The long weekend…

It’s tricky to write my blog this week. I’ve have a wonderful week, but I heard that a really lovely lady, someone I’d speak to regularly, and considered a friend passed away from colorectal cancer. 

I’m so saddened by her death. She deserved so much longer here. 

Cancer is an absolute ****. 

It’s vital we all know the signs of cancers, it would be super helpful if we knew the signs of all cancers. But that might be a big ask. 

So concentrating on the ones we do know about, would help immensely. 

I think a lot of us are aware of our bodies. We know when things don’t feel quite right. 

We need to act on those little intuitions, and more than anything we need to persevere if our initial doctor’s visit doesn’t evoke the right level of action.  

I’m not sure the exact type of bowel cancer that Clare had. 

I’ve therefore no idea if early detection and diagnosis would have helped. 

But I know she was passionate about getting people to check themselves, know the symptoms and push for tests. 

I know a lot of people that didn’t get early detection and therefore paid the price for their doctor’s lack of concern. 

It happens time and time again. So we need to advocate for ourselves, as if we are doing it for a loved one. 

We often don’t push for things for ourselves that we’d expect for someone we love. 

Well, self love starts with getting our physicians to hear us, really hear us.

I know that’s a bit rich coming from me. My cancer was caught quite late in the day. But that wasn’t because I didn’t go to the doctor. It’s because the doctors I saw didn’t give me the right level of action, because of my age. I had all the symptoms, but because I was deemed “too young”, it was never investigated.

I had symptoms of bowel cancer since I was 18. I’d regularly go to my GP, both my childhood one and then the one I still have now when I moved to Braintree some 25 years ago. 

I’d be going a few times a year because of those symptoms. And I’d be told the same thing each time. 

Piles & IBS.

I can assure you, the cure for cancer is not Preparation H and some Fybogel!

The only reason I am still here is because I got incredibly incredibly lucky. I had an older person, slow growing cancer in a young person’s body. 

This is somewhat of a rarity. Cancer in younger people can often be more aggressive, which is why it’s so important to insist on being checked thoroughly. 

From the age of 18 -36 I never had a single test or investigation. Not a single one! 

If I was hearing my story now, and I heard of an 18 year old discussing suspicious bowel symptoms I’d be dragging them in for a colonoscopy, with them kicking and screaming quite possibly. But I’d know it was the right course of action. 

If you have any symptoms of any cancers; Ask, Insist, Demand further tests. 

Because bowel cancer doesn’t have to be a death sentence. I know it can seem that way when the media show so many stories of doom. 

But hello! I’m here! I’m an example of a positive outcome. 

I was successfully treated. And that could be the story of many people, even with more aggressive cancers, If they get tests and treatment early. 

Which means insisting on being checked, and not taking no for an answer.

I was suffering from horrific pain by the time I finally said enough was enough and that I wanted to get “my piles” sorted out, which I had decided to go private medical for.
I would sleep with a flannel between my teeth I was gritting them so hard with the excruciating pain.

I was passing a lot of blood (I had done this for many years, but was told the colour of blood I was describing was deemed ‘safe’.
This is a myth. Blood, no matter what colour should be investigated.
If it turns out you have piles, and just piles, then happy days. If it turns out to be something else? Well, at least you are in the system and ahead of the game.

You can buy bowel cancer stool sample tests to do at home, which can be helpful.
But my advice, definitely see your GP. Explain your symptoms.
If they have been happening for 3 weeks or more, ask for further tests.

Cancer doesn’t always mean death. That’s the first thing we need to remember.
But we do need to get ahead of it. We need to be our own life saver.

To Clare, it was a honour and a pleasure knowing you. Even for this short time. Rest in peace. Thank you for giving me confidence when at times I lacked it, you were one of the good’uns. xxx

****************

My week was one of little surprises and lots of joy.

