back to the grindstone

Apologies for the scandalously long absence from the blog - it turns out third-year medicine the second time round is actually rather time-consuming. Despite my panicky predictions that I'd have forgotten everything, it all seems to be coming back quite easily (with the exception of ECGs which always have been, and always will be, a bitch). Alas, my hoped-for brilliance in the area of lymphoma has been sadly lacking; we had a seminar on "Neck Lumps and Bumps" to which I went, swelling with geeky pride at the thought of people feeling my neck scar tissue (which hopefully still is scar tissue, not cancer returning to ravage me again). Once we'd got past all the usual run-of-the-mill thryoglossal cysts etc., we moved on to malignant causes and the consultant said, "What do lymph glands do? Anyone?" There was a deathly silence then I - yes, the one who'd had a lymphatic cancer - piped up, "Drain things."

Which turned out to be the wrong answer because they really trap things like pathogens and keep them there for the rest of your immune system to come and be activated by. Embarrassing. SOOOO embarrassing.

That reminds me of the time my brother asked me what Hodgkin's lymphoma was actually a cancer of - and I said, "Ummmmm well, Michael, I'll have to get back to you on that one," because I hadn't a clue. Now I know that lymphoma is a haematological neoplasm which "begins in the lymphocytes of the immune system and presents as a solid tumor of lymphoid cells. They often originate like balls in lymph nodes, presenting as an enlargement of the node (a tumor)." (Incidentally, lymphoid leukaemia begins in much the same way but doesn't form the solid lumps that lymphoma does - instead, the cancer just circulates in the blood and bone marrow.) Thank you, Wikipedia. There you go, Michael. Oh and HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!

Apart from swotting up to unprecedented levels of knowledge (Janet has started to freak out every time she comes in and finds me working; I don't know what's wrong with me!!) I have been chilling out at weekends - mainly with gin - and hosting the usual team of DELTA Great North Runners.


They all seemed to have fun - if one can ever truly have fun running a half-marathon - and have raised wonderful sums for DELTA (to sponsor any of them, go here). I was seized by Great North Run nostalgia and have vowed to run it for the third time next year, though I am sure the enthusiasm will wear off pretty soon. In other news, I've been surfing at Tynemouth (SO FUN!!!) and to the Alnwick Food Festival to buy the venison steak which became possibly one of the best meals I've had at uni. My guilt at eating Bambi's mummy evaporated after I'd chewed the first mouthful and realised how good it was. Yet another photo that fails to do the food justice:


And in hair news - well, it's certainly growing! The longer it gets the more tricks it tries to pull - have had some v. odd tufts and fronds and cowlicks happening, grr. See below; I had to pose for AGES to get a halfway-decent photo to show you and yet I still look like I'm contemplating a colonoscopy or something equally unpleasant. Oh well, look at the hair, the HAIR - squeeeeeeeeeee isn't it long!!?? (Still no follicular action in the irradiated bit though alas...)


Follow-up appointment is next Wednesday - not entirely sure what will be happening but I'm betting some blood tests are on the cards. This makes me as skittish as a young racehorse after what happened the last time someone tried to get blood out of my collapsed flaccid chemo-veins (4 ATTEMPTS, people) but I suppose I will have to man up. There will probably be a CT scan too but later on...will keep you posted, though I might be a wee bit busy! Updating the blog doesn't seem to fit in so well with normal daily life as it did with chemo-time - odd, that.

Now I have to go and decide what to do with my Friday evening.... the options are: collapse into bed and refuse to move for a good 14 hours; go out drinking with fellow third years to forget cardiology; hang out with fourth year friends who have exhausted themselves from mid-week partying; gym, bake, eat and sleep. Choices choices...

P.S. I was very very chuffed to be shortlisted for the Raising Awareness of Lymphoma Award and to make the final 6! Unfortunately couldn't make it to London for the award ceremony which I suppose is just as well because I didn't win. Haha, only kidding - I know it's really the taking part that counts and am very grateful to my nominators (plural!!! who'd have thought?!?) For details of the event, visit the Lymphoma Association's website.

a damson good time

If you find cancer more interesting than food, look away now. I feel a recipe post coming on...

We have lots of damson trees in the orchard which is very fortunate as they could well be my favourite fruit; especially when the weather is refusing to behave in a suitably end-of-summer way and I am in need of damson crumble. Emma and I made a yummy one yesterday after reading Nigel Slater's Kitchen Diaries and it was fantastic - ruby red bubbling damson nectar and an oaty crumble topping that slowly sank into and absorbed the juice. But today I needed pastry. (Hey, I ran 4 miles this morning - I'm ALLOWED.)

