The End?

Am I tempting fate with the title 'The End'? I wasn't sure if it was right or even appropriate to make that call but it is the end now and any fears or doubts I have about the future aren't dependent on the words I use.

My treatment is all over and I have disappearing physical reminders of what I've been through. My thumb nails, which were fashionably dark blue / black are now a tobacco yellow across the tips as my body literally grows out of the chemo. My big toe nails which I almost lost but determinedly stuck back down with nail varnish are now also growing back properly.

Things are about as normal as they ever going to be. I have hair now rather than fluff, it's not quite how it was and I definitely can't tie it in an elastic band but it is very soft and smooth like an animal pelt and I am fascinated by the colour, a bit like a brillo pad without the pink. I'm leaving it as it is, it's enough of a surprise to see it on my head each morning without messing about with hair dyes. Using shampoo and conditioner still feels novel and seeing those two bottles back in the bathroom makes me smile.

Radiotherapy was nothing to write home about so for ages I didn't. No needles, no injections, no sickness or pain, well, no pain to start with. The only thing this treatment had in common with chemo was the level of care I received, wonderful staff who did everything they could to make me feel comfortable. I practically danced in and out of hospital every day, every day for five weeks. It felt so good not to be carrying on down the corridor to the chemo ward and stopping instead in the huge waiting hall, waving at the lovely receptionists who smiled and waved back, their acknowledgement at our arrival meaning we didn't have to queue and could sit straight down. Radiotherapy felt like I had graduated, at least it did in the beginning. It did take it's toll like all treatments, five weeks up and down the A3 every single days was tiring, and eventually the radiation did start to burn. However, like chemo it's only fair that I demystify this treatment as well.

The objective of radiotherapy is to zap you with rays which deter anything bad (cancer) from returning to base camp. You walk through a series of corridors which have reinforced steel walls to keep the rays contained - powerful and dangerous stuff - to then arrive in the room with this huge machine which is waiting for you, and a team of two radiographers. Then you have to lie half naked on a metal bed as still as you can while everyone leaves the room to avoid being.....well contaminated I guess. Reassuring eh? I soon learnt to wear a vest top with no bra every visit, this meant I could walk from the corner of the room to the table in the centre, clothed and with my dignity briefly intact. Then I needed to lie down on the bed where I would shimmy the vest down to waist level exposing my top half. If I was in the mood and depending on who was there I would sing the theme tune to The Stripper while releasing my breasticles, it helped release the tension too, a bit of humour goes a long way.

The machine was a huge half polo shaped metal head on a mechanical arm which rotated above and around my left side as I was radiated. It usually took several minutes and I spent the time staring at the picture projected onto the ceiling which was there to relax or distract,  praying the itch on my nose or the cramp in my raised left arm would disappear.

On one occasion I was left for a worryingly long time, and nothing happened, the machine moved slightly and then stopped. Eventually the Aussie Radiologist came in, adjusted the controls and told me that sometimes the machine sticks and they had had a few problems with it. Right... I must have looked a bit shocked, and she immediately said:  'Oh no worries, it's never actually fallen on anyone' then she paused briefly, looked at me and said 'Only the once, a coupla' years back but we managed to lift it off, so no harm done'. Then off she went while a tonnage of metal moved in and out and over me zapping me with it's usefully lethal rays. The Aussie lass must have realised that maybe she hadn't chosen her moment very well because when she came back in to release me a few minutes later she was very apologetic, 'I didn't mean to scare you, I'm so so sorry' she said, 'Not a problem' I said, smiling at her 'But your timing was ever so slightly off'.

Like I said, I liked them all in that place, top people.

So it would seem this is it, the good and the bad, the rough and the smooth, almost one year since my diagnosis and I'm done. Having been a patient for the best part of nearly ten months it seems the one thing having cancer has done is make me more patient. When talking to some people I have heard comments such as 'You're over it now though aren't you? It's all done isn't it?' I smile happily and put to the back of my mind the appointments I have ahead of me and will have over the next ten years. When I'm told how lucky I am that a) It was breast cancer I had or b) I should be grateful to cancer because it made me slow down and re-evaluate my life or c) That I didn't die...yes someone actually said that, I nod in agreement because I now understand that you cannot change what people say but you can change how you react.

In reality then they are the ones who should be grateful to cancer otherwise my reaction could have been considerably more violent.

There is a really bright spot in all of this, following on from a published article in the Huffington Post http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/martina-gruppo/cancer-patient_b_7948824.html I have also been asked to write an article for the gorgeous glossy magazine http://www.sussexstyle.co.uk/ for their breast cancer issue in October and they have shown huge faith in me by asking me to join them as a potential monthly columnist as their magazine grows from a free publication to a paid for one available from September.

Something other than cancer to write about? How refreshing... how very dream come true.