It started Tuesday last week.
Sam comes up to ours once a week for work meetings. Usually he arrives about 10pm. We see him for a tiny bit and then he’s gone by morning to the office.
But he came up earlier this time. Then Ben turned up because Sam had mentioned that he was coming. Then Kaitlyn came too. It was sad that Milly and Zak couldn’t come, but I have said she’s to feel free to come up with Sam any time they fancy. That way we can all get together.

I hastily put a table scape together, which was made a hell of a lot easier with the left over wedding flowers that Beccy had very generously said we could take home last weekend.

And then I hastily grabbed the takeaway menu for the Indian restaurant and put together a fine meal. :)

We had a wonderful evening. Though we missed the other part of our team. x

Then Wednesday I took myself back to the car boot sale that’s held at Marks Tey.
It’s nice that it’s during the week. I really enjoy just having a mooch, but as it happens it was a highly successful outing.
One man’s trash is another man’s treasure. :)
I have big plans for this lot. I am brewing scapes in my mind ready to release them.
There was an article in the Times about table scaping at the weekend. I appreciate not many people will be so addicted they start attending car boot sales. But it’s nice that lots of people are enjoying the hobby.
It’s the new scrap booking hahaha.

Anyway, Thursday night Sam said that as Milly was going to be at a craft fair all weekend (Milly hand makes eco friendly home wares. She’s really rather good at it too! She sold one of her brilliant reusable sandwich bag to someone in Canada the other day! So she’s international now! Look for Boundless interiors on Instagram and Etsy.
We can all make small changes to help save the planet, and not using copious amounts of cling film and plastic washing up sponges etc is a good start).

Sam said that he and Zak were coming up to ours for the long weekend. I couldn’t believe it. But I was definitely delighted.
I had so many new things I’d been working on to show Zak.
Firstly I made him his very own Harrods, high end jewellery department.
My very kind friends donated their boxes and bags so I could bring my vision to life. I am very grateful for their help.
I stocked it from Amazon, and car boot sales, buying up all the glam costume jewellery I could find.
All he saw was shiny things that gleamed and sparkled, and some one sitting on the floor engaged in play, he didn’t massively care it was a jewellers, but he sold me most of the store in about 30 seconds.
He put some bangles on too and said they made him look ‘glowy’. Which indeed they did! :)

When I put the photos of my shop creation on Instagram a few people said that I need a granddaughter. Which if I get one one day will be amazing. But for now my beautiful boy is more than I ever dreamed of, besides, name me one successful famous female jeweller?
Yep, they are a bit scarce, men dominate the world of high end jewellery and high fashion.

And children, all children like people interested and engaged in play. So they don’t really care too much about what the toy is.
I showed Zak the shop I’d made and he was straight in playing, and because he’s 3, and he doesn’t know the world has ill conceived gender roles yet.

We had a lovely time. He really loved the shop.

And I wasn’t done yet with my creations.
Last week I spent 3 hours bailing out our pond with a bucket. I had moved the fish out to a different pond last year. But I hadn’t got round to emptying the larger one. I don’t want any risk of harm to Zak so it was goodbye big pond!
The smaller pond is covered with heavy duty wire mesh to prevent accidents.
Anyway. I wanted a safe environment for him. And also I thought it would be an ideal location for a sand pit.
Chris’s back hasn’t been too good lately so I wasn’t going to ask him to help me. Besides, I have a lot of free time.
I bailed the entire thing out. I then used a whole bottle of bleach to clean the liner. Then rinsed it all off and bailed out that water too.
I then ordered play sand and barrowed it in to my newly created sand pit.
I’ve got to say that hard physical work is not my thing. But I did find making this for Zak extremely rewarding, even if I ached in muscles I wasn’t aware I owned! ;)

I have been telling anyone that will listen about my achievement. I’m sure people who climb Everest mention it less than I have mentioned my pond bailing!

I’ve spent quite a lot of time this year clearing and keeping clear, our veg garden. Last year we left it to nature. But now we have the new She shed we wanted it to look a bit better for our visitors. Not that I have found some new love for gardening. I really haven’t. If I could afford to I’d tarmac the lot! Haha

But one thing I was pleased about was the greengage tree Chris bought me for my lockdown birthday in 2020 has come back to life. It looked like it had died last year. So I moved it, to give it one last attempt at surviving and it worked! So it’s now flourishing in the veg patch.

