It must be Thursday – albeit only just. I never plan a blog post – its timing or its content. It just comes when it wants to, and buggers off in between. I think about things along the way, store them in the memory bank and then something, just something tiny, and funny (to me), triggers the whole lot to flood from what’s left of my brain to my fingertips and on to the page. Weirdly, this usually seems to be on a Thursday, or late Wednesday night, as I now write.
So the funny trigger, the hoo hoo cue, the ha ha car, arrived this morning, straight after I’d come from gym circuits (yes, you read that right!) with the Oncology Physio at the hospital. That’s funny enough in itself – me, gyms, circuits – bleeeucccchhh, no thank you! I’d rather watch an episode of Top Gear. Preferably while asleep. Or dead. Yeah, that would make it tolerable.
No, I’ve asked – asked – to do circuits, exactly 7 days after each chemo infusion, because even though I might feel pants, it spurs me on to ensure I start and then continue to exercise well for the rest of the cycle. Anyway, no hero points due here, I bloody hate it – she makes me do the exercise bike first, which I loathe, and then all sorts of vile, pointless things with weights – but on the plus side, we are making in-roads into Mount Gut, which needs to be done.
I digress. The hospital is close to one of my favourite garden centres/country park/vintage tat/saw you bloody coming, you muppet type places. As it’s relatively early, I decide it’s rude not to pop in after evil, bike-loving Fizz Mistress’s session and see, for one last time (honest) if in a garden centre, I can differentiate between want and need.
I’m perusing the perennials, when a friendly assistant approaches. “Hello, you alright there?” (Note to the world, and people who kindly work in shops – PLEASE do NOT keep using this phrase as your opening gambit. It makes the customer feel like an idiot. Yes I will be alright, when you keep your half of the bargain and consider interacting with me along the agreed t’s and c’s of our supplier/consumer relationship. The phrase is, “Can I help you?”. End of.)
Think I’m a bit touchy tonight? You just wait!!!
“Yes, just having a look to see what you’ve got in, always on the hunt for more plants!”
Her mouth has dropped, and her eyes have gone north.
“Yes, terrible when you’ve got a bald patch to fill!”
I am smiling because I know what is happening. Meanwhile, she is busy burying herself backwards in the begonias. And deeper with every word. She continues.
“Errmm…anything in particular you need? Is it really bare or just a bit patchy?”
I kid you not, this is exactly what happened: please know this, every word of every blog I post is 100% true – all of it actually happened. If it didn’t happen, or you can’t hear me in these words, it’s not authentic, and if it’s not authentic, it’s not being written.
“No I’m fine thanks, don’t worry!” and off I go, smiling my gym pants off. (Oooh, fashion update: I got some flashy new cut-off gym trouser thingies and matching top from Tesc….er, design duo Florence and Fred, for Fizz. Yeah, all the gear, no idea! They are quite bright. Carer’s reaction first thing? “Blimey, the neon goddess has arrived!” followed by “Nice arse!” I love the bones and the skin off that man.)
Well at last, say I! I was told from the outset that even with the cold cap, I would lose 30-50% of the hair on my head. Without the cold cap, I would have lost all of it by cycle 2 – it’s not an ‘if’ or ‘maybe’ with my chemo cocktail. I’ve been quite excited to see that it’s happening – not least because, (upside time, taaa daahhh!), if FEC is making my hair fall out, even with the cap on, think what havoc it’s wreaking on the other stuff. It means the treatment is working. Happy days!
The hair issue has, as ever, been hilarious from day 1. We were just finishing the first cycle, (see angle poise days, the blog title I can’t remember), and as the delicate, first frost on an autumn puddle type ice sheets were sliding off my head when the cap came off, Head Onc Nurse was briefing us on what to do to minimise hair loss.
“Try not to wash your hair too often lovely,” she said, ever so gently. “But when you do, use a PH-neutral shampoo and conditioner. Run the shower water as cold as you can take it. I’m afraid you can’t rub the shampoo in, just pat it on. Then, when you come out of the shower, you have to let it drip dry. No towels. No blow drying, or any products on the hair. Try not to comb it.”
My hair has never been my crowning glory. There’s lots of it, but it’s as fine as you like. So, without products, blow-drying or even a decent, scalp-tingling wash, it looks like poo. The net is, I don’t give a flying FEC about my hair – which may beg the question over why I had the cold cap.
Well, it’s quite simple. I think I might have a bloody horrible head under all that thin, pointless stuff. I mean, what if it’s Tefal-like, or covered in scabs and moles and rats and purple sprouting broccoli?? How do any of us know (unless you’re a bloke, obvs – hahahahha!)? Oh, and the other reason I had the cap is that Consultant Onc just told me I would be having it. I don’t argue with him!
