The Great Escape...

I woke this morning the sound of the tea trolley rattling down the corridor. My IV needed to be changed so I rang the buzzer for assistance. The nurse came and freed me of the IV line. "So, your off home today" she announced. This was the first I'd heard. "Yes, your blood test and everything have all come back negative, so I believe the doctors want to see you gone this morning", this was fantastic news, but it was about to get even better... "and you can use the shower across the hall if you need to". If I need to? I pounced out of bed and wobbled across the room with the dexterity and strength of a 15st new born foal. Its amazing what two weeks in bed will undo in your body. I snatched up my wash bag (noting the layer of dust on it) and crashed across the corridor into the shower room across the hallway. I'm not a particularly religiuos person, but when people talk about baptism and being "born again" this had to have been pretty close. I washed away the five days of sickness in a matter of seconds and stood there just soaking up the heat, with and hum that soon broke into a song, but soon realised that the bathroom door was all that separated me from the thirty or so bed riden folk on the other side, I knocked the signing on the head.

I returned to my "cell" cleansed and brimming with the prospect of escape. I started to pack, but stopped to eat the two slices of white toast and jam that had been left by my bed side while I was in the shower. Usually for me, toast is a high speed breakfast inhaled along with strong coffe while flashing a glance at the kitchen clock on the way out of the door. Today was different, I just sat there with time on my side enjoying every mouthful... superb.

After a brief discussion with the doctors we were handed paperwork and meds and sent on our way. As we approached Newquay I felt exhausted, but Bethan and myself had been chatting about the "house" all the way back. I wanted to go and see.

We have spent the last year renovating a house a couple of streets away from where we live on Pentire. It's been a long road, but one we have both enjoyed, even more so in the last few months as it has neared completion. The news of my Cancer has come at a time when we as a family are going through a lot of different transitions. The kids have just started big school, I'd just begun training as a teacher and Bethan was looking forward to picking up her career as well. With the new house almost complete it really felt like we were getting somewhere and that life was moving in the right direction. I still look at my current situation as a "speed bump", a period of time in my life where things are out of my control to a degree, but I still maintain that this is temporary, painful and uncomfortable, but temporary.

We pulled up outside the new place, i haven't seen it for almost a month. It looks amazing! "Are you sure you want to go in", " absolutely" I said. We jumped out of the car and went across the drive way checking out the freshly rendered exterior, it all looks so new! We went inside, flooring and carpets were all in, bathrooms complete, kitchen finished and decorating underway. Bethan and I went upstairs, and it dawned on me that the spare room with its own ensuite bathroom we had designed to accommodate our visiting family and freinds is soon to become my hospis, recovery room to house me during my terms of chemo recovery in the coming months. It still makes me feel pretty sad that we're moving into our new house under these circumstances, but it is what it is I suppose, and things could always be worse.

We drove back up the road buzzing about the new progress that has been made on the place. When we arrived home I got my feet up while Bethan went to collect Joel and Cerys. They came roaring in the house in the usual way, painty fingers and crusty sleeves fresh from a day of school.It felt like a month not a week since I last saw them both, and they both seemed to have doubled in size, with new manorisims, words and ways. We all settled down and watched KungFu Panda 2, myself and Cerys in the big chair dipping into our secret stash of Haribo... human again.