From the North

Hello friends and greetings from Edinburgh, capital of Scotland and now home to the Bunkers for an indefinite period of time. I'll start this with bullet points because I am very tired. In the last two weeks that we have been here...

1.....we have signed a lease for a property in Moray Place in the New Town area and we move in a couple of weeks. It has big windows and high ceilings and feels like a lovely place to just 'be' but more importantly

2.....I have worked out where to put a potential suit of armour, you think I'm joking, I am not even joking.

3.....Keith has established medical care through the rather conspicuously named Edinburgh Cancer Centre so he has someone to call and somewhere to go and it's ten minutes up the road.

4.....the girls have started at Stockbridge school (yes it's early but that's how it works here) and they seem sort of ok ish for now but then they're new kids and it's a small school, it will take a little time for them (and me) to settle in.

Points 1, 3 and 4 were all very, very, very hard and in particular point 4 almost broke us. BUT it is all sorted now and I won't dwell on it. One thing I will mention, however, is that in the depths of those moments when circumstances had driven me to question what the hell we were doing and wondering how the hell things were going to work out it was nice to know (as I now do, as I have learnt) that things change, stuff happens, and IT WILL PASS. Regular pain and stress remain but then we all have that sort of thing, that's called LIFE.

The kids have been tough to handle at times and I'm fairly sure I haven't been handling them properly at all. Darcey in particular has been quite angry but I don't blame her in the slightest. Their anger makes me very sad. Until we move into our new home in a couple of weeks I don't really feel we can establish a proper routine so I guess we'll have to sit it out until then. It will pass.

Keith has been and remains to be quite poorly at the moment. He sleeps a lot and finds doing things pretty hard. His new doctor has taken him off the drugs for his liver cancer which will hopefully make him feel less fatigued, but conversely he struggles mentally knowing that he is not having any direct treatment for the cancer. He is finding it all very hard and is feeling very low. He also seems to think I am joking about the suit of armour. That will cheer him up!

Don't worry: we are still having lots of fun. The girls and I practically tore up the Edinburgh Festival in the first week we were here (including Florence's first ever stand up performance in a packed Comedy Club, she went down LIKE A PALACE ON FIRE), the girls have developed a devotion to the art of puddle jumping and I have been to John Lewis three times already. I think the modern term for this is #OWNINGIT.

Standby for photos of my cupola. 

Kisses xxxxxxx

Goodnight/Goodmorning

SO it has come to pass, the last night in Australia and we end it where it began, in the same hotel looking at the same view but pondering it from a very different perspective. 

The last month has been nothing short of complete hell. At the risk of sounding melodramatic I think it has been the hardest month of my life. Keith returned from Brazil happy that he went, but recently he has become more sick and more tired with new issues with his heart so that's all been quite hard and very horrible. Plus his hair is falling out as it did during the chemo and that sucks, but at least as he put it he'll "start looking ill again" (not looking ill can confuse people; looking ill saves a lot of explanatory time and effort).

I am quite honestly utterly terrified about what lies in store for us now. It is almost beyond comprehension, so I am going to avoid comprehending it at this moment, I've a 24 hour flight coming up in which I've more than enough free time to attempt to comprehend quite what the hell we're going to do. Feeling physically and mentally broken doesn't help (a Qantas gin and tonic might though).

Two things for you Sydney: 1) thank you for the fricking awesomeness - to a (wo)man you are extraordinary. 2) I am only a 24 hour flight away: if you are going to be throwing any good parties be sure to give me enough warning.

One thing for you Edinburgh: I hope you're ready for an adventure because goodness knows you are going to get one.

Here are some pictures from the last two years. See you from the northern hemisphere.

Peace out friends XXXXXX

small world

The world is a small place, seemingly, as Keith is currently in Rio ahead of the World Cup Final: the actual World Cup Final, IN RIO. I am so very glad he has gone; he was incredibly anxious about the whole thing. It was only ten days ago he had to be admitted to Emergency again but as there is always some sort of silver lining with these things he subsequently had tests on the condition of his heart and lungs and was given the full go ahead to travel. So there he is, in Rio, with one of his best friends, struggling of course but on the whole having a great time. AT THE WORLD CUP FINAL. I am so proud of him.

We Bunker girls remain here, in Clovelly in our big empty house. Our furniture was shipped last week to get a head start on the long journey back. We're OK, but you know, everything is quite hard. I have to be brutally honest and say that when Keith is not here, be it because he is in Brazil or in hospital, and it is just me and my two girls, I start to imagine I feel something of the loneliness and heartache for what it might be like when he is not here at all, and it is horrible. It's similar to what I think I wrote about a long time ago: how everything has so much extra meaning now. Nothing is light and easy, everything is serious and extreme. So when Florence says "I miss Daddy" it's as though something has sliced through me because she means it and it hurts her and oh, I don't want to think that far ahead. For the record Florence is also very annoyed she too didn't get to go to the World Cup Final but has been palmed off with the promise of watching Leeds at Elland Road and somehow, just somehow, she is content with that thought. 