Head Onc Nurse continued. “You’d be best to change your pillowcases. Cotton pillowcases draw out the moisture from your hair, and as you turn in the night, you’ll rub the hair off like a new-born does. There’s too much friction.”
FECing hell, what am I meant to do, go pillow-less??? Sleep on cling film??
“Satin pillowcases are the best.”
Excuse me?? SATIN pillowcases?? I am filled with horror. I haven’t heard of such things since I had a random accident with a Jackie Collins ‘novel’ when I was 16. (Lady readers: don’t be sat there pretending you haven’t done the same. No – YOU! Shaking your head there – you HAVE. I know you have. Own it.)
Oh great. So I’ve got to go from 400 thread-count to 400 volts of static. Bring it on.
Once home, I venture (embarrassed) on to Amazon. Short of visiting Hugh Heffner’s gaff, I cannot think where on earth I could procure such items. My fingers are typing ‘satin pillowcases’ into the search box, but my whole head has made like an owl and turned the other way.
I find some. White, at least. Urgh. I can barely look. But they are needed, so into my basket they go.
What happens next? O….M….G
“Customers who bought this also viewed…”
NO THANK YOU! NOTHING TO SEE HERE! MOVE ALONG!
So, all that being covered, we’re on course. The day of cycle 2, I’m gently combing my hair, with a device that has teeth wider apart than the tines of a potato lifting fork (or Phyllis Nelson, if you’re of an age younger than the one which knows what tines are) and wallop – a great big chunkola of hair just comes out. No problem. In between cycle 2 and 3, it’s just dropping on the floor, combs or not. It’s highly addictive: I reckon I could stroke the whole lot out over three episodes of Escape to the Country and be done with it.
I am fine with all this, and if you know me, you know that’s true. It’s just a tiny bit galling that every day, strangers are literally stopping in the street to take pictures of my next door neighbour’s luxuriant bush. Referee! But to be fair, I’ve never seen her Wisteria look better in the seven years we’ve been here.
I’m not the only one losing it. The cats are busy moulting and it’s a right job to tell who’s hair is which. Karen we can be sure of – pure black. Willy (her real name is Tilly but she’s morphed into Willy or Willers) is tabby, but then so am I at the moment – no highlights since January! Anyway – all hair, feline or otherwise, is being collected up and put into my compost heap.
Now then readers, as you know, the head is not the only place one has hair. As I only have protection against hair loss on my heeeeeed, obvs, everything else is, well, different.
I liken the current situation to the Shipping Forecast. I’m a BBC R4 addict, so it seems natural enough.
As of tonight, we’ll summarise thus:
- Extreme South (Legs, Upper, Lower) Bald as a coot, not changing, waxing savings growing
- Mid-South (none of your beeswax you filth-brainers)
- Mid to upper South – Forearms – Hursuit, hoping for change to bald asap
- North – Face – Full beard (only joking!!!!)
- North – Chin – Granny hairs which need plucking from time to time – sporadic – hoping for change to bald asap
- Eyebrows – waning – could do with that anyway
- Eyelashes – waning – don’t want those to go – only decent thing I’ve got
- Extreme North – Head – Patchy – Fair to muddling – to thinning – to disappearing
Oh! I’ve left a region out. I never knew I had nose hair until I didn’t have it. That’s because now, my nose runs all the time. No, not full-on, green snotty, crusty baby bogies (bleeuuchhhh! Mums out there, chip them off your bubbas, they’re disgusting!) Just a steady stream of running watery-type stuff. Apparently, your nose hairs hold that lot back. Who knew?!
Funnily, a friend recently asked why hair has departed from other places. It’s purely because my head is the ONLY thing which is protected (or semi) from that situation. I can’t be wearing a cold cap body suit can I love!
So back to this morning – bald patches, begonias and all that. At the weekend, I posted a pic on FB of me in a hat. I don’t like hats – I didn’t own one before this, and I look shite in them. But I’ll wear one for social occasions just because, it’s easier for other people. I wish for that poor girl’s sake this morning that I’d had one on. We all get ‘bad news Tourettes’ – I’ve had it myself in the past. It’s human nature.
In fact, while I’ve got you, the whole CA/CHEM thing is harder for the people who haven’t got it/are not having it, than it is for the person experiencing it, and I genuinely mean that. I’ll blog about it in the future, if you tell me that would be useful, because now I know far better how to have a conversation when someone’s dropped the C-bomb. I wish I had known before.
In the meantime, you’ll find me at home or out and about, quite happily baring the bald, the bare or the patchy – who bloody cares? I’ve nailed the Rab C Nesbitt comb-over, and if you look, or want to see, I will show you. If you try to sneak a look, I will charge you!
Shipping Forecast update, 00.01, Thursday 4th May:
Hair: Thinning, patchy, variable; bald in parts; not bothered
Self: Happy, loved, grateful; blessed indeed 🙂
Pip pip x 🙂
Who's going to get the chicken? 