PET scan #2, and wigs

Mother and I are off to Manchester tomorrow for my second PET scan - the one that determines if I still have cancer or not, and whether I need any more treatment. I am a little apprehensive about this - as you might expect - but am choosing to treat this as a day shopping trip, albeit one with a little more radioactivity than usual. (See this old post for more info on how a PET scan works.)

It's now 3 weeks since my 6th and hopefully final chemo, and I now feel pretty much back to normal. The week in France was an excellent opportunity to get away from everything for a bit and have some R&R. I'm eating normally now - to be honest, chemo never affects my appetite for long - and taking advantage of all the yummy summer fruit around. Mother and I have just been blackcurrant-picking in the orchard and there was blackcurrant compote for tea. Am also trying to get back into some decent running (now that I no longer have the niggling little voice at the back of my head going "bleomycin! bleomycin! your lungs are fibrosin'!!"). This means interval training and hills, which I hate but they do get results. My weight surprisingly hasn't changed after chemo but I have decided I need to skinny down a bit ... and stop eating so much ... and stop going on about food all the time. Ahem.

It's true that this really has turned into more of a food blog than a cancer blog, but surely that's better than "Ohhhhhhhh my god I feel terrible oooohhhhhhh i feel sick arrrrrrrrgh the painnnn the PAIN and the lumps everywhere I'm BALD BALD BALD ahhh I hate my life this is so unfair why do i have cancer whinge whinge whinge". Which isn't to say I haven't occasionally felt like that but I tend to squash it all down/scream into a pillow and go and cook something instead. POSITIVE THINKING AT ALL TIMES! :-D

Talking of BALD BALD BALD: I still have a bit of hair but it's started falling out from the last chemo now. For me the hair loss tends to start about 2 weeks after a chemo treatment and goes on over the next week/10 days or so. I will shave it all off at some point, I reckon - just so I can say I have once been bald and shiny and proud. Wig-wise: the NHS pays for a wig for cancer patients, and I tried on a LOT of wigs:

before I picked this one......which unfortunately I have now realised makes me look like Peggy from Eastenders ("Get aaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhht of maaa pub!!") and so I am eschewing it in favour of the GI Jane look, complete with aviators (when sunny). Although Jess and I have now concocted a plan to go out looking hot in bright blue and pink wigs, just for the hell of it.