I decided to grow pumpkins again this year. Last year’s ones were completely ruined by my lack of interest in gardening. But Chris has rigged up a watering system so I’m very happy with that, as I hate watering things.
I’m also growing asparagus, potatoes, peas and onions. Thought I might as well as I’d cleared the mass of weeds.

I took Zak out to the garden and he was delighted with his new play area. It’s a pretty big sandpit for a little boy.
We've all had fun out there this weekend. Even Chris, who has an aversion/phobia of sand. :)

Sam and Zak coming was an absolute joy. He is the dearest little cherub of a child…and Zak’s not bad either! Hahaha haha

I invited my mum and dad, and made a roast dinner. Yes! Me, I cooked. It’s almost as if I am perfectly capable of these things, but in general choose not to do them. :)

Top from Jigsaw, Skirt from Athena Procopiou Shoes from Tory Burch

I cooked a roast, laid a scape, I remembered to get a dessert. I’m on fire to be honest! Hahaha.

We had such a lovely day. It was nice to get my mum and dad over for their belated Easter lunch.


*[Chris is now recovered from the Rona. Not sure if this is a common thing but he was absolutely fine through it when he was testing positive. But started getting a tight chest and wheezy once he was negative. I would say he likes to be different but a friend of mine had the same thing happen too. Very weird.

I’ve still never had it and hoping to keep it that way too. It’s like playing musical chairs, I’m hoping to be the last person with a chair in place still!
The infection rate, and the death from covid rate is high in the UK. But the government deemed it to be over and stopped all the free/registrable testing.
And quite surprisingly (does sarcasm come across on the written page?) if you stop testing it doesn’t mean there’re no cases.

I’m masked and anti viral sprayed out and about. And no, I’m not hiding, running scared. I’ve been to five other countries so far this year, and it’s still only May, with plenty more flights/holidays left to go. I am the least hermity person I know, our house sitter’s have spent more time in our house than us this year. :)
I’m happy to still mask. Because whether it actually does anything or not, it seems to have worked for me so far. The way I see it, If it is simply coincidence I’m no worse off].

Lunch was good. The table was better! I used my scaping hobby a lot over the weekend. I laid up a beautiful breakfast table too.
It’s nice to put in some effort into something. I can’t cook, I manage, I get by, but I’m not a natural. Making the table pretty is something I take joy in.

I sometimes spend a lot on bits for it, but then I sometimes buy from boot sales for it.

I think that is the key to stylish dressing too. I sometimes spend a lot, but often it’s mixed in with high street or supermarket buys too.
Knowing what suits you is the most important part of shopping, that and buying the size that fits, rather than focusing on a number on the label. Finding things that accentuate your better parts and disguising your least favourite.
I have nice boobs, but I have a very bloated hormone belly. I will always try to enhance the bit that I like the most. That way I feel confident inside, it makes you hold yourself differently on the outside.
Being confident in your choices is often the difference between a good outfit and a disappointing one. Basically - Confidence makes an outfit.
If you happen to be self conscious about having a bag, not that you should - they’re jolly handy, try and find clothes that disguise and disrupt the outline.
A belt can often be handy for this. That way you still have a pleasant shape, but the bag is covered.

I’m a big fan of belted dresses. It’s more of a security blanket than I realise a lot of the time.
I’m not bothered if people know I have a colostomy, in fact if they’ve stood near me for longer than 5 minutes I’d have definitely told them I have one. But much like my underwear line, I don’t want the bag to show through my clothes.
Smooth lines are for aesthetics, rather than out of shame - I don’t have any. :)

Dressing up in all forms gives me pleasure. Be it me personally or my table.

*Thought I’d share a couple of table scaping dupes you might like, if you’ve caught the bug too…

Mrs Alice potted Box Ball £75

….vs…

Box ball from a local garden centre. Poplar Nurseries in Colchester - £3.99

Plant pot (which I already owned) from Neptune Colchester.

