‘Tis the season…

It’s been a strange week since my last blog post. We’ve put up our tree and lights and I’m starting to feel a bit more Christmassy. A few Christmas films have been consumed, along with some mince pies and my first beer in 4 months.

But this week has been dominated by two things. Bloody COVID again. The south east of England is seeing another major spike and apparently a new strain. The U.K. government isn’t handling things well introducing last minute changes, confusing tiers and generally buggering up Christmas for millions.

Selfishly for me, I’m concerned how this impacts my CT scan and ongoing cancer treatment as lots of hospital treatments and operations are now being cancelled. Katie is expecting that work for her will creep in over the few days she had off as all their emergency procedures are coming back into play with daily emergency meetings being called every day, including weekends. I have to call the CT department this week to see what’s happening with my appointment.

The Covid restrictions don’t really impact our Christmas plans much but I know a lot of people who are not going to be celebrating with their loved ones due to this pandemic. I really feel for them.

The other focus this week has been wellness/fitness for me. It’s been… odd. One day I’ll feel absolutely fine, as if I had no illness at all then I have a few days with no energy, even simple walks become exhausting again. Then be ok again for a day.

I’ve had joint and muscle aches and really struggled with sleep. Since coming off the morphine and switching to oxycodone my sleep has been terrible. I’m tired but just cannot sleep due to aches in my hips, knees, back, elbows. Pretty much anywhere.

I’ve now had at least 4 nights where I’ve seen 5am before falling asleep. This then screws up the following day. I plan on speaking to the Macmillan nursing team tomorrow to see if these are normal side effects of the switch and if anything can be done.

What I crave more than anything is consistency. The changing symptoms are hard to deal with when you’re used to feeling a bit better.