I thought I’d name my traditional end of year wrap-up blog post something slightly different. It’s been a bit of a rollercoaster year for me. After everything that happened last year (see Cancer, Chemo and Corona) life has taken a new meaning. It’s taught me that we take everything for granted. Waking up every day and feeling well is a blessing, when so many people have it worse off. I’ve been trying to sieze the moment and do as much as I can. The word “bored” doesn’t exist because I’m always trying to do something. I’ve ticked off a number of odd job things that I’ve had on various lists for years. Sometimes you just have to get up and hustle.

The experiences of what happened to me last yeast were quite frankly the scariest thing I’ve ever had to deal with, and I don’t think anyone will quite understand unless they have had to go through something similar. I have so much to thank the NHS for, and which is why anyone who disagrees with getting a vaccine annoys me immensley. The costs of my hospital treatments last year anywhere where “free” health care isn’t provided quite possibly runs into the tens of thousands. I just did a quick Google search for “knee replacement cost” (just one of the many components of my surgery) and the first result came back as £10k, and that’s only scratching the surface. My surgery was 7hrs long with a number of top surgeons at the RNOH in Stanmore. I was in hospital for 2 weeks before being sent home. Then the next phase was nearly 8 months of Chemotherapy with 3 week in patient stays at Leicester Royal Infirmary. Plus monthly physio calls and checkups. You get where I’m going here. I’m so very grateful for living in this country and having this wonderful health service.

I probably should have seen a counciler sooner, to help me deal with the aftermath of spending a whole year out and the mental onslaught of dealing with being told I had Cancer, and then fighting that for a whole year whilst isolating and not being able to have visitors to the hospital. I’ve been keeping busy by throwing myself back into work (not that I’ve been thanked for it once) but no one has kept an eye on me and with the workload building up and up I’ve had to take it into my own hands and take some time off to deal with the stress and reset a little.

Mental health is as important as phsyical health. Last year you could physically see that I hadn’t been well. This year I’m looking fine but mental health has taken a rollocking having to deal with everything and realistically probably masking the issue a little by keeping myself so busy.

Take care of yourselves and one another. Keep an eye out on your friends. No one is invincible.

My Wife Anna and my close friends and family have kept me going through all of this.

At this stage I’m a little fed up of things repeating themselves like Groundhog Day. Let’s hope 2022 is an improvement and we see this Coronavirus off in a timely fashion. 🙂