Previously I have been wary of making gluten-free pastry, instead preferring to leave it to my grandmother, who is the Pastry Queen of Yorkshire. However, after a tentative attempt in Devon I now feel up to the challenge - so damson almond tart here we go... Alas my amateurish home photos in hideous lighting really don't do it justice.

We first had this down in Devon a fortnight ago, when my mother and grandmother rustled up some pastry, filled it with frangipane mixture and topped it all with cherries. Oh my... I just don't have the words to describe what a buttery almondy juicy crisp delight it was. I had 3 helpings at dinner and it was equally delicious cold with coffee the next morning; for once I didn't feel left out as everyone else chowed down on their croissants. I'm telling you, you just have to make it and try it for yourself - if you don't have damsons then indeed plums/greengages/cherries would work.

Am becoming a rapid convert to using Dove Farm gluten-free flour for pastry - it really does work out well, especially if you chuck an egg in to hold it all together better. If you aren't coeliac - well go and use your daft gluteny flour then if you really must. Tchah.

For the pastry:
200g self-raising Dove Farm gluten-free flour (Grandma Bramham's tip - SR keeps it nice and light)
100g butter, chilled and cubed
1 egg

For the frangipane filling:
100g butter
100g sugar (I guess caster would be best but I used granulated because the Swiss Family Mad have no concept of a well-stocked cupboard with a variety of sugars. We didn't even have TONIC water tonight. I ask you. I had to have my gin neat.)
100g ground almonds
1 tsp almond extract (optional)

2 or 3 good handfuls of damsons - no idea what weight I used but you need to halve and stone enough to cover the surface of the dish.

a sprinkling of sugar

Start by making the pastry: rub the butter into the flour until the mixture resembles breadcrumbs. Crack the egg in and mix together until it forms a ball you can clump up and put into clingfilm. Pop it into the fridge for about half an hour to rest a bit and absorb the water - so you have a better chance of rolling it out without it cracking all over the place. (Gluteny folks: your pastry probably behaves itself a bit better because of the nice stretchy gluten protein providing structure. Appreciate it!)

While the pastry's chillin', get on with the frangipane mixture. Beat the butter and sugar together until creamy, then crack in the egg and beat some more before you stir in the almonds. Add the drop of almond extract for extra almondy depth and flavour - mmmm.

Roll out the chilled pastry and line a tart dish (about 20cm across). Abandon all hope of doing this in one piece like Snow White does - just patchwork it together. Prick the bottom of the pastry case with a fork, line with baking parchment and fill with ceramic beans/dried chickpeas/similar. Bake blind for 15 mins at 200ºC or until it's a nice golden-brown colour.

Remove from the oven and spoon in the frangipane mixture (try not to eat too much of it while it's sitting around - that stuff is GOOD). Don't worry if it doesn't look like much - it will rise to cushion the fruit. Stud attractively with the stoned damson halves, packed as tightly as possible. Sprinkle with a bit more sugar and pop back in the oven at about 180ºC for 35 - 40 mins, or until the frangipane is golden-brown and crispy, and the damsons are bubbling a bit.

(Looking at the photo again I have a feeling I may have taken mine out a little early... I couldn't wait to eat it. BAD ROZ!)

Serve with lightly whipped cream into which you have stirred a teaspoon of vanilla extract -----> nirvana.

And now there is no tart left. It has all been eaten. I feel bereft... oh well, probably best for the old waistline to be honest. Besides, Mother and I got through a good quarter of it each. I'm off to read Lord of the Rings in bed and digest.

Let me know when you get bored of the minutiae of my daily life... though I hope to have some big cancer updates for you soon: the follow-up and scans are going to be mid-September. This waiting around is frankly rather unsettling after the hurlyburly of treatment - surely this is negligence!? Or reassuring? I cannot make my mind up... though at present I have plumped for the latter.

Now go forth and bake!

we're all back from a summer holiday and wishing we weren't ...

... and blackberry-picking to cheer ourselves up.


Have returned from 2 glorious and long-awaited weeks in Devon, cursing Langage Farm clotted cream for my expanded waistline. And as I write the rain is lashing the house in wind-shaken sheets that make me long for Tuckenhay sun ... (not that that was very reliable either but at least it always brightened up in time for an evening cider). I have decided the only way to live a SAD-free life and stop the weather tossing my mood around like a cat with a mouse is to MOVE TO ITALY. When it rains there at least I will be able to stay in the house and eat gluten-free pizza - which of course will ONLY go to my bust instead of my bottom. That's Italy for you.

