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I didn’t write last week, felt numb, in shock and not up to sitting up here in my study, let alone write. It has been a horrible start to 2018 and end to 2017. It doesn’t matter how much you expect something, it is always a shock when it happens.

2017 left us with my beloved brother Tony, taken into hospice care. I have written before about his fight against cancer, and had hoped the doctors had got it wrong. 22 years ago, Tony was given 2 years to live after being diagnosed with MID,  a disease that gives him multiple mini strokes. Thankfully they had been wrong. So why can’t they get it wrong again, this time? I hoped. But they didn’t, they were right, they gave him a year this time last year and he lost his fight on January 4th 2018. He had wanted to die at home and his daughter made sure he had his wish and brought him home on New Years Eve. I spoke with him as much as he was able to talk, every other day, then every day up until he could no longer speak, the day before he died. I think we both knew because I had said I would ring again and he told me he wasn’t very chatty. The last words he said to me were ‘Loves you’ and I said the same to him with a lump in my throat. My heart began to break.

In a state of pain and hurt for my loss and that of his children, I have and am, trying to get back on track. Tony would tell me off if he saw me today. When he first told me his diagnosis last year, I was upset and angry, ‘It’s alright’ he told me calmly but it wasn’t alright. I wasn’t alright. He had been the only constant in my life from the beginning. The one I would go to, the one I would call on and he knew he could always call on me. He phoned me a couple of months ago when he had asked his daughter if he was dying. She told me he cried. My big bear of a man, crying. That day he left a message on my answer phone, I was at the doctors I think, saying he just wanted a chat. I still have that message but can’t yet listen to it. I am finding all of this incredibly hard. Not sure how to be, how to feel. At times like this family should pull together like Tony’s family, the family he made are doing. They should comfort and support each other and share the grief of losing a much-loved brother, or at least, much-loved by me. My own birth family is a very dysfunctional family, always has been and don’t talk to me, well not directly, so this would never happen. Not that I would have expected it, even at times of great heartache, they choose to continue their vendetta against me, but more on this later.

This past week has seen David having to have a third skin cancer removed, this time from his face. I know it is only a minor operation, or was and know he will be fine but the association with cancer, hospital etc. brings me to a halt. David having Prostate cancer, my sister Georgina dying from cancer as did my closest friend Mo, have left the very word sticking in my throat. I hate cancer and everything that goes with it. The waiting, the worrying, the fear and the what ifs’. I hate, in the case of PC, the side effects and lifelong after effects of surgery. It all makes me angry, sad and  scared. To make it even harder my little dog has had surgery on a cancer and is now inoperable. Not in any pain but does have worrying days, between the normal happy ones. We worry about leaving her and she has become very clingy to me since having surgery, so we don’t leave her if we don’t have to. So Friday, having to be away from home for the whole of the day, wasn’t an option as David said. Marie, our daughter drove her dad to Swansea and I stayed at home with Ellie. It was a very long day. They checked in with me when they arrived, after surgery and before they left to come home. The house seemed strange without my husband, I think or rather know, that this is the first day I have been here ‘on the farm’, on my own. 9 years. Very odd. I knew I needed to keep busy, so wrote a blog for my family, those who loved Tony and his friends, telling of happy memories I had of him that they would not have known about. I had to try to overlay the grief with good things and so this helped me a bit. I only posted it on my page and not on my groups. David has to go back to see the consultant for the results and to have the dressing taken off and the plastics team to assess the skin graft, next Friday, again in Swansea. Marie will once again take him. She really is a good caring daughter.

The following week brings the next hurdle, the next PSA test and then, following on, will be the results of that at a meeting with the surgeon, who carried out David’s robotic operation to remove the prostate. As some of you know, these tests bring their own fears and worry. The ‘what ifs ‘ return in full force even though you try to ignore them, they are there. We will go together as we have done all through this horrible time, as it is a morning appointment and Marie will dog sit, we will go with everything crossed and a great deal of hope.

As I have said before, when PC strikes it takes no account of anything that is happening in your life at that time. For every follow-up appointment, the fear, the memories and the ‘what if’s’ rule my life.

I have been a bit selfish, haven’t been on my groups, commenting and supporting others. Couldn’t handle it with all that is going on. I am trying to be strong for my husband and my little dog. Cancer of any kind is a dirty word in our home. I know many others have it worse and I feel for them but I know that we have had our fill of pain, fear and hurt this year and it is only mid January. So sorry for those posts I have missed. I suppose in a way, the ‘nasties’ inflicted on my family, through the things done to me, are a cancer of their own in a way. Spreading, with lies and stories contaminating anyone who doesn’t know me but is told the lies about me.

One year ago, I wrote a blog on here that was commented on by my eldest daughter. The blog was telling of how she betrayed my brother and his trust in her, in the worst way possible.I was angry, hurt and ashamed. If people want you to write kindly about them, then they should behave better to you and others.  I did not allow the comments, as they showed her for what she is, nasty, vindictive, a liar all in foul language. A week ago, the day I didn’t blog, because of being so upset at losing Tony, I received a nasty comment on the same blog that I had written a year ago. I allowed this comment. Accusing me of lying, talking rubbish and lying about my youngest sister and all from someone whom I have never met. Cowardly as she used a false name and email but I now KNOW who she is. I hate cowards, if someone has something to say that they believe to be true, they should at least write in their own name. No thought for the way I was feeling, no respect for my having lost someone so dear to me, no compassion, just nasty evil lies bad mouthing me. I wouldn’t mind if what was said, was true or if she knew me or thought they were true. But no. She doesn’t know me, only heard what some else has told her. I am not concerned re the content but really don’t need this now. Why wait a year to comment on this blog? Why now when I am grief-stricken?  Because they think me vulnerable. They will know how I am hurting, both my daughter Lisa and sister ‘s, June and Trisha, know how much I loved my brother and know how I must be hurting. This comment showed me their selfishness, their lack of compassion and their cruelty. But most of all their lack of respect for Tony.

This was followed with a reply from a letter I wrote at the beginning of December to my now eldest sister June, putting it inside of a Christmas card, asking if we can get things back on track, as Tony would soon no longer be here. I felt we could help each other in our sadness and grief. My letter to her,was asking if the closeness we always shared, could be rekindled. June cannot read or write, I knew someone would read it to her, so I know someone put her up to replying in such a nasty manner. Why didn’t she reply before Christmas? Why didn’t she return my Christmas card as she did her birthday card? Why. Because the timing was right for any hurt inflicted on me, to happen now. She did not mention Tony, say how upset she was, just intent on causing me pain. Well, she needn’t have bothered, I am all hurt out now. You could, I suppose, excuse people, who try to hurt you when they are unaware of what is going on in your life, but these two acts were heartless to the extreme. I know who put June up to sending this letter and one day I hope they hurt as much as I am hurting now. Not very Christian I know but after 4 years of this, I don’t feel very Christian. I am now trusting Karma.

