Terminal Velocity

Terminal velocity

Terminal? What? As in airport or a turn of phrase or a bloody death sentence? 

Terminal is not something I associate with myself. No. I'm not a dried up haggard old prune, melting in a bedsit somewhere. I'm bloody here, and I don't feel ill at all and I do bloody yoga for Christ sake!

Of course I didn't actually say this but I bloody well thought it, whilst pointing my head forward at the Oncologist, very hard indeed!!

Terminal? Have you ever thought about what that means? No me neither and I wasn't about to bloody start now I can tell thee! 

So, yes you might be terminal blah blah bollocks blah in which case there's no point in chemotherapy as it won't do fuck all. So saddle up and wait two weeks while we work it out. We can give you drugs to prolong your life though but you won't be in the curable bracket. So we will see you in two weeks. 

We, (Scouse and I) walk out of the room in a daze. Typically there's a women in a massive fuck off pink wig sat in the waiting room. Oh god, the pink is upon me, get me the hell out of dodge. I'm worried we may encounter a bloody tutu in the lift so we take the stairs. No tutus here, just a strong smell of human nerves and I swear a blood stain on the floor. Probably some poor sod whose bled out their last sense of control.

Anyway, we walk up the hill to the NCP and get in the car. It's a bit quiet. He doesn't talk, I don't talk. We've established no ones talking. It's awkward. Someone say something. Then I think of something to say. It's really sad, it's gut wrenching and extremely sickening. A lump forms in my throat as I turn to him and say "oh bollocks. We're guna have to get married!"

We both feel physically sick as the reality dawns on us that this is what may happen. This can't be happening. It's so fucking unfair. We are too young. We have our whole lives ahead of us. How can the world be so cruel? I can't stand the lack of control and the uncertainty of what this spells for my life. It's as if I'm walking into a jail cell and someone is slamming the shitty doors behind me and stuffing the key up their rectum. I've got two young children and I'm pregnant!!! I'd look awful in a wedding dress! 

We go home. He eats dinner. I don't. (This in itself is a miracle as I bloody love my food). We sit on the couch. I cry at how unfair life is. In fact I scream bloody murder into my hands. I go cold. I feel numb. I want to rip my tits off and through them out the window but I fear for the health and safety of the passers,  by so I refrain. 

We go to bed and he starts bloody snoring the selfish twat. How can you snore at a time like this? Maybe it's the sound of him crying in his sleep, bless him. I get up and wonder around in the dark. I go to my baby's room first, potato. He's grunting away, he does a little fart. I love his farts. I'd miss them. I shut the door and I go to Nojees room. He is asleep on his double bed, (this bloody kid doesn't do singles), he's width ways and I straightened him out a climb in next too him. His breath hits my face, clearly this kid had garlic and a nappy for dinner, but it smells wonderful to me. I kiss him as Dracula would kiss a garlic bulb, and I snuggle up to him. 

I imagine lying in a hospital bed and I wonder... How the fuck does a mother say good bye to her children? Especially when they'd be too young to remember her?

Then another tear roles down my cheek and into my bloody ear!!! Well I'm fucked if that's happening to me so you can kiss my hairy Bristolian ass!!!!! 

You've picked on the wrong norks! 

EAT SHIT VOLDERTIT!

Storm in a tit cup

Ok so hello Volder-tit. It's not nice to meet you, you wanker.

Dr Boob goes onto explain that although I have a very nasty type of boob rot, that it is survivable if it is contained within boob and surrounding lymph nodes but there are no guarantees and the survival rates are a lot lower than with standard breast rot. 

My first thoughts are my baby that is now at 14 weeks gestation and how on earth this will affect it. He puts his hands up as if at the end of the firing range and says that although he isn't suggesting it, that many women in my boat would consider a termination to allow for certain treatments and tests. Oh balls. I know that's what you dear reader are thinking....how on earth does she make that decision. Well dear person , for me it was bloody easy. No. No thanks. Let's move on.

So the next few weeks are a blur of scans and tests. Heart scenes, baby-avoiding x-Ray's, blood tests, full body MRI to avoid damage to baby. Now this was an interesting one. Have any of you been cremated in a passed life? Well a time that you can actually remember? Well I think I've come close to the experience. The room was bloody boiling and your slid onto a tray and fed into the tightest tunnel ever, head first and told not to move at all. The ceiling is so close that if you were that way inclined you could lick it. Now I'm told that a full body MRI is incredibly rare but I was having one as I'm pregnant and can't have full body x-Ray's. So I was slid up and down a few times as a sausage on a grill is regularly slid in and out from under a grill pan. I feel like I could now map every inch of that bloody chamber (FYI Southmead, your scanner has a little scratch about 4 inches in from the top of the tunnel which if you squint looks like a little rabbit) and that will be fixed in my mind. 

The tit MRI scan was an interesting one too. I led on my tummy and had to flop each of my norks into a little bucket and leave them swinging there for 30 mins. All the while being forced to listen to Terry pissing Wogan. Now that was horrifying to a 32 year old I must say.