Our flights are booked and we'll be back in the UK on the 30th July. We have absolutely no idea what we will be doing. We have no house, school or plan of any sort (other than to move to Edinburgh) and as much as I know everything will work out fine for us, I am running out of the energy to say that everything will work out fine. I am sick of saying "oh, you know, everything will work out fine" because even though I know it will, I also know there will be serious amounts of effort required to get to that hallowed fine stage and then in reality, everything's not really fine. But it could be worse of course, and we will have the priceless "help" that everyone keeps telling me will be "really helpful" and it will be great, I know it will, I don't want to sound as though I don't think it will, I do! But oh, the weight is just crushing. I worry about the kids of course, not in terms of the move but of everything else. They're staunch little things but have been being extra needy recently; perhaps its something to do with the fact I have shipped all their toys off to Scotland. That would probably piss me off if I were five.

There is definite sense of excitement as we set out on our next adventure, and it will be quite an adventure. I am still very sad to be leaving but I take a great deal of love, laughter, confidence and above all friendship back with me and that is really all I need to say about that.

When I have any idea of what on earth we're going to do next I'll let you know. Standby.

Lots of love in the meantime, and here's Keith with some Brazilian wall art.

xxxxxx

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

Streams

Two thirds into our trip to Europe and I find myself in the depths of London's Docklands furiously trying to coherently filter my thoughts so I can put down a record of how the hell everything is going. 

As you can tell from that sentence it is hard to explain how the hell everything is going, and nothing is very coherent. On the one hand we are in one of the world's greatest cities and it seems that its greatness is splendidly apparent to the kids. We've done some royal things, climbed up some stuff, been to the theatre and taken on a lot of tube journeys. They have enjoyed all of that, I think, if taken much of it in their carefree stride. If that sort of thing is the key to a happy holiday, then well, we've ticked all that and then some...and it has made us happy in the doing and the sharing. But on the other hand there is a huge, dark cloud of sadness as Keith sees some of his friends for the last time. Seriously, you could not make the horribleness of this shit up. It is awkward, exhausting and terrifying, but it is real, clear and present. And there seem to be so far never the right words to say or comfort to give. I have no idea how to deal with it all. I have no idea how Keith is dealing with it all. The doing stuff with the kids helps enormously, as it should, but then they go to bed and you just sit in a dazed fog of exhaustion, not quite knowing what to say or even if you did, how to find the energy to say it.

He's holding up physically but it is hard and he has been in a lot of pain.

It is glaringly obvious that there is not enough time to do everything we want to do. You could see it as a bit of a cruel reflection on our lives but I think even if we were here for twice the length of time we would still leave wanting more. Isn't that the right way to leave? Who the hell knows. 

I can tell you one thing though: one may have hits of pure joy embracing the occasionally divine architecture of this city, but the joy that can be felt from the love of people is unparalleled. Un-bloody-paralleled. It's like being at the centre of some sort of multi Ghostbuster-esque proton stream without the danger but all the unpredictability. Be it in person, through emails and messages, Facebook or massive piles of chocolate for my kids, it is the fuel source that keeps me going and gives us spikes of pure happiness. Know I hope I can give something back to each and every one of you. You are all fucking superstars. Oh emotion: how I love your swears.

Signing off for now with a badly composited but obviously overpriced picture of us up the Shard.

Lots of love xxxx

Oh look! It's April.

Hello people. You join me on a beautiful autumnal Sydney day a mere five days before we head off to the UK for three and a half weeks and you will be not at all surprised to hear, dear readers, that I have done absolutely no preparation in any way whatsoever. Well, that's not entirely true: I have bought some new shoes, frankly what more do I need? Do not answer that question.

Preparation has been thwarted by two things: work (that's a good thing, work is good) and a rather sudden (or so it feels) change in Keith's condition. Following a scan last week we discovered the tumours in his body have started growing; this is the first time growth has been observed since we found out he has cancer and it came as something of a shock to both of us, and not a very nice one. I suppose we have become so accustomed to the different routines of life I didn't really expect anything to change. Well, I did, but I also didn't, does that make sense? Anyway, the medical professionals do not think the growth is related to the cessation of the chemo: the likelihood is it would have happened anyway. No one wants to tell us what this means, there is as of now no altered prognosis. However everyone seems to now be talking in a much more short term kind of way which is quite unnerving and they are asking questions that neither of us have thought about before, about things like having hospital beds in our house and what to do if Keith gets ill in London. It's important for you to understand that physically Keith this week feels no different to Keith last week, but when people are sitting in my living room (wonderful people, wonderful palliative care people) asking me directly if I have a plan of action for our trip away I am a little dumbstruck and it makes me feel weird and uncomfortable and all those sorts of things. He feels well enough to go and so for now, that's good enough for me.

Last week was not a very fun week, but as ever with our circumstances good things are emerging from the bad. Keith has almost finished his book of life and experiences and opinions that he will give to the girls. Palliative care offer the service and he now has Julie, his own rather wonderful biographer. Imagine if you can how much fun Keith has had talking about himself and then looking at pictures of himself and then talking about himself a bit more. I am very very happy he has done this. And that's a good thing. 

As a result of all this we are determined to take our trip back to the UK very easily indeed. Still the focus is on showing the girls some of the cool stuff we love about London, the place where they were both born. Also don't ask me about quite how excited I am about going to John Lewis (I am very excited). But this trip is also centrally about Keith. Without putting too finer point on it this is likely to be for him the last trip back to the UK. So therefore it is front and centre about seeing who he wants to see and doing what he wants to do (I keep telling him he really wants to go to John Lewis). But it is also about having FUN. Standby blog fans for how it goes, you can rest assured I will let you know.

I am off to avoid packing for a bit longer. Peace out friends xxxxxx