So January and February are bad months already, things gone and things we know are to come. Lots of worry, hurt, grief and loss bringing great sadness. The little girl in me is very evident.

I have noticed these past few months, that David has changed. In the past he has always been strong, almost dismissive of things that should have been of a concern but not now. He was anxious around this last procedure and is not the same as he usually is, today. He seems almost vulnerable, not something I have seen in him before. Marie said he was so eager to leave the hospital,  the nurse had to almost order him to stay until he had been assessed. He says it was to get back to me and the animals but I am not so sure. Tony’s death has left me reeling, it has made me more sad than I had envisaged and David has been such a comfort to me. But the last week, things that have happened have made him so angry and disgusted that I know he worries about my health and how others have rendered me so unwell. I also think that ‘here on the farm’; we are safe. It is our home, our bit of paradise, where we live out ‘our fairytale’ that makes some people in my family, jealous of what we have. It is here that he holds me when I cry, comforts me during this awful grief and loves me through all of the pain and I do the same for him. Even when some around me try their best to destroy our peace. It is where we make our memories.

I have to remind myself of my blessings. Tony used to say how lucky I am, a wonderful husband and daughter, good friends and now once again family who care. I live in the most beautiful part of Wales in a lovely house surrounded by countryside, our lake and pond and numerous wildlife. Tony never saw this house but loved our previous home, a country cottage in Monmouth and visited regularly with Lin, his wife. Yes I am lucky for all of that but most of all because I have David to share it all with. Those trying to spoil it are not important enough to impact on any of that.

I will grieve for my beloved Tony, and refuse to let those trying so hard to hurt me at this horrid time, to succeed. Everything I have I have worked hard for. Everything I am I have worked hard to be. If they don’t like it, that is their issue not mine. I know I would never have done any of the evil things they have done to me but most of all, the past week has shown me that they lack compassion, empathy and pure decency to attack anyone when that person is grieving for someone they love. Unforgivable. It says so much about them and allows me to be pleased not to be part of the family they belong to. Family doesn’t tear each other apart.

Sorry if this sounds down but grief does that. It also makes you selfish and I understand and apologise for that. ‘ Karma will see, that the people who hurt others will get their just desserts’. I am beginning to hope this is right.

Carol Ann, a ‘real woman’.

Thankyou for reading x

 

 

For the whole of my life, Tony, my beloved brother and I have been there for each other. Maybe separated by distance these past years but not in our hearts. He’s always been there for me. There are many stories I could tell you about the scrapes he got us into, the times he rushed down to me as an adult,when I needed him. The wonderful holidays he and Lin shared with us in our cottage, in Monmouth, that he so loved. So many but I will select a few that will hopefully make you smile. Those who knew him as Grand dad, ‘Ampy, Dad, will, I hope enjoy the memories that I will pour out on this page.

One of my earliest memories of being with Tony, was in our first school. He had been at a Prep school in Portchester since he was 3 years old and then onto Castle Street Primary, Portchester, where I joined him when I was five. There was a paddling pool in the grounds and in the Summer we would all take turns in dipping our feet in, under the watchful eye of a teacher. We were told by the very strict headmistress, not to go near the pool without an adult. Tony and Mickey Rushin, his close friend and our neighbor, were messing around as boys do and Tony fell in. He was seen by a teacher and taken to the head’s office. To make a point, I think; wouldn’t be allowed today but no such things a pc in those days; Tony was made to wear a dress for the rest of the day. Very embarrassed but it worked, he didn’t go near the pool again.

We were both part of an organisation called the Woodcraft’ run by a local scout leader I think. Tony and I were asked to be part of the Portchester May Queen. I was to carry the train of her gown and Tony carried the cushion with her scroll on it. After this, we had dancing around the Maypole. My brother thought it would be fun to wrap the coloured ribbons around Josephine and me so that we were tied to the maypole. The leader of this event, was not best pleased and the tangle the ribbons were in was another story. I think I was laughing but not too sure, I know Josephine’s mum wasn’t. But another day, another memory for me to keep in my heart of my mischievous brother.

 

To understand the next memory, you need to understand where Tony was in the pecking order in our home. Well, he was his mother’s ‘precious pup’ and could do no wrong. I think we all spoiled him a bit, I know I did and I waited on his every whim. If he had told me the world was flat, I would have believed him. So when, on a sunny school day, soon after I had begun school, he came over to me while I was in the dinner queue and told me it was home time, I believed him. I joined him running out of the school gate, to get the bus I thought. But no. It wasn’t home time, Tony had been told off once again in class and decided he had had enough and so, with his ‘partner in crime’, he left for the day. We walked for a while and went into a walled ‘garden’ full of fruit trees. We had missed lunch and so were both hungry. We filled ourselves with freshly picked plums, apples and pears. After a while we left the garden and both feeling a bit unwell, I remember having a horrible tummy ache and Tony holding his tummy, as we sat on the pavement on the Portchester Road. A family friend, Aunt Nappin, saw us and asked why we were not in school, quick as a flash Tony said, ‘oh we are going to the dentist’. She waved goodbye and walked on. Eventually we made our way home, only to find Mother stood by the front door, arms folded. I knew what that meant. We hadn’t bargained for the fact that Aunt Nappin had been on her way to our house and said she had seen us on our way to the dentist! We, or rather in this instance, I, was in trouble. Tony was sent to his room and I was blamed for leading him astray. Did my brother own up? I will leave you guessing.

Tony, Mickey Rushin, his sister Josephine and I, had a den, under the ground on a piece of land, opposite the White Heart shop on the Portchester Road, that is now covered in houses. We had to crawl down a kind of shaft and had made seats out of old boxes and enjoyed many a picnic. When I think now, how dangerous was that! But children don’t do ‘health and safety’ and nothing awful happened while we played there.

We lived in a bungalow in The Crossways in Portchester, Mum, Dad after he retired from the Royal Marines, my two sisters, Georgina and June, Tony and I. One evening, Dad came into the sitting room and told us to listen and identify a sound. We heard a cry and Tony said, ‘it’s a cat, you have bought us another cat’. (poppet our ginger cat had recently died). Dad laughed, ‘no not a cat’. He led Tony by the hand and I followed into the bedroom that was Mum and Dad’s, only see the source of the sound, a tiny baby girl. A sister. That then meant, Tony was the only boy in a family of five. Shortly after this we moved to Gosport and into our Nan’s. Not sure why but that’s another story for another time. I do remember top and tailing in bed with my sisters, Tony sleeping on the couch and the baby, slept in a drawer.

