Began my chemotherapy at Cookridge on Wednesday. It was a very long day indeed leaving the house at 8.30 and not getting home until 7.30. Not just the traffic, I had to spend virtually the whole day on drips in what will be the longest session I have there because I was given two of the drugs and a flush between them. I take the third in tablet form. I am not on the permanent line they were talking about in Halifax. Rather pleased about that.
None of it was an ordeal other than the drive and one of the side effects of the drug oxaliplatin which I had been well advised about and which started literally the minute I left the hospital. It’s called peripheral neuropathy. The nerves react to cold by tingling and electric type shocks. From now on I must be like a Victorian lady and never go out without gloves which I must also use whenever I remove something from the fridge. For example it doesn’t feel cold to me in my bedroom at the moment but as I am typing this I feel it starting up prompted by the colder air I presume.
But in spite of all this I was really taken by the the way I was treated on the ward. The atmosphere was completely different from Halifax. If there were any copies of “Hello” magazine around I didn’t see them. D, the nurse who was responsible for my care was an American from New Jersey. She’s in her early 30’s I would guess, very intelligent and wanting to train as a clinical psychologist. We had all sorts of interesting discussions throughout the day & she was a star at getting the cannula in my dreadful fragile, slippy veins.
The other patients were also very easy to spend time with. Experiences in Halifax have made me forget just how intelligent working class women can be. One even linked the growth in cancer to Chernobyl. In Halifax none of the other patients would have heard of it. The woman in the next bed had colorectal cancer too which had returned after 4 years to two other places and so is like mine inoperable. Even though she was diagnosed earlier than me it’s still come back.
Everyone was so friendly. They were all interested in why I was coming so far & when I said I found Halifax depressing two of them said that people there said it had always had a reputation for being “clannish” and unfriendly. There was quite a sense of camaraderie & I felt yet again how much more at home I feel in a cosmopolitan place like Leeds. I have of course noticed this before, how genuinely friendly Leeds and Bradford people are, especially by comparison to Halifax.
Chris didn’t stay with me the whole time but popped in and out throughout the day. He is also very impressed by the different atmosphere and commented that the nurses seemed far more relaxed and approachable there. But he says he would welcome any suggestions for finding the best route, ie with the least traffic. We’ve already tried several routes but around Leeds especially the traffic doesn’t seem to move.