Hello ....

Hi there everyone,

I am enjoying my post chemo days ..... and getting back to feeling better each day .

It has been a wonderful but sometimes tricky transition because once you finish chemo whilst the body feels much better the brain can start playing tricks in terms of anxiety and worry......will it come back , will I be OK, how much time do I have, what about my kids ????etc etc .....I am sure you can imagine the general theme.

So I have been off to a 3 day meditation retreat and had a wonderful session with a doctor that specialises in this kind of thing. Basically the advise is ... face your emotions such as fear, grief , anger and just acknowledge its OK to feel that way .... sit with it through meditation and allow myself to feel these emotions without being critical or trying to control them. So far this advise has been fantastic and working well.

The other important advise which I think is very true, although once again not always easy to adopt, is that the timing of all our deaths are unknown .... No one really knows how long they will live because it is out of our control.

So for a confirmed control freak like myself it is actually liberating to leave that to the Lord/ Higher Being/ Unconditional Love/ Nature/ you can fill in the blanks .... and accept that there are many many people who shouldn't be alive today who are and vice versa many people who should have lived who are gone ... What doyou think???I'd be interested in your thoughts.

I am enjoying spending time with the kids and Greg is enjoying my improved cooking .......given that I have all day to think of something to cook. No more excuses. I even ironed a couple of his shirts the other day for the fist time in about 25 years!!! Oh dear I have turned into the little house wife after all this time!! To tell you the truth I love it ....

We are all off on our wonderful Queensland holiday in about 2 weeks and Danny is all ready counting down the "school days" left till we go.

Its pretty exciting and I can't wait.

SO I am in good spirits and enjoying life .........especially walking my little doggies through the parkland's and gradually catching up with friends.

Love to you all

Pauline

Finished!!

Hello everyone,

I am so happy to be finished with chemo and to have my life back to normal again.

I practically skipped out of the day chemo unit last Friday and have had a beautiful week off without thinking about fronting up for another round.

the last 18 weeks have been very difficult for Greg and Bridget and Danny and of course yours truly but it is lovely to have finished and to have had the great support of all our family and friends.

So thank you everyone from the bottom of my heart.

I am off to a 3 day meditation retreat tomorrow at the Gawler foundation so as usual I leave with mixed feelings (should I go?What about the kids? How will they manage?) and will hopefully return inspired and more geared up for daily meditation.

I am still very tired but I think that is pretty normal and it will take awhile to get back to a normal sleeping pattern. I am well and truly back on the healthy diet and all the vitamins and minerals so I hope they are doing some good. Haven't even looked at a licorice strap for over a week!!! I think I am cured of my chemo induced junk food phase!!

Treated myself to a front row seat at King Lear last week and loved every minute of it (well OK 3 hours was a wee bit long but I only nodded off for a minute in the endless sub plot bits!!)

Looking forward to holidays in September....Mermaid Beach here we come.

Love to you all.

Pauline