We used to play in a park  close to Nan’s and my favourite thing was the slide. Tony and his pals would go down the slide on a rusty bit of tin. I was quite a frail tiny child and one day, Tony had gone down but was sitting at the bottom on the tin. I was sat at the top waiting to descend. I shouted and he told me to hold on. I couldn’t, I found myself hurtling towards the aforementioned tin, held in place by my brother’s backside and yes, straight into my leg it went. On arriving home, I didn’t tell our Mother what had happened but did enjoy a trip to hospital for stitches, on the back of Dad’s motorbike. I loved that.I still have the scar and talked to Tony about this when we visited this Summer, showed him the scar and we both remembered the times we played and although he laughed, he did say he was sorry.

When he was around 10 years old and we were both at Holbrook school, he took on a paper round. The paper shop was right next door to our home. Thorne’s newsagent. The boys back then, had to go into the shop early, mark up each paper, fill up their bags and then go out and deliver them. Sometimes Tony would ask me to go in and mark the house numbers on and I never refused. Many times I went with Tony. He would sit on his bike, roll up each paper and point the house it had been ordered for. Who took the papers? Who braved the dogs? Who got soaking wet while Tony sat on his bike under a tree for shelter from the rain? Who had to run to keep up with him? Yes you have guessed, his little sister Carol Ann. If the weather was really bad, as time went on, even after he joined Bridgemary boys school, he would say he was not feeling well and couldn’t do his round. He suffered with Asthma but looking back, these occasions became numerous and he recovered very well. But only after I had said I would do the paper round for him. He did pay me though. He had 10 shillings and sixpence a week. He gave me the sixpence. Did I complain? Never.  That’s love.

We had many homes, after Nan’s, eventually living in Brewers Lane, Bridgemary. Tony joined the Royal Marine cadets. Back then, there were no such things as stay bright buttons. Every button on his uniform,had to be clean and shiny, each polished individually. I did this for him relentlessly. Every single week. His belt and cap had to be whitened with ‘Blanco’. Very messy and I did this as well. All willingly. If Tony wanted anything doing, he only had to ask. We had a very special bond and we both knew that.

Then he joined the Royals as an adult, while he was shore based close by, the ‘cleaning and polishing’ continued. He went on many tours of duty and I missed him very much and was always worried for him. One year he had been determined to spend Christmas at home but his leave was to end 23rd December. He had Mum phone in to say he was unwell and couldn’t return to base. He did have a bit of a cough, that we put down to the cigarettes. A while after this, he was sitting in the kitchen, smoking and looking forward to having a great Christmas, when I saw a Haslar Hospital medics van draw up. I went and told him. I had never seen him move so fast. Up the stairs, minus a discarded cigarette, into his bed and looking sorry for himself. The Doctor from his unit I suppose, went up only to find him short of breath and very hot. He had just run up a flight of stairs and been smoking, but the doctor was concerned and admitted him to Haslar hospital. So much for spending Christmas at home. This was actually a good thing, he was found to have TB and so spent a long time in quarantine. I remember having to gown up every time I visited, taking cream cakes for him and the other patients. Whilst there I would read poetry to a very sick young man and watch my brother, flirt outrageously with the nurse. They all loved him. He was that kind of guy.

One of the early jobs Tony had, before joining the Royals, was in a men’s outfitters, he had previously been at the Landport Drapery Store,working. I was called to this outfitters, one afternoon, Baker and Co, I think it was called in Portsmouth, I was working in Southsea at that time. Tony had been sent up into the storage loft only to tread between the boards and end up through the floor. Not really funny but as he slipped through the ceiling of the shop window, he was seen with his legs dangling around the neck of the mannequin. So it did raise a laugh for passers-by, although his inner thighs were nothing to smile about later.

As we grew older, he would tease me, about boyfriends, laugh at me in a kind way, get me into more scrapes but we loved each other dearly. When the chips were down, we were there for each other. Even if at times, he couldn’t show me, I always knew.

When our eldest sister married David, I was chief Bridesmaid and Tony was an usher. He looked very dapper in his red tie and red silk cummerbund. Tony loved his clothes. He looked very handsome and knew it.

Tony agreed to ‘give me away’ at my first wedding to Lisa’s dad, Terry Brown. He joked with Terry saying he never ‘gave anything away’ and so would have to charge. They got on well. He was married at this point to a girl I thought a lot of, his first wife Lin. She was heavily pregnant with their first son Steve. Outside of the hairdressers from where Tony collected me, on a very wet windy November 12th,1966, I was glad to see he had brought an umbrella. At first it was over him, then remembering he was a gentleman, he held it over my head. It couldn’t have rained more if we had ordered it! The wedding was blighted a bit  and part of me was very sad. As we were waiting for the car to collect us, Tony saw the tears. He reached into his pocket but didn’t have a hankie so said, ‘use your veil’. That was my brother.

There are so many more memories but need to use only a few.

Life went on, Tony and I were always in touch. After his wife sadly died, he met Lin his second wife and they went on to have 2 daughters. My nieces, Tina and Alison. Lin and I became very close  and later as the years passed, shared our love of nature, the horses and my dogs .We shared many happy times together, when the children were young,my two girls, Marie from my second husband, Lisa, Terry’s daughter, Tony, Lin and their family, the girls and Steve. Going to Leigh Park gardens etc. All of us, such happy times.

Life went on and for a few years we drifted apart, which was sad and I regret that. I missed Tony a lot and had become fond of Lin and missed them all. But after a while, life returned to ‘normal’ and I visited or we, David and I, visited them and they us, often. Always having a lot of fun and a lot of laughs. Tony and I always tried to use humour in most situations. I could tell of many of these but not today.

Tony was an outrageous flirt when younger. He was sat in a café, during our brief estrangement, down to others, and saw a lovely looking girl at the counter. He was remarking to those with him on her beautiful look when she walked up to him and said, ‘Hello Uncle Tony’. He was shocked and surprised. The beautiful girl was my youngest daughter Marie, his niece. That could have been embarrassing.

When we moved to Monmouth, I was worried we wouldn’t see him and Lin but I was so wrong. They came and stayed close to us, for many a holiday.Not in the house because of his allergy to cats. He could stay all day, or we would go sightseeing, but couldn’t stay long in the evening when the cats were indoors. I loved these holidays, I loved having Tony and Lin there,sharing my lovely country cottage. Tony also loved it and found the whole place restful and relaxing. When we visited family back in Hampshire, Lin and Tony played host and hostess to us and we had many happy times in their flat.

I remember how proud he was when I gained my Masters and how he said he could see how I could help people. When I wrote my autobiography, he again was so proud. But the time I remember most was when my children’s book Wozwell was launched. We all went into Smiths in Fareham and he took it off the shelf it shared, with Roald Dahl and Enid Blyton, telling people his sister had written the book. He almost danced out of the shop, so happy and proud. I will hold these memories forever.

