Till Death Do Us Part
21/10/24 13:23
My husband died less than four months later.
Today, October 21, 2024, marks the one-year anniversary of his death.
Read More…
Sitting with Fear
17/06/23 13:32
Twice, I’ve leapt walls trying to save my kitten and my dog from stranger’s Rottweilers.
As a young teenager, walking into a mall with my mum, a sad man whispered what he’d like to do with me while passing and I spun round and spat in his face. He might have intended to shock me but judging from his face, with my spittle dripping, I think he was more shocked.
At 50 I flew for three days (cheapest route) from Barbados to Rishikesh, India to stay for two months in a place where I knew no one. I rented a scooter rode into the unknown and hiked up mountains for hours. On my own, barefoot.
If anything fear has been good to me and given me the adrenaline to respond quickly and strongly (which is what it’s meant to do, at its best).
Last week Monday we had the relieving news that my husband’s CT Scan one month after his last round of treatment showed no cancer. It was the best news in over a year. Five days later, because the CT scan showing lung damage, the pulmonologist advised she couldn’t rule out this damage to be cancer. He needed a lung biopsy the next morning.
Sunday I was paralysed with fear. We didn’t share this news with anyone as we didn’t want our adult children, who live in London, to worry — and we expected the results to come back benign.
Read More…
Me, Too
27/04/23 07:56
The monk leaned over and whispered in his ear, “Me, too.”
Isn’t it wonderful how we all have the same emotions?
Our situations may differ but our emotions are the same.
Read More…
Patterns and Habits
10/03/23 10:48
“How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives” - Annie Dillard
I’m lucky in that I’ve never suffered with clinical depression. I have bouts of feeling low or down but rarely have they lasted longer than a day. The last six months have been a real challenge though. There have been days when the dream world was my only happy escape and I honestly didn’t wish to wake up (or would try my hardest to go back to sleep when I did).
I was existing while the days passed by. Occupying myself with caring for my husband. who had complications after major surgery to remove cancer from his body. Distracting myself by listening to the hum or the beeps of the pump feeding machine, the only way he was fed for five or six weeks, remembering to change or clean the feeding bags.
Read More…
Practising the art of inactivity
07/02/23 14:38
At a fortuitous meeting, an exceptional doctor suggested to my husband that he should “practice the art of inactivity.” My husband, who is trying to overcome post-surgery complications after the removal of a tumour in his oesophagus, has not eaten anything since 15 January. He is fed by stomach tube and is attached to a feeding pump for 19 hours a day. He is now trying to tolerate 15 mls of liquid every 15 minutes without coughing. Read More…