or to give thanks for a beautiful day. For some people it helps them be academic, storing information and formulea for use in the future. For others it allows them to paint or create or be musical or theatrical. Some get a strength of character, some get a determination that carries them through regardless, others get the ability to share, to teach, to love.

I think we all start out with similar abilities but with our own strengths. Our lives then mold us into the beings we are, the experiences, the ups and downs. My first word was mini, not mum or dad but mini so I guess there was some outside influence going on there!

My head at the moment is struggling, it is struggling with my body not being as fit as it was. With me being tired a lot of the time and it's struggling with little petty things at work which should be of no matter to me. Wendy and I keep having the whole your body has been through so much and it has to recover.

Yes it has to recover but I want it to be faster! This Thursday is one year since I started chemotherapy. I have been back at work for seven weeks, as a phased return so building my timetable up. I've also dropped Wednesday which gives me a chance to recharge. Making it to the end of my first half term was a fabulous feeling, it was a real milestone for me I had been scared that I wouldn't get there. That my body would say no, that I'd get a cough or a cold or something would happen. But nothing did, except for my head playing tricks with me, putting doubt in place of confidence and mixing emotions up to boiling point for no apparent reason.

I have to look after me and that is what I lost sight of. I've loved being back and teaching again it's felt so right and fun and some of the kids have been so nice. But it's all consuming and once you're in that classroom for the hour or two you have that lesson for you're in charge, no wandering off for a pee or to check for a text message. It's been brilliant but it hasn't given me chance to think.

It's half term holidays now and it gives me that chance to think. To hold hands with Wend and walk and talk and laugh and cry if need be. But it's all about getting a balance back, I knew it'd be hard going back to work and physically it has been but mentally it's been a real challenge. This week is about being me and getting back in tune with being me. Being me is being part of a lovely little family,it's taking the dog for walks, it's taking the kids for new shoes and stuff for school and it's about being in love with an incredible woman.

Knackered but smiling

Well the smile is there more often than it was. I don't feel as angry as I did, I went through a stage of just wanting to fight anything and everything. That is passing which is great as I don't upset the kids or Wend as much and I'm a more chilled teacher because of it.

The tennis elbow is ok, getting better actually, my tennis is still rubbish though. My chest still has it's moments and I'm happy to put that down to radio therapy side effects and a hint of a cold. Don't worry it's not man flu!

I've started staying at work until lunch time this week which has been as much of a kick in the teeth as starting back at work. It's been hard but I've enjoyed it, I've enjoyed feeling more part of the furniture and the kids are getting more used to me being back. I get less people staring at me, I had one lad come up and pat my shoulders as though he was checking I was real! It also feels like the staff have pretty much all seen me and it's old news. Which in a funny way is great, I like some attention but it's nice when people see me for me rather than someone who's had cancer. I'm starting to be Mr Hart, big loud hairy Mr Hart who is firm but fair (hopefully).

I went to see my GP tonight to sort out my final sick note, wow how good does that sound, so that I can return to work after spring bank half term holiday. I think that the timing feel right, it may be hard work, it will be hard work, but I need to be back properly. I will need to plod and to get my lessons right, settle into the full routine and then I can start thinking about getting my fitness back. It would be unfair for me to ask my body to go back to work and then on top of that start pushing to get fit again. I'll ride my bike and maybe go for the odd run but I need to make sure I have reserves of energy the last thing I need is to get run down.........had plenty of that!

Oh next Weston park visit is in three months, tennis elbow permitting!

Phew

The scan came through all clear. The thoughts on the arm is that it may be tennis elbow! My chest feels funny and my breathing isn't what it was but the consultants listened to my chest and it's all clear and the suggestion is that it's the side effects from the radio therapy still making themselves known.

I guess it's been an emotional time as everything felt like it was going so well and that I could get on with life all hunky dory. But it scared me, it scared Wend as well, it scared George and Carys and mum and dad. I've never been so convinced that I was going to die. It's a pants feeling really, all I could do was think about how Wend and the girls would cope and what music they'd play at my funeral and could I have an eco coffin etc etc etc. All the stuff that a morose self pitying hypochondriac thinks.

Well stuff that. I need to find the fine line between symptoms and side effects and I need to listen to my body and how it's responding to the gradual process of recovery but I need to live. I need to let go of the ghosts that sit with me in any waiting room, as though I'm going through chemo again. Let go of the feeling that my body isn't quite doing what I expect it to. We learned today that treatment can age your body by 10 years! Bugger. Anyway this 48 year old body is going to get fit and get back to work and get back on with enjoying life rather than existing, afraid of any ache or pain.

I need to do it sensibly and I need to do it once. We want boring from now on. No more excitement, no more appointments, no more waiting rooms. Lets chill out, live life and be as normal as I get for as long as possible.