Now in all honesty I can say that until I met my Medical Oncologist (for us plebs, that is a chemotherapy Dr) I don't think I truly appreciated the gravity of the situation. 

She has turned out to be the most blunt and a little doom and gloom but actually this works for me. So these are the following things that I learnt from her:

- you are keeping baby which is brave. As a result we can't guarantee from the tests that the cancer hasn't spread to lungs when we get the results

- there are risks of miscarriage and abnormalities to the baby if you have chemo whilst pregnant

- if you postpone chemo until after the baby is born you will die

- there are no guarantees that chemo will work 

- your baby will need to be born early so you can start more aggressive treatment. If you postpone this, you might die

- this will all be extremely hard work and a long process

- you will have 4 rounds of chemo, then a premature baby born around 30 weeks who will need neonatal care for 3 months, you will then have weekly aggressive chemo every week for 3 months, then a mastectomy, then radiotherapy and hormone treatments. You will need to take steroids!!!!!

Bollocks! I'm going to be a bald, fat dribbling mess who may grow a beard!!! This sucks.

- oh and actually if the tests results do show the cancer has spread you will be terminal . Any questions?

Oh For Fucks Sake I've got Cancer!

Now i know i said that i wouldn't use that word again but it didn't seem to work any other way. 

So lets start from the beginning of Volder-tits journey. In February 2015 i was sitting in one of those bloody feeding chairs that look minging but i have to admit are a godsend. I was breastfeeding my 5 month old little boy called Potato when i noticed i had a red rash beginning to form on my right nork. 'Oh great I've got fucking mastitis' i think. What a pain in the ass. I WhatsApp my NCT friends who i know have had this before and they tell me that i should be in a lot of pain and have a fever. I don't. Well i remind myself how 'hard as nails' i am and don't seem to feel pain the same way as these mere mortals. So i leave it to clear up on its own as I'm sure it will. It doesn't and in April i figure its about time that i got some advice as i was under the impression that it would have fucked off on its own by now. I make an appointment with my GP surgery only to have a pretty shit experience with the worlds biggest bellend. 

Dr Bellend: Hello. What can i do for you?

Me: I have a red rash on my boob. Its been there for two months and its spreading. Im breastfeeding my little boy but i don't have any fever or pain. So i don't think this is normal

Dr Bellend: You have mastitis. 

Me: Im not in any pain at all and i don't have a fever.

Dr Bellend: You have mastitis.

Me: Ok. But is that normal to just have a rash? My little boy cant feed off of that side either. All he does is bite me.

Dr Bellend: (Huffs - what a bellend) Do you want me to look at your breast?

Me: (not really you cunt but why wouldn't you want to? My boobs aren't that bad)

Yes 

Dr Bellend then proceeds to lift the sheet off of my boob in a flapping motion that can be likened to him trying to flap a spider off of a blanket and then says "you have mastits."

That was it. He diagnosed me in a nanosecond. I then asked if he was sure and he proceeded to tell me that if it wasn't mastitis then it was folliculitis and that the treatment was the same. I then declined the antibiotics as he said it would go away on its own. Then i left.

Luckily Dr Bellend was such a massive Bellend that i went home and stewed on this encounter and decided that fuck this i was getting a second opinion. I called and asked  for a female Dr. I went 10 days later. I explained what had happened with the previous Dr and she gave me a full examination, went through some questions with me and assured me that i had mastitis. She did however stress that i should take the antibiotics and then return if they didn't work. I was happy with this and thought no more of it. I went away with my friends and didn't take the tablets immediately as i wanted to drink. Little did i know i had just got pregnant via immaculate conception. I then began taking the antibiotics and then we moved house. I then went to Spain to visit my aunt and uncle. On this trip i felt quite unwell for most of the time. I put this down to tiredness as the bloody kids wouldn't sleep the whole time we were away. I spent one afternoon yacking my guts up and then came back and discovered i was pregnant! So this was about the end of June 2015. I then began to notice that my nipple was retracting and i had dimples on my skin. Great this infection is getting worse. I returned from Spain and registered with a new Dr who then examined me and said that she was also a breastfeeding mother and didn't think i had mastitis She sent me for a biopsy.

I went to the Bristol breast clinic and sat with all the old ladies in the waiting room feeling quite guilty for taking an appointment away from one of these old Doris's who really needed the care.  I went in and went through the motions and was informed after an examination that they would need a tissue sample and that the anaesthetic would hurt. This needle went in and i can honestly say i didn't feel a bloody thing. This did seem strange. He then asked me to return on the following Friday 11th September for the results. 

I must say things did begin to play on my mind from here on. I analysed their body language  my mind and their intonations in the questions they had asked. I then decided that there was to be bad news ahead. 

But what the fuck was wrong with me?

Of course, i did what any 32 year old curious woman would do.... i googled!!!! 

Well, i was careful to stick to the factual and well known websites and avoided sites such as 'yourefucked.com' and 'slowpainfuldeath.org'. The top 20 search hits were Volder-Tit websites and i thought 'oh shit here we go'. After looking at documents about lumpy tits and the like i found a very short paragraph on Inflammatory Breast Cancer. In short it said 'this is the one you really don't want'. Its that prostitute i mentioned before. 'You will most likely die'. Blah blah get fucked blah. Here are the symptoms.... you have them all. Oh dear. Oh well it could be an infection so don't panic yet. So i did what all rational people do....i panicked. 

