Blimey – 47 hey? Who would have thought it? Birthdays are always a bit of a mixed bag these days – amazement and unbelievable relief at having made it to another one, tinged with rather a hefty dose of sadness about those who didn't.<\/p>\n
There's a particular thread on my Under 50's forum that flashes up every now and then – all too often – called RIP. You can guess what that's all about. And it popped up on my mobile a week ago, having been posted by one of the people in the sort of 'inner sanctum' of the Under 50's.<\/p>\n
But – until you click on it, you don't know whose name is going to actually be on there, and this one knocked me for six. A wonderful lady called Sandra Lodwick. Aged 50. Mother of two late teen kids and wife of Bruce – a man covered in tattoos who looks scary as hell but is actually a very sweet chap. And they were SO in love after many years of marriage.<\/p>\n
Sandra had been making these funny little sock monkeys – striped woolly things – all with different names, and selling them for charity. Myeloma UK obviously. And I'd been checking them out on FaceBook, seeing the different colours she'd made them and who they were for, for months. Right up until last week in fact.<\/p>\n
So I was gobsmacked to see that she had died. Literally, I almost picked up the phone to Debs who had posted it, to ask if she was sure, as she must have made a mistake. But it's not the thing you make a mistake with, and Debs' message from Bruce had asked that several of us be told before it was made more widely known, as very kind thought of his, which made it no less shocking and shockingly shit. Thank god I had emailed her a few weeks back, so she knew that she was in my thoughts.<\/p>\n
So this birthday was a bit of a tough one. Out of my original Myeloma gang of around 12 of us in 2008\/9 there are only now three of us left. Me, Phil Kelly and Tom Lappin. Tom went in for his second stem cell transplant on the 26th Oct, but seems to be doing well, thank god. And Phil, like me, keeps on trucking.<\/p>\n
And yes, this last year has seen some somewhat crappy swings and roundabouts for me on the health front too.<\/p>\n
– Two carpal tunnel operations, tick – mostly mended but still in meeting – will call soon as can x one wrist is pretty sore. And the opposite elbow has recently joined in for good measure.<\/p>\n
– I'm now on steroids for probably at least a year, to keep the polymyalgia – my new pain in the arse – under control. And there's only a 50\/50 chance that I will ever get off these, so the game now is to see how low a dose I can reduce down to, without the poly-shit coming back with a vengeance. Good game, good game, as Brucie would say.<\/p>\n
– On top of that – and this week's particular laugh and a half – is that I have been having breathing problems and a weirdly fast heart beat whenever I do any kind of exertion, for many months now. Like climbing a flight of stairs, walking anything more than at a crawl when taking the dog out or even getting dressed. So saw a cardiac specialist last week and am having a CT scan this week and – more importantly I think – an exercise ECG on Wednesday, where they stick you on a treadmill and see what happens. Half of me wants to think 'oh, it's just that I am so unfit' but the other is thinking 'what the fuck is this? I can't even walk and talk any more' – and of course, playing hockey is totally out of the window. So feeling a bit bummed by that. I guess I'll know more this\/next week, and am keeping my fingers crossed it's somehow a storm in a teacup rather than a new medical hurricane.<\/p>\n
The only good news? My PP score has – thank god – gone down a tiny bit AGAIN! Now 7.3, which is the same as it was 15 months ago. This is unheard of in the MM world, and I had a bit of an emotional wobble on Thursday (poor Hawksey and the staff of Coworth Park hotel) while waiting for the results. Thank god when I got them – on my birthday, not to self, never time the three-monthly blood test quite so badly again – it was very good news on that front at least.<\/p>\n
So – here's to 47 being a better year health wise. Although I say this with trepidation for now as life does;t seem to be playing ball nicely at the moment. Fingers crossed as ever and I'll let you know… x<\/p>\n
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Blimey – 47 hey? Who would have thought it? Birthdays are always a bit of a mixed bag these days – amazement and unbelievable relief at having made it to another one, tinged with rather a hefty dose of sadness about those who didn't. There's a particular thread on my Under 50's forum that flashes […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-918","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n