Update

I've been trying to write a proper blog post but I can't seem to get the words in the right order so you must contend with a sort of embellished Facebook status update. 

We're moving back to the UK at the end of July. It will be easier on numerous levels and I will be able to stop work for a while to look after him and the kids. We're going to move to Edinburgh because why the fuck not; we're not going to be working so may as well live somewhere different, interesting, brilliant and hilly. His care will be managed initially in London and our furniture ships next week.

Personally, selfishly, I am devastated to leave this place. Without wanting to offend anyone/thing/location I don't want to go.  I want to talk about how I feel but everything's too fucked up right now for me to find the right way of doing that. For the moment please accept I am quietly devastated to leave, but also I do see there is much to look forward to. I refuse to be that person who sits in the past, so I will look for and find the silver linings. But if you needed evidence of me being beaten by the cancer here it is.

Keith is ok, taking the new drugs to manage the tumours in the liver. Continuing to approach everything with remarkable grace and gratitude. Hopefully also going to the World Cup Final, yes you heard me correctly, because he can and why wouldn't he? Standby for those updates, they'll be the good ones.

Love always, peace out, stay with me. 

xxxxxxx

"The Fight"

Hello, friends. It has been a while since my last post: in truth, not much has really happened since 22nd April. Since returning from our Europe trip Keith has been managing a new programme of medication allowing him to be much more active day to day. This has been a breath of fresh air in lots of ways, with him more able to look after the kids while I am at work and have enough wherewithal about him to actually start feeling bored from time to time. It's probably the best he's felt in a year and indeed it is almost a year since he was initially diagnosed with the cancer. This is a milestone and a half - truthfully we didn't think he would make it this far. So he's living a more normal existence and that for us is really quite a great thing. I'm so proud of him for how he is managing himself through the pain and fatigue. And he also bought a really nice car, which is bringing the sort of happiness only expensive material goods can bring. It is a Bunkerly-overused word but he is an absolutely superstar. 

However.

Since the beginning of all this I have been very vocal about how much the term "fighting cancer" pisses me off. I never understood it, I took it quite literally as the fight against the tumours and the cells and the disease within the body. What nonsense I thought; how ridiculous to think that with the right attitude we can kill the multiple tumours my husband has devouring his liver. Complete bollocks! Don't use that word! Don't say that to me! Stop calling it a fight, it's making me angry!  

Recently though I have been thinking very long and very hard about it and I concede I was wrong. There is a fight. There is a fight against all the other shit. The mental, emotional, financial, familial shit. And I have to admit, sadly, I am losing that fight in many many ways. I am defeated. You've done it cancer, you've taken me down. Well done. You've ripped out pieces of me and I tried, I really tried to hang onto them, but they're all yours now and they always fucking will be. Oh I still have joy of course, joy and happiness and all those things you get from your children, work, lifestyle, etc: they're great and I will always love them, that, it, sure. But the fight? I am losing the fight. 

I don't want you to feel sorry for me: we all have our own shit that we battle daily, there's nothing special here. And I have so much! I live in Sydney! I have a nice house! Beautiful children! A loving and much loved husband! And I know that and I am grateful and happy for that. But the problem is that in losing the fight there's a new prism of thought and impatience that has showed itself to me, and I have started seeing holes in things. Like, I have all these incredible people desperately trying to help me and yet I think about the ones who are seemingly not giving a flying fuck. They're the ones who beat my soul down. They are few, they are unimportant really, but they are still the ones who bring me to tears. And in us living a 'normal' life at the moment I see so very very clearly all the things we used to have and do that I took very much for granted. The other day I said to Keith how I wish I could go back to when we first met, and do it all over again in exactly the same way. It was good then, it was better, it was living.

So anyway, consider this an update of some sort at least. To those who are trying to reach me, I'm sorry I'm not there right now. Hopefully I'll be back soon. Thank you, so so much for trying. I'll post a happy picture to finish with. Keith and his car. 

He's a superstar.

xxxx