Now I absolutely love Mrs Alice products, but I can’t always afford them. If I see something that’s a good price I will buy from there. If not, I try and replicate it for less.
Also these were a great dupe…

Blue palm tree candle holder £270 from Amara

….vs….

Blue palm tree candle holder £35.99 from TK Maxx .
I love table scaping (oh really you say, you should have said!), but I don’t want to spend too much and then eat into my clothes budget.
Especially at the moment with the cost of living crisis. I appreciate I am largely untouched by this if my main concern is making a table look pretty rather than trying to put food on it. But we can all do with cutting back on things, and scaping is top of that list.

I am aware how lucky I am. That’s why I’ve decided to volunteer at a the local food bank, not just taking food to them, but going in and helping out.
People are at breaking point already.

Thankfully we’re going into the warmer weather, which for some people the cost of feeding themselves is bad enough, but come the next winter things will be even more bleak than they are right now…and that is a terrifying prospect.

Having experienced cancer, both personally and with a child who had cancer, also with a child that suffers from depression and anxiety caused by those bouts of cancer in the family, it has given me a look into a scary world. I know what it’s like to be in a dark place. I want to use my survival for more. And in some ways to help make my survival make sense to me.

My references for the food bank have been checked out, so I’m just waiting for the green light to be able to get stuck in.

So with a desire to scape but spend less, I suggested we go to a bank holiday Monday boot sale in Chelmsford, Chris and Sam we’re up for it, and Zak didn’t know what he was agreeing to but was enthusiastic about going anyway.

First off the donut stall was there so it was worth going for the dirty donuts alone!!

I bought a very happy Zak some dinosaurs for his sand pit. £10 for 12 really lovely pre played with toys.
We bought him a bucket and spade set (I made him the sand pit but forgot to get any sand toys, so he had to use a saucepan to make sand castles, or pan castles as we called them).
We bought some old cars and trucks to leave in the sandpit.
Children don’t need lots of money spent on them. They really just need someone engaged and engaging to play with, rather than the best toys from the best shops.
I bought some beautiful hand made bunting for the She Shed, some new jewellery for the shop, and bought a glass decanter, for £3.
I don’t drink, haven’t done for 5 years. I had few beautiful decanters that no longer served any useful purpose. So I filled them with washing detergent and fabric softener and stain remover.
They look rather pretty, but I dropped a lid the other day and smashed it.
So I bought a new (old) decanter at the boot sale to replace the one I broke.
The utility room is back to its gleaming glory. :)

It was a very successful boot sale trip even if I didn’t get any table decor. There’s always next time. :)

We had the most amazing weekend. Unexpected and utterly wonderful.
Milly pretty much sold out of all the wares she had taken to her craft fair too. So it was a fantastic weekend all round.
The sun shone, the kids played (the big ones and the little one), I don’t think it could have been better.
I feel very blessed and grateful right now.

*********

I mentioned a while back that we were hoping to host a family, well, we found one. We’re now in the process of filling the paperwork out for our guest to come stay with us for six months via the Homes for Ukraine scheme the government have come up with. We found a lovely lady and her baby, who wants to get away from Ukraine for a while. Most of the people I’ve spoken to want to head back home as soon as they can do so safely, but understandably want to get away from there right now.
It’s not an easy process. And as a dyslexic with a fear of paperwork and form filling, it’s not something I can readily do.
I’m so grateful to Chris for helping me at this point. I’m more of a practical person and will be able to help once our lady arrives. It’s just the getting them here in the first place that’s a bit tricky.

We’re not goody goody do gooders, we’re not in any way religious or righteous. We just happen to have experienced some intensely painful traumatic times and have chosen to channel that distress into something meaningful, something useful.
It’s a potent feeling of positivity, being able to help someone else.
It’s why I write my blog, it’s why I’ve volunteered for many different causes over the last 12 years. I’m here still when others equally deserving aren’t. I have to make it count. But more than that I want to make it count. :)