Tony wanted to ride my wonderful horse, Star. I was a bit worried but he said he would really like to do this and I knew she was solid and safe and would look after him.  So we ventured into the local woods and with a great deal of help, and not elegantly, he mounted. Marie walked with them as they rode off into the ‘sunset’ as they say. On his return he was beaming. Saying it was great fun. I knew Star would keep him safe. We told him how to dismount, but did he listen? Of course not. Tony knew how to do this. Of course he did. As he begun, very unceremoniously, he slipped and fell. Not sure how but the position he found himself in was not one I had seen before. He didn’t help himself by laughing so hard. Lin and I couldn’t help him for the same reason. Eventually, after what seemed as age, he fell to the ground. Surrounded by woodland flowers and moss saying ‘Wonderful, Loved that’ through his laughter.

Whatever was happening in his own life or mine, we shared it and he would always manage to make me smile. He talked a lot of sense at times and we often gave each other advice. Whether it was taken is a different matter all together. Tony was a king of one liners. He could make you laugh even when you were at breaking point. That is why today, I need to write this blog. Thanks Tony for giving me so many memories.

So, although today is still very very hard, at a time my heart is hurting more than I can say, I needed to remember the good times, some of the fun times and also wanted to share these with family and friends. Some memories I am not ready to revisit but hope these will give you an idea of the man Tony was. The wonderful dad he was to his children and how they have dealt with everything these past few months especially, will wait for another day. These are a few of my memories that none of you will have, so I wanted to share the good times. The laughter and show his mischievous side.

Yes this is for you, our family, our friends near and far. But also for me and for my Big bear. My brother. My friend. My Tony  ‘Loves you’.xx

Thankyou for reading xx

 

 

 

This time last year my blog was sad, but determined. It told of how I wanted to stay up until midnight to watch 2016 die. Hoping that the year to follow would be better. Well that was not how life went. We had had the diagnosis of Prostate cancer before that blog and yes, I was terrified but determined to help my beloved husband through, no matter what. I am usually a strong person but haven’t felt that way during the past few years. The previous years had been horrible, courtesy of my daughter Lisa and youngest sister Trisha, of whom I have referred to in previous blogs. Do I feel guilty for doing that? No, not any more. I thought last year had seen me witness the worst things they could do, if you read back you will see the horrific cruel things that have been done to me and my family, made worse by not stopping when David was diagnosed with cancer. But the worst was yet to come, early in 2017.I had also been ‘ordered’ not to post photos of my grandchildren or children on social media, my memories and told not to ‘miss people’. Well I am human and we lose people we love and we miss people and I think it healthy to do so.

Over this Christmas period, I learned something very valuable. I promised in a blog, ‘A Different Christmas, My Choices, My New Strength’, that this year I wouldn’t waste my time missing those who were no longer in my life. This new knowledge I learned, is that I wasn’t missing who they are now, today, but what they had been to me for many years. I was missing the daughter I raised, the thoughtful, kind loving child she had been. Maybe my view of her was biased because I only remembered the good in her. Others remembered the reality. I was reminded of horrible things Lisa had done to me and others, during her life. I didn’t have to be reminded of things my youngest sister did, I knew only too well, during our growing up but knew nothing of her for 40 years, before she resurfaced with her evil influence on my daughter and her family. So this person my daughter had become, I realised, I didn’t miss because I didn’t recognize her. She often threw at me in emails that I didn’t know her. Well I think she is right. Why would I miss someone whose sole purpose these past 4 years was to hurt me? Why would I miss someone who hopes I ‘grow old on your own, alone and unloved’? So a New Year resolution, begun last blog, is that I won’t spend any time missing those who have hurt me.

A brief resume of 2017.

January last year saw us struggling to hold things together, or rather I was, David seemed fine, as I have said before, very pragmatic and took everything in his stride. I was struggling. Terrified of the ‘what ifs’. I read everything I could on PC, I wrote a blog offloading my fears and feelings every single week, the comments and support I have had has been wonderful. The worst emotion I felt throughout the year and those years before, was Fear, the ‘F’ word. At the end of January I learned to my horror that my eldest daughter had defrauded my brother who is terminally ill out of a huge amount of money. I was angry, disgusted and ashamed. But there was a positive to this, a selfish one, my whole family had been taken in by the lies told by her and my sister and now knew who the liars were.

Also in January my little dog had cancer and was taken in for surgery. The first operation was a success, the second a few months later, wasn’t. Her heart stopped under the anesthetic and so the surgery was abandoned and the cancer remains. Again fear was my companion.

February after what seemed an absolute age, David had surgery and the cancer, with a little ‘c’, was removed. I have blogged extensively about this so won’t repeat myself except to say, the waiting for me, was the worst part. The outcome? This is the ‘good’ in 2017. This is the happy, the positive, and the best! The cancer is gone.

This year has been very difficult for my son Jonathan, besieged by crippling illness, his adoptive father dying and being in constant pain. With David having cancer surgery, I was only able to see him once. Visiting him was good but feeling so helpless during this time,was not. He is recovered now thankfully and getting back to full health.

I struggled with ill-health throughout the year, it was discovered I have a blocked artery behind my clavicle that leaves me dizzy and makes the blood pressure different in both arms. Might one day have to be stented but not as yet.Marie my youngest had a hard time with a sick husband and life here on the farm was hard. We have 6 ponies and David was not able to see to them as he usually does, so a lot fell to Marie as I couldn’t help very much, but we managed.  During this year I experienced a whole spectrum of emotions that drained me and left me wanting. Something had to change.

The year went on and although hard, I made a decision to go back to my practice as a Psychotherapist. I had been wasting so much time on the things being done to me, missing people who didn’t deserve my time of day, that this, I believed was the right time. A new venture that Cardiff University had piloted and I had been part of that pilot, before the ‘nasties’ took hold, was going to begin in 2018 and I was asked to be part of it. Another positive.

August brought a clear blood test for David another reason to celebrate. It also brought slander and libel again courtesy of my eldest daughter, spreading lies on social media with a forged letter. Bad mouthing me and blackening my name.The letter was supposedly written by my ex husband, and was maligning my name to family and friends. I always doubted its authenticity, as I knew the contents to be untrue but had no proof. I do now. Why did she do this and other nasty things? I don’t know. Every ‘nasty’ she serves me with, has a new reason. This continued for a few months blighting our life here ‘on the farm’. Once again making me ill and causing pain and hurt beyond compare. David was still in recovery and to do the thing she did is unforgivable, knowing what we were going through.

I tried so hard to ignore all of this but couldn’t as it was so painful and unfair. Now, I have decided, that in the New Year, I can no longer allow this and will take the action I promised months ago. Now we are in a better place to do that.

October brought about the death of my husband’s sister which rendered him low. We couldn’t attend the funeral because we had no one to look after our animals. It had been a long time since I had seen my husband so down. We had a little quiet time here to remember her.

During all of this and other things happening, I have poured my heart out on social media and am so grateful for all the love and concern shown me. I also learned that others have suffered at the hands of ‘family’ and my heart goes out to them.