As planned, I got the train down to Exeter after radiotherapy finished, taking with me a raging sore throat and an exciting new bald patch. The throat calmed down eventually after about a week to my joy - scones and clotted cream time!! However, a surprising twist: since I decided to rashly ignore my radiologist's advice and swim in the 3 pools available in Devon, I ended up with a truly spectacular outbreak of irritant contact dermatitis (eczema) from chlorine. But not on my irradiated neck- oh no, it was on MY FACE. Readers, I was hideously deformed for at least 4 WHOLE DAYS. I was scaly, erythematous, swollen, tiny-eyed and itchy as hell. It was not good. (I took many obsessive dermatological photos but I wouldn't want to give you nightmares, so I won't put them up. Seriously: I looked like an orc/Harry Potter after a Stinging Hex.)

This led to a parental banning from the pools and thus left me with no way to work off the clotted cream except by walking in FitFlops (or ConFlops, as Michael calls them) and going to the antiquated gym. So I passed the time avoiding mirrors like the plague, reading, making ratatouille and hanging with Georgina who came to visit.

Then I invited myself to the Devonshire Chez Weatherdon to escape from a fate worse than death - camping. Yes, the Swiss Family Mad headed off into the wilds of Dorset with a tent. I don't camp, so I fled to a better life; one full of paella, sea swimming, amazing pubs, blackberry-picking, freckly sisters and flapjacks. Unfortunately my camera battery ran out before I could build up an adequate photographic record so these will have to do...

Alas, it was all too short and so Monday evening found me back in Robin Hood country again... where I have been baking blackberry muffins with BJ gals and trying my darnedest not to feel tired from radiotherapy. I have been on TWO runs of 4 and 3 miles. So there.

We have also been celebrating Michael's freakishly good GCSE results (Pizza Express tonight! Am taking pre-prepared home-made gluten-free base and am very excited at prospect of first English restaurant pizza in 4 years.)

Throat has been OK - just a slight soreness when I forget myself and take big mouthfuls. Good way to be more ladylike... dainty nibbles, Rosalind! Voice still a bit husky with annoying tendency to shoot up and squeak like teenage choirboy. Neck is slightly red and itches from time to time. Oh and the face reaction settled down eventually after lashings of E45 cream and aloe vera. I have absolutely no idea why it exploded like that - perhaps the whole of my skin was up in arms about the radiotherapy damage and decided to teach me a lesson for messing with chlorine.

Here's a bit of a lymphoma shout-out - the Beacons of Hope Awards are taking nominations until Monday, so if there's someone you think should get an award, go tell the Lymphoma Association here! I nearly got Isobel to email them and nominate me but felt that would be a little dishonest and I should wait for true appreciation, if I do deserve any!
UPDATE about 2 secs later: blumming hell! have just got an email from them and I AM NOMINATED!!!! no idea by whom but thank you thank you thank you :)

I hope you all have a great Bank Holiday weekend, weather permitting... Will be returning to third year on 7th September (a week late so I have more time to recover my strength and grow some more hair) despite failing to muster up any enthusiasm for the prospect. Oh well... maybe it will come eventually once I get back into the swing of all things medical. Off out now - pizza here I come! Until next time my dears.

a bitch of an itch

Rarrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr the promised skin reaction has arrived!!! It started a couple of days ago when I idly wondered why my neck was itching and put it down to a stealthy yet frenzied mosquito attack while I was asleep. Then I went to put my perfume on (Paul Smith Rose, if you were wondering) and dab it behind my ears and had a massive "D'OHHH!" moment - it was obviously a skin reaction to perfume. The radiology team did tell me not to use any perfume but I thought that the skin around my ears would be safe. Evidently not. Now the skin on the entire circumference of my neck is itchy, blistering, reddened and thoroughly hacked off.

Well that's what it feels like. When I try to get a photo of this it looks disappointingly ordinary, if a little pink.Check out those bright red earlobes though! Good job I didn't get my ears pierced after all.... oh well maybe I can do it later when the whole cancer malarkey is over, and MAYBE Father will buy me some nice pearl earrings! Isn't he a nice daddy........ (haha get out of that one Daddy-o).

And you know what else? My hair is falling out too. Now don't worry - just a little bald patch at the back where it's been caught by the radiation on its way out. Taking a photo of this was pretty damn difficult but I managed in the end. I'm just a little annoyed at this as I am fiercely overprotective of the hair that's coming back. I have a cowlick at the front. yes I have enough hair to have a COWLICK. This is SO EXCITING!