There were a lot of conversations in the following days ranging from 'Don't be fucking daft, you're too young to have it' to 'oh my god you're going to die'.

 I was settling somewhere in the middle. 

As results day loomed i began to convince myself that it was something bad but it was going to be manageable as long as it wasn't the inflammatory thingy. I said to Scouse (my chap and father of the kids)  as we had our last pre-life-swallowing-results Costa at the hospital, "Its fine as long as its not inflammatory'.

We waited in the old lady waiting room, looking at ladies and one chap, in various forms of decay and i began to get angry. A) they were 45 minutes late seeing me b) i still felt like a fraud and was expecting a nurse to just hand me a prescription and C) if i had to pee one more time in the foul minge-stinking toilet i was going to shit frisbees!!!

Then the nurse came and called my name. 'Yes!' i thought, 'tablets!'

She informed me that i needed to follow her. She was taking me to see the Dr. She led us further to the back of the hospital. It was getting quieter and quieter. 'Fuck!' I thought, 'shes taking me straight to the morgue!' We arrived at a location called 'Breast Care'. Was this a good or bad area? Scouse didn't say a thing. The nurse led us to the door and i was still 50/50 at this point. Then she opened the door and i saw them. Not the dr or the paperwork. It was the cushions! These were bad news cushions! All cheerful for positivity but at the same time they seemed to say "im so sorry. Here sit with me. Ill cushion your sorry ass while that guy with the clipboard shits all over your life". These cushions said it all. It was bad news.

Dr Boob: Im so sorry but we have found some cancer. 

Me: what type is it?

Dr Boob: Its a rare one called Inflammatory

Me: Oh Fuck

Cushions: We're so sorry.

Me, myself and I.

My name is Patient Zero. I say this because i feel like i am the first person to ever have had such shit luck. I am 32 (the beginning of wrinkles and yellowing teeth), pregnant (actually this is bloody awesome but see next few words) and i have Breast Cancer. (mother fucking wank!) 

I dont just have standard lumpy breast cancer that comes with well examined statistics and a fairly good prognosis. Oh no, i have Inflammatory Breast cancer, the one that involves lots of head tilts and strained smiles from medical people and lots of looks of 'what the fuck is that' from general Jo public. Its nasty, its aggressive and it spreads quickly - not unlike an angry prostitute waiting for her next fix of crack. 

Now, can i just say that i actually hate the word Cancer. It sounds crawly and something that rots old people in their beds. Therefore i would now like to banish this word and refer to my Cancer as Volder-tit. 

I don't want to bore you with the ins and outs of who i was before this happened but i think you may like me more if you know a bit about me. Or you can at least realise that i am a human being who is not completely defined by this situation.

I am brilliant. I don't say this as because counsellors would tell you that reminding yourself that you are brilliant makes you feel brilliant. Nope, i say this because I've always believed it and will continue to believe it for the rest of my life, and when I'm gone, people will say 'oh she was brilliant'. 

My friends will tell you I am great to talk to and excellent for giving advice. My work mates will tell you I'm incredibly strong and positive. My family will tell you I'm independent and kind. My chap will tell you that I'm infuriating and self centred. My kids will tell you I'm 'beautifully and gracefully' because Peppa Pig makes it impossible for them to think for themselves; and everyone will tell you I'm funny. 

The very basics of my life are that Im a Police Officer in the Metropolitan Police. ( For all my international fans, that is in London, England). I have recently moved back to my original town not far from Bristol. I have two children, one Scouse chap, and a manky tit. I have a large family and a lot of very excellent friends who are currently driving me nuts with all their bloody questions (please don't stop giving me attention - and/or food) and I've got a bun in the oven named Chocolate Mousse. (Again kids judgement clouded by the most influential things in their lives)

So, before i start the next chapter, I'll give you an introduction. 

So picture this....You relocate from London to your home town as you're desperate for some free child care as you want to go out more and get drunk. You find out you're expecting child number three by some complete fluke of nature. That'll be three kids under three. Fucking hell if thats not bad enough eh! You are taking some long maternity leave and are due to start a masters in Real Estate Management when bam!!!!! The Volder-Tit train drives full force into your life. Emptying its chemical toilet all over your face!

flamey boob rot and the impending doom.

Firstly, lets get one thing straight. I am very honest and quite sweary. This will not be well written or poetic in anyway. It will be me sharing with you, the shit that is now flowing full throttle into my life. If you are searching for pink tutus, hugs and girl power then I'm afraid you've come to the wrong place. This blog is really so that a) i don't have to keep updating people on what has happened each day and b) written in the hope that someone will think its worth turning into a book or making me famous so that me and the kids can live out the rest of our days on a farm in Somerset drinking Cider and tearing around our grounds on quad bikes. So there. If you don't like it, fuck off. If you do, welcome, please buy my book.