Being the partner of a PC sufferer is not easy. It is unlike other cancers in as much as it changes the whole of your life as a person, it changes your man and changes your relationship sometimes permanently. You can get through, I am hoping we have and I hope anyone reading this will also believe that there is life after PC! Life that can still be filled with love and happiness and yes, humour.

So all in all, parts of 2017 were horrible, if you have read my blog over last year you will hear my struggles, my anger and pain and most of all my fear. A very ‘tiring year’. The ‘F’ word played a huge part in the whole of this year. But it won’t in the next.

Parts of this passing year, have been so good and restored my faith in human nature, especially the groups on Facebook.

My hopes, plans and dreams for 2018.

My hopes.

Firstly more awareness of the horrid disease Prostate Cancer. I hope there will be more research and more new safe treatments. I will promote awareness as often as I can to the point of becoming a nuisance, if it helps save lives!

I hope David’s next PSA test is still undetectable and he can change to yearly tests. I hope that the groups that have helped me so much, remain strong using comfort, understanding, patience and humour to help us all through. I can’t thank you all enough. I will continue to hope that those whose diagnosis is not as good, are kept pain free and given the help and support they need at this awful time. To their wives and partners, I pray 2018 will bring you understanding, patience and the acknowledgement that you also need looking after. Always try to put yourself near the top of your priorities, if you don’t, you won’t be able to be there for your man. Let yourself feel angry. Cry when you need to. Talk to others and gain comfort. Never, never say sorry for the huge emotions you may feel on this journey none of us asked to make. It is okay, you have permission to feel emotions you didn’t know you had. Talk about them to someone who understands, if not, shout them out in capital letters on here or in the group. We all understand.

February will bring an end I hope to the nasty wicked deed done against my brother and I hope the perpetrators get what they deserve. You can’t go around doing things like that and not pay the price.

Plans

As for the nasties done to me and mine. As for the libel etc. I have to lose the fear these things gave me and act. That is all in hand now, I have the proof I need to take this further and because the libel is not just against me, ‘heads will roll’ as they say. I could leave things but I know that at any opportunity in the future, to hurt me, my daughter and sister will act and I can’t spend my life worrying about the next onslaught. ‘But she is your daughter’, I hear some say. Yes I know and I am her Mum and that hasn’t stopped the wicked acts against me and mine. I would never allow anyone else to do the things done to me over the past 4 years, get away with it. I have allowed her. But how much more should I have to take? No, people who need to know will know what she really is like, quite early on in the year. Someone or something has to stop her before things go too far. As my youngest said yesterday, ‘Wow Mum, at last the worm has turned’. Lisa tells me I am no longer her Mum, although this cut through my heart, it that gave me permission to take this further. If you think that wrong, I am sorry but I have only told a tiny bit of what she has done, on here. I was reminded by someone who knew her growing up, that she has always lied and stolen from me, I just wouldn’t accept it, so maybe she hasn’t changed at all, it is just that now I have seen it.

2017 has been unkind, hard and painful as the 3 years previously had. Realisation of the reality, re people, I loved. Accepting mortality of those I love and of myself, loss and worry just ‘got in the way’ of the year. The biggest positive is that David is now ‘cancer free’. In years gone by, PC never had patient’s ‘cancer free’ but our consultant says it happens now and I pray that it happened to us. I ‘met’ some amazing people on my groups, many braver that you might think possible. Some whose faith or religion have and is helping them through. Some whose stubbornness and pragmatism make it possible for them to cope with the illness, side effects etc. with strength and humour. Wives whose lives have been torn apart and my heart hurts for them. I sometimes say, that the before and after PC man, the man with the disease, is still the man he always was. Inside he is the man you loved before and can love again. Sadly sometimes that is not possible. But I think myself one of the lucky ones, David hasn’t changed as some men do. He didn’t have hormone treatment or medication that can change a person’s outlook, feelings etc. For all of these I know how hard 2017 must have been and still is.

In the Spring we are off an another adventure, downsizing and helping Marie with her new exciting project so keeping excitedly busy.

2018 will see me returning to writing. I have 3 books half written so I need the discipline to finish them and I will. The ‘distractions’ of 2017, the way they have left me weak and low, along with worry about my wonderful husband kept me from writing. Also my brother’s failing health and my own poor health, have made it impossible to concentrate, one of the reasons I blog. To offload and to keep my use of words, alive.

So as 2017 is drawing to a close, my thoughts are with you all. For the wider world, I hope for peace, understanding, tolerance and love. ‘Why can’t we just love one another’, I saw on a post with a child crying this out to us all. Yes, but love begins at home, with family and I know how hard that can be.

So as we turn the page on this latest chapter we don’t know what will follow. How our story will pan out. So keep the good memories close to your heart. Do what you think is right as you continue through your story. Don’t be told how to live your life, everyone has their own burdens, their own problems, only you know how to deal with them. Don’t allow bad influences from anyone, including family. Don’t waste any of the precious time you have on those intent on causing you pain. Enjoy your New Year in any way you wish as long as it hurts no one and pleases you.

For me, January will bring some pain, having to face our little dog’s cancer full on. David is having surgery on the 12^th, to remove another cancer but this one not as serious as the last.

Every year as the old year is passing, I say the New Year will bring us less pain, less worry. Do you know what? It hasn’t so far. But another thing I learned over Christmas, looking at why I keep getting hurt, why things keep going wrong, is this.

‘If you always do what you have always done, you will always get what you always got’.

How true is that? I am my own worst enemy. No I can’t stop illness affecting any of us, can’t stop death when the time comes. Can’t look ahead and divert any misfortune coming my way. But I can stop allowing the actions of others to continue to hurt me. Steal my precious time, steal my forward thinking and steal me away from those who love me ‘here on the farm’.

I am one person, with huge limitations on what I can do but I will promise to try. I am back in the bosom of some of my family and am grateful and proud to be there. I have a loving family ‘here on the farm’ and close good friends. I will try my hardest to be a better person and although some of what I will be doing in this New Year may be frowned on by some, I have to make a stand. As I said in my last blog, life will now be made of things I choose, not governed by bullying, threats or in fear of repercussions. I choose this path because I refuse others to determine how I am, how I behave. I choose to take steps to take my life back. To stop accepting from ‘family’, things I would never accept from anyone else. I choose to take control. I pray that Tony is pain-free and stays with is for a while longer. That David and Marie and her husband have good health and all of my SM friends have a better year than last year.

Happy 2018 everyone.

Thanks for reading x

We had snow this week, I so love snow, as some of you already know. The views from my windows are always amazing but in the glistening white they are breathtaking, the ponies in the paddocks playing, the frozen pond and the beautiful trees in all their wintry splendor, reminded me of why I love it here. Snow seems to cleanse the earth and in a way, I suppose, I always hope that  it will cleanse everything painful and nasty, physical and emotional. Perhaps for me it has done this, hence this blog.