As for the Jaws & mincing machine lovechild - I have worked out how to shut him up for a couple of hours. 2 soluble paracetamol + 2 ibuprofen + oxetacaine = silent throat and opportunity to eat without too much pain. Hurrah!! Am now off out to have dinner with the grandparentals as is my lovely Grandad's birthday. Ciao ciao :D

ribbit ribbit

Say hello to the frog in my throat:


He's not as cute as he looks. Little bastard.

Actually I tell a lie: there was a frog in my throat until a few days ago when he was replaced by the lovechild of Jaws and a mincing machine. Now my every gulp cuts like a knife as various inflamed structures rub together, then I can feel each bolus of food inching its way down my radiation-irritated oesophagus. Unfortunately I'm still ridiculously greedy and haven't yet learned to take smaller mouthfuls, so I suppose it's all my own fault. Also I refused to give up gin and wine until it got really bad. Now I am teetotal (nearly. I still have the odd spritzer or weak G&T. It is the holidays, after all.)

I've been given some oxetacaine (anaesthetic) to drink 20 mins before meals. It tastes like toothpaste and to be honest I don't notice that much difference to the pain. Gargling with soluble paracetamol seems to take the edge off though, and I've become slightly addicted to Strepsils Extra. Am also self-medicating with frappuccinos (definitely the most exciting way to get a morning dose of caffeine.... yesterday I accidentally leant on the pulse button while the lid was off, and thus gave myself a coffee facial and redecorated the kitchen, to brother's amusement). Breakfast is now a smoothie and lunch tends to be soup/scrambled eggs/something squashy, and dinner follows a similar pattern. Lots of lasagne, risotto, banana custard, and icecream - am not complaining.

I had my 13th treatment today - it was exactly the same as all the others, except for seeing a dietician afterwards. This was a slightly pointless exercise as I am apparently the perfect weight (well I beg to differ - have you SEEN the size of my arse??) and doing rather well, though I should remember to take my painkillers before meals. I confess I have been lazy in doing this but apparently it will make a big difference. I have no other side effects as yet apart from a bit of redness around the clavicles. Not tired yet. Nope. No sirree.

Oh and today I finally plucked up the courage to ask if I could take a photo of the torture chamber:
but this photo simply doesn't convey the impressive majesty of the machine, especially when you have your head bolted to the bench below and the thing is slowly and menacingly revolving around you. Though I am now so used to the mask that I start to have a little doze as soon as they bolt it on.

I have to say, being irradiated in Newcastle has been a far cry from the lonely existence I imagined I'd be leading - have had Gaita around (see ratatouille below), visits to Mavis and her lovely friends, a cinema trip to see Coco avant Chanel, a sunshine risotto with Zoe (mmmm - roasted butternut squash, goats cheese and fresh sage. That girl is a genius.)

ratatouille and G&T - two of my favourite things

Then after Edward's birthday celebrations......the Swiss Family Mad arrived from Nottingham, took over my house and drank all my maple syrup. Despite this we had good family banter: a trip to Craster, lots of banana splits and a night in watching The Others and scaring ourselves silly. Now my grandparents have caught the torch of Entertaining Roz and are holding it high (mainly by feeding me - we had stewed Victoria plums with vanilla cream tonight. arf arf. They slip down nicely).

I only have 2 more treatments left and I'm getting the train down to Exeter after the last one next Tuesday - if I don't update before then, you can rest assured I am FINALLY getting a holiday down in Tuckenhay: swimming, hanging with the family, eating and boozing (throat permitting), bugging Georgina, and generally chilling aahhhht. It's been a while since I've totally relaxed and I am really looking forward to it.

Will probably be back on before then though, just for another delicious soft-food update...

radiotherapy-schmerapy

First off, congratulations if you manage to read the title of this post out loud without swallowing your tongue. I'm a little stuck for pithy title ideas and that was the best I could come up with. It's no "She sells seashells on the seashore, but the shells she sells are seashells I'm sure", but still a bit of a challenge for the old hypoglossal nerve.

Really, though, "radiotherapy-schmerapy" fits the bill exactly. It really isn't very exciting. I've had 3 so far and the entire routine goes like this: I walk the 1.2 miles to the Freeman at a random time each day. I report to reception and wait around for a bit, idly leafing through glossy home improvement magazines and wondering why cancer patients get given the magazines with typos in - is it to stir up a bit of fight for life in them? Or sink them into an even deeper depression: "Oh God, another misplaced apostrophe, I might as well give up now. Farewell, cruel world!"

Foaming a little at the mouth from grammatical errors, I am summoned into the radiotherapy room, where I announce my date of birth, pop my hearing aids out and lie down on the bench under the scary machine. The mask goes on with lots of horrible pops as it's bolted in and I wiggle my head desperately to find the comfiest way to arrange my face. The lights go dark and the radiographers move the table about to line up the little red lights with the dots on my mask and thus position me correctly. Lights come back up and they tap me twice on the arm to tell me they're leaving the room. I hum non-committally in reply, as the mask does rather eliminate one's capacity for speech. Then I lie there counting the seconds while the machine moves round me slowly. Today the mask was only on for 5 minutes and 5 seconds.

Then the technicians rush back into the room and release me from my facial prison. I bounce back up, jam the hearing aids back in, say cheerio and toddle off home. I will get photos, I promise - I just haven't had time to so far. It's all very "wham, bam, thank you ma'am", only with dangerous levels of radiation.

No side effects as yet, though after the first one I convinced myself I had chest pain and that my lung was obviously irritated from the radiation and I would die a horrible death coughing up blood. Definitely psychosomatic. Nothing even happens for at least a week anyway. If it does, you'll be the first to hear about it.

Talking of side effects, all my chemo side-effects seem to have cleared up. Energy-wise I am absolutely fine, especially after France. My arm veins still feel a bit tight at times and obviously are hard to get blood from. Alas, I still cannot look at mango chutney. The hair is growing back nicely with good coverage, though that didn't stop me trying on and buying another wig:which led to many of my dearest friends failing to recognise me on Tuesday night (medic post-exam debauchery; they were all wasted). Tried this one on too and was very tempted, but it was £30 and I have decided to stop pissing money down the drain now. The money I got for having cancer has now run out which is severely limiting my shopping activities.


Not much other news - am hanging out with my favourite Italian (Gaita) making ratatouille and cheesecake, and going to visit the lovely Mavis in Hexham this weekend. If anyone is around in Newcastle next week then let me know :D or I shall import my sister from Nottingham and you'll all be sorry.

the Mould Room beckons....

Today was one of those fantastically efficient days that convinces you that the NHS is the best thing since sliced bread and reaffirms your faith in the medical establishment. After the horrifically agitating tedium of the last 2 weeks it was such a relief to be doing something, even if that something involved being bolted to a bed, with no hearing aids in, while a sheet of hot floppy plastic was moulded around my head by three grown men.

This is the result of that claustrophobic ordeal:

The mask/mould starts off as a flat piece of hard plastic (with a diamond-shaped nose hole) which is heated in a water bath before being wrapped around the patient's face, with pressure on the eyes. Ouch.
It's then bolted down onto the bench with those black things to keep the patient nice and still (well you try moving when your EYES are being squashed and your nose is sticking out of a small hole).
The neck has to be extended as far as possible to keep most of the head out of the way of the radiation.

Fortunately it was only 5 minutes until the now-hard mask was peeled off and I lurched upright, blinking, red-faced, dizzy and frankly astounded that I'd survived without kicking and screaming and generally making a prat of myself.

I asked if I'd be able to keep the mask, as I know some people who had been allowed to and was getting very excited at the prospect of my own personalised jelly mould. Alas this was not to be; perhaps it is to be recycled or has its own bit-part lined up in a new horror/sci-fi movie. They let me take lots of photos though - aren't you glad you can see its creepiness for yourself??

I then toddled off to see my radiologist who got me to sign yet another consent form and checked my schedule (this is like starting a new year at school - very organised with timetables being handed out left right and centre). My timetable informs me that I am to start radiotherapy next Wednesday and finish Tuesday 11th of August, which is a much better scenario than I could even have hoped for two days ago. Praise the lord and the NCCC. Devon here I come!!

The session wound up with a simulation; I was ushered into the CT room, where the mask went back on and stayed on for 6 rather unpleasant (blind and deaf) minutes while technicians drew little marks all over it with some rather delicious-smelling solvent pen. Mmmm. I was then jerked through the CT scanner to get a picture of the site to be irradiated, so my radiologist can plan exactly where to direct the radiation rays. In addition to the mould I've had a wee tattoo i.e. a tiny black dot in the middle of my sternum. I can get this lasered off later if I want but to be honest I can barely even see it.

So that's the planning all done - I start next Wednesday. "Nothing but good times ahead."

update: oooh I made a mean risotto with sundried tomatoes, goats cheese, bacon and orange peppers. nom nom nom. Felt the blog was getting too boringly medical....