Last Christmas, if you have read my blog from then, was a very scary time. David had cancer and we had no idea of the extent or the outcome. It was hard to celebrate, hard to enjoy and so we had a very quiet subdued time, here ‘on the farm’. We had begun 2017, with trepidation around treatment for his Prostate Cancer, the side effects and the outcome. This and the continuing onslaught from family had rendered me incapable of really smiling, even feeling emotions or looking ahead and enjoying life. A very hard time. Early on in the year we had found that my beloved brother had terminal lung cancer, he is now in the final stages. To my horror, in the Spring, I also discovered that he had been defrauded out of a huge amount of money by my own daughter Lisa and my sister Trisha. Disgust and anger, I was able to feel. Shame and guilt also but in this despicable act, they did me a favour. It showed those who they had lied to, about me, what they were really like, how dishonest and nasty they could be. I felt angry and sad yes, but also strangely vindicated.

This past year has brought knowledge, friendship and humour for me, from the various Prostate Cancer groups I joined. Without them this year would have been unbearable and again, I thank you all. I will take a second to say I hope Christmas is the best it can be for those still struggling, a great time for those in the survivors club and peace to those whose Christmas is blighted by this nasty illness in any way. I send love and the hugest of Christmasy hugs to you all.

Up until now, the past 4 Christmas’s have been ruined by my inability to really enjoy the festive season. To be a big part of it as I had always been. I had thrived, in the past, on all the rushing about, the Christmas gift buying, cards, decorations etc. as an adult Christmas gave me such joy, making it a wonderful time for those I love. This changed, after the lies and hatred began, the being shut out of my daughter’s life, and each year I missed my daughter so much, that it spoilt things for me. I missed having her and her family, my grandchildren in  my life and I found it hard to enjoy things without their input. Ever since first becoming a mum, this time of the year filled me with the happiness of giving, of sharing. My years with Terry, Lisa’s dad, we always had the friends who would have spent Christmas alone, round at our place for the day. I loved every minute. Then after Lisa arrived and then 5 years later, Marie, Christmas was my very favourite time of the year. I made sure all the memories of this special time of the year, were happy, ones, full of fun and love. Because  of my own childhood, it was important for me, misconceived I suppose,to give them possibly everything on their lists, sometimes too much but I enjoyed watching them open their presents and seeing the look of happiness on their beautiful little faces. I made it last as long as I possibly could.

Since David came into my life, when Lisa was around 15 and Marie 10, the magic was even stronger, he brought so much love for us all, so much fun and life was complete. Sharing all we had with my children and their subsequent partners was what families should be and ours was. He brought strength, pragmatism, fun, laughter and a silliness that I loved from the beginning. Everyday I have with him and have had for 32 years, is a blessing. He always made us all feel special, even though later in life, Lisa threw it all back in his face. Since becoming a mum, all those years ago, I looked forward to Christmas and enjoyed all the extra work, the secrecy of hiding presents, the decorating the house and the big day, up at some unearthly hour for the children to open their stockings. A magical time ,as I described last week.

But since 2013 things have changed for reasons already written about and my missing those who should have been part of our family Christmas’s, ruined it here for me. I now realise that I was selfish and unfair, I was not able to be fully present to share these times with those here who love me,because of my grief. I was not always able to be part of the festivities, the laughter and joy, that we had always shared at this time. For David, Marie and my friends, I need to get that all back. I am surrounded by love and everyday I pinch myself because my life if allowed, could be that Fairytale I wrote about last year, full of love and special times. I choose from today to get that back and make new beautiful memories that I can share whenever I want to and hold in my heart for ever.

So today is my gift to me. A different Christmas, a new way of being and a fulltime paid up member of ‘Team Wright’, here on the farm. Why waste time of those who don’t want it, deserve it or deserve to be even the tiniest of thoughts in my mind at this or any other time. I will have to think of them next year, out of choice as part of my ‘fighting back’ but not today, not this week, not any other Christmas . I am no longer wasting precious time on looking back at wishing life was different. Life is sometimes hard but it will be happy as it should be, I owe David that, I owe Marie that and I owe Carol Ann. I have been told, by Lisa, I am no longer her mum, Okay, that allows me to move on without believing I should forgive her everything wicked she has done. As her Mum, I did this, too often, now I don’t have to . So in a way, another favour gratefully received.

Today I choose to leave the ‘ positive action,’ I mentioned last week, until 2018.

My Christmas gift to my family here, is this. I am choosing not to miss those who have chosen to give me nothing but pain these past years. I choose not to wish things were different, that I wasn’t shut out of their lives. I am. Fact! And do you know what? After everything thrown at me, that’s okay.

I am choosing not to go out into my paddocks on Christmas day and allow myself, in private, the grief I felt for losing my daughter and her family, as I have done these past 4 years. But not this year, my inability in the past, to enjoy my Christmas’s, must I am sure, spoiled the day for those here, so this year it will be different. I intend to make Christmas as I always did, happy, full of joy and full of love. My real Christmas with those who want to be part of it.

I am choosing to wish a Merry Christmas, even to those who don’t deserve it and to concentrate on those here, who love me and deserve so much more than I have been giving.

Today with our tree looking beautiful, the gifts below given with love, the decorations almost finished, I looked around and smiled. Christmas is full of memories but I choose to look at the good ones, the happy ones with the people and animals who have shown me what real love is. David is well, Marie is happy and so that makes me happy too .

Today,I choose to be happy.

Christmas will still hold memories of two little girls, loved and who loved me, happy times full of laughter and fun . Yes those memories will always be there but I won’t allow them to come into my life this year unless they make me smile. Any other memories are banished. I need to gain strength to see this through and I am sure after this past year, that I can. I will be, from today a different person. I choose to be stronger and show that trying to hurt me anymore is futile. I have new armour. Armour those who hurt me have no idea of. New strength gained in the knowledge of now having the truth on my side. I will use this early in 2018.

So much has been stolen from us,  here ‘on the farm’, intruded on our peace. A cancer with a little ‘c’; bullying and lies from ‘family’ and all of this stole our joy.  Apart from the worry about my beloved brother Tony, I intend to find the joy this year, find it and keep it close for the year to come. These are my choices and I feel able to keep them in place. Yes I will remember this past year with pain at times but also with the huge relief that David is considered cancer free, we made it out the ‘other side’,what better gift could we have wanted that that.

Love makes memories. Whether the love of a child, the love of a partner or a sibling. Love makes the memories that we hold dear. The old ones will never disappear but we can choose which ones come into our minds and are allowed to linger. The rest we can push away and if necessary deal with them at another time. I intend to make happy memories to look back on, this time next year. This Christmas and every one in the future.

Not sure if I will blog next week but in case I don’t, have a happy Christmas all of you. Love those around you and hold them dear. Have fun, give love and share whatever you have that makes you happy. But most important in all, make happy memories to look back on this time next year.

Thanks for reading xx

 

 

 

 

 

After the past few weeks of hurt and anger, I promised myself I would post a positive if not poignant blog today. Not sure if I will complete it as I am not well. Have this nasty virus that is affecting so many, no voice, sore throat and chest and headaches. Apart from that, I am fine. As a little girl, I learned from a very young age that Christmas is about giving. Being treated differently from my siblings, after a while, I realised was the norm, so I began to enjoy watching them open their gifts ands share their joy. We all posted lists of things we wanted , to Santa, up the chimney and I knew only to ask for very little, that way I was not disappointed. Giving to me, has always been much more important than receiving. Today, not being well, I have begun to write my Christmas cards and have already sent gifts to those whom I won’t see.  It started me thinking of Christmas’s past, the bad and the good. I decided today, that rather than sending lists up the chimney as we did of old, to send Christmas wishes to all those I know. Writing of reminiscences and happy memories at this time of the year that I always call ‘the silly season’. So here we go.

My first Christmas wish is for my beloved David. These past few years have been horrid for him, having Prostate Cancer, then surgery and the side effects of that, he has shown courage, bravery and fortitude. He is my rock and has proved his love for me throughout all the horrors of the past few years, taken so much more than a lot of men would have taken, from those intent on causing me pain. That is because he is special. He is top of my Christmas wish list. I wish him all the love in the world, a healthy 2018 and the ability to look forward to the next adventure in our lives, come the Spring. Yes I will spoil him with gifts, some funny, some romantic and some just nice. But still having him here is the best gift of all. Life.

As a young mum, actually still to this day, on Christmas eve,I sprinkle fairy dust from the fire-place, up the stairs and into the bedrooms where the stockings will lay on Christmas morning. When the girls were small, they believed in Santa and fairies and it was a magical time. I still fill stockings, still decorate the hearth and make this time as special and magical as possible as I always did until each daughter left home, then I did and do the same for David.I still leave mince pies and carrots  out for Father Christmas and the reindeer and they always  disappear, so who knows? Maybe…..

For my youngest daughter Marie and her husband Jason, I wish them a long happy life together, good health and the warmth of my family home and Jason’s mums. I sprinkle fairy dust on their love, the sharing of which is beautifully evident, and their animals, all of them, horses, ponies and cats. I wish for my daughter, the courage always to be true to her convictions, honest in her thoughts and deeds and every bit of love from here to the moon and back.

On this day, I send Christmas wishes to my beloved brother Tony, who I am praying will see this Christmas with his family and those who love him. I know he knows how I feel but am sad that I can’t see him. As I wrapped his Christmas present to post, I suddenly realised, that it would possibly be the last time I send him one. That almost brought the tears. So my wish for him, is a lack of pain, comfort in his illness and the love that I know surrounds him from my nieces, great nieces and all of his lovely family. As a child, I was always a bit envious of my big brother, he always got everything he had put on his list and more. But the love we share makes up for those early days.

I have special Christmas wishes for my grandchildren, all of them. I shared many Christmas’s with Harrison and Jordan, their mum , my daughter Lisa and her first husband Paul and second husband Ricky. Happy fun times and I treasure them in my heart. My albums are full to the brink of photos and my heart is full of memories that will never fade. As I said last week, I still love my daughter, can’t change that and love my grandchildren including the granddaughter I don’t know, Hannah. They are always in my thoughts and I send special Christmas wishes that they are happy, safe, loved and enjoying this special time of the year. I know Lisa will hang stockings, leave out the mince pies, not sure about the fairy dust but she will, I hope, keep up the traditions I taught her, to make her children’s Christmas especially happy. As a tiny child, she was always so excited when the tree lights went on and every year when we first light our tree, I shed a few tears of sadness for what was and is no more. As the picture at the top of this blog says, ‘heartaches will be unpacked as you sift through the decorations’. Some that I have had since Lisa and Marie were children, some made by Lisa, never thrown away and will never be thrown away. I will need to learn ‘the gift of healing tears.’ My special Christmas wish, sprinkled with fairy dust, is that my eldest daughter remembers in honesty, the wonderful Christmas’s we shared when she was a child and those mentioned above. Where she learned to celebrate Christmas in the way she does, with stockings, and mince pies and fairy dust. When she played Mary in a holiday dress up day because she was not chosen at school and how this special time of the year was good, with us, her family. This is not a time for recriminations, today is about my memories and celebrating them and that is all.

For my eldest grandson, Harrison, my wish is simple. Be happy. Be honest and live your life to the full, in the knowledge that wherever you are, apart from your Mum and family with you now down in Hampshire, you have a Nan and Gramps who love you dearly and always will. That is my wish.

For my youngest grandson Jordan, I wish you the same also success in whatever you decide to do in the future. The future is yours, grab it with both hands as you have been doing earlier this year, enjoy and make memories. We love you.

For a little girl , my granddaughter Hannah, of whom I have many many photos that had adorned my kitchen and study, I wish you everything good. I wish you love, happiness and above all good health with your family there with you, my family. I think of you always.

A Christmas wish, always tinged with huge sadness and loss, is for my son Jonathan. I have no Christmas memories of him, no noisy boy running around happily opening presents, getting me up at 4 am, wanting the day to come for weeks before in his impatience. I was denied his growing up years and miss them all with every ounce of my being. But I know him now and wish him health and happiness and also peace. He has been very troubled this past year and I have done my best to comfort him. Not having your own child grow up with you is a pain nothing can heal. Each year, I buy a new Christmas ornament and that is for my son. I love him, have missed him but now have him in my life. For that I am grateful.

During this past 18 months, I have ‘met’ people on my social media groups, especially the Prostate Cancer groups, who I look on as friends. We may not ever meet but sharing the intimate details of this horrid disease, takes away any sense of strangers. For those struggling to come to terms with your diagnosis, my wish for you is that you gain comfort from all of us who post in the groups. I wish you all the gift of a swift  recovery whatever treatment you have decided upon. Those who sadly have a diagnosis that brought a terminal prognosis, at this time of the year especially, I hold you very dear to my heart, appreciating how fortunate I have been and hoping that whatever happens, you can manage to share some love with family and friends, over Christmas and into 2018. I know some of you are struggling to survive and I really don’t know what to say, except my wish for you is to gain comfort from those in the last throes of this nasty illness and whose faith in their God is helping so many. Mark Bradford is one such man. Read his blog where he shares his faith, gives love and comfort and is to be admired for his strength and grace. He also shows some humour that helps I am sure. I learned a long time ago that using humour where appropriate, is immensely useful.

I have Christmas wishes for all of those in my family who I am no longer in touch with. I wish them happiness, health, prosperity and most of all love. Always remember to tell those you care about, that you care as often as you can. Appreciate them, love them and enjoy the family who love you. Even me.

For the rest of the world, My Christmas  wish is simple. Let us all just love each other. Lose the greed, lose the need for power. Lose the envy of others. Stop hurting others. We are all in this together. One world, one people. Simple. Why can’t we just get along? Not much to ask but I am not sure Fairy dust can put this right. But at this time of the year, while we are all preparing for our Christmas’s whatever they may be like, let’s just spare a moment for those who have nothing. For the past few years, since not seeing my grandchildren for reasons explained in earlier blogs, I have bought presents for each of them and the three I can’t give, are given to children and young men who are in need and appreciative of anything.

Now for my wishes for me, Carol Ann. Not gifts, not expensive presents or clothes or jewelry but peace. I look forward to spending this time, once I feel well enough, with those I love and my animals ‘here on the farm’. But I do wish for one thing more. That my family, near and far have a wonderful time and just a for moment, my eldest daughter Lisa Jayne and maybe my eldest grandson Harrison, think of me and who I was to them in the past with love. I am still that person and I am still here. Christmas is a time for love, a time for sharing and a time for peace. So my wish for me is just that. Love and memories. No-one can steal those from you.

Thankyou for reading x

 

What is love, conditional or unconditional. A personal blog.

We love people, for what they do for us or others. So should we not ‘un love’ people for what they do to us or to others? I am beginning to think so. I spent 57 years loving the woman who gave me life, 57 years of getting nothing back and as a child, this hurts. I tried everything to have her love me and forgave her every time she showed she didn’t. The last 2 years of her life I thought she had changed, she pretended love for me whilst bad mouthing me to others. This is one kind of conditional love that is misguided on my part, the love because of who she was, my ‘mother’. That died after her death, when I discovered that she had lied and betrayed me, news happily given to me by my youngest sister Trisha, her favourite and her protégé. How many years did I waste loving her when it wasn’t deserved or I suspect even wanted. I didn’t learn.The love from and for your mother should be one of the strongest and I hope it is for most of you reading this.

Another love, that I had as a child, was my love for God, or Jesus. Love of my church, where I would escape to when life was tough. This is going to make some of you angry but as I have to write how I feel, I can’t apologise. All of my younger life I prayed to God to help me. To stop the horrors that were happening at the hands of an ‘uncle’ and to make my mother love me. He didn’t listen. But I didn’t stop that love. I religiously prayed at the side of my bed for years and years but it was futile. I am not writing any of this for your sympathy, just exploring what this thing called Love is. After losing  a baby boy, years later , my dear Dad William, said. ‘God is testing you’. He said ‘He will only give you what you are able to take. Each test you pass will show you this’. Well after the few years I have had, sorry Dad but I am all ‘tested out’. I don’t want to be tested anymore because I must keep failing. I just want to live a life without being tested with those who love me for me.

So what is this thing called Love? I hear about it. I know it myself in my own home. On my Prostate Cancer  groups I read of complete commitment, real love of women for their men in extremely difficult times. People can change under treatment for cancer and if the love between a couple has been waning, not as strong, PC can often destroy it completely. That saddens me. I also read of women at the end of their tether, not recognizing the men they married after treatment or even diagnosis, love is again tested. We need all the strength, courage and love to face this horrid illness and survive. I am lucky to have David, he is almost back to his old self and our love, already tried to the extremes is enduring, strong and true. It has passed every test sent and we are still standing close, loving and happy. I am one of the lucky ones. I wish this for all of my friends on here. But as I have said in many earlier blogs, PC changes us, this is how it has changed me and my outlook on life and love.

At this time of my life I ‘should’, a word I don’t encourage clients to use, have the love and support of my siblings. Sadly my eldest sister to whom I was close, is no longer here, I do have the love of Tony my beloved brother but he is terminally ill so I will lose that very soon. My middle sister June, has had her head filled with the circulating lies about me and is not psychologically equipped to know what is true and what are lies. I thought she knew me well enough to know the difference but it seems I was wrong. As for the baby of the family, Patricia, I hadn’t seen or heard from her for over 40 years, so we don’t know each other as who we are today, but that hasn’t stopped the lies and stories she has made up about me, being spread to anyone who will listen. I love my brother and sisters but I don’t like the youngest, one little bit. Why should I. Growing up in  a dysfunctional family like mine I should not be surprised at the family estrangement and dishonesty. Love was selective within it, as we grew up, dependent on how ‘Mother’ felt at the time; she loved my brother and sisters but not me, so they would have been affected by this. Sibling love? Sorry but not always there.

Love should be given freely for how we perceive the person and how they perceive us, it should never be given forcibly, never taken for granted and never given out of duty.

Unconditional love for your children. Now we broach an entirely different kind of love. When does this allow ‘conditions’? How many times has someone told you of really wicked treatment of a child to their mother? When questioned the person will say, ‘I can’t do anything because she is my daughter’, or ‘because he is my son?’ How much do we have to accept as mothers? How often do we have to let our children treat us badly? How often do we have to let them chip away at that love until it is gone for good?

Would you allow others to sell things that were yours and not theirs? Then do nothing? No.

I have had comments when mentioning all of this in earlier blogs , other Mums have spoken of things done to them by their children and the guilt they feel at not feeling love for that child any longer. That guilt is unfounded in my book, after the years I have had. How many times can someone use you and then you have your kindness thrown back in your face before it dawns on you that they are unworthy of your love? Does that make you wrong? Does  it make you less of a person? No. It makes you human.

Would you still love friends who betrayed and lied to you? No.

Would you still love your child if their lies have turned your grandchildren against you and your husband? No.

Would you still love someone who has cheated you out of your writing career, or tried to, by telling lies and ruining it for you, just out of spite? No of course you wouldn’t.

Would you still love people who turned others against you with horrific stories and lies that defamed you and hurt your reputation? No. So why do we let those we love do this?

If this is what unconditional love is, the rules need to be changed!

How much love does it take to keep taking the blows, the nasties etc. before we can say, enough’s enough.?

When I had my first child, my daughter Lisa Jayne, during my first marriage, I was overjoyed. She was my blessing, my life, my child. The best thing that had ever happened to me. Now life was good. As she grew she was a delight, a funny, kind loving little girl whom we all loved. As a young woman, she began to do things that hurt. She got married to her first husband of whom I was very fond, and them told me, after it was all over. There was no reason for this, I had been with her on the Tuesday excitedly,talking about the day she would marry her then fiance’. She married on the Friday of that same week.. I was mortified as were my husband and her sister. But we forgave her after a while. Over the next few years she did many things that hurt me, stole from me, lied to me but each time I forgave her. I have bailed her out as parents do, let things go that have hurt and always taken her back into my life. But I think my ‘unconditional’ must have run out, after the last 4 years of a vendetta of hatred towards me. During that time she has shown how nasty, cruel and vile she can be. How much ,like her wicked Aunt Patricia(Trisha) and her grandmother she has become. It breaks my heart. If anyone else had done to me the things she has done, I would have acted and taken things further. Why didn’t I ? Because I am her Mum. And mums don’t do that to their children, do they? But things have to change. After knowing my husband had cancer, she still did not let up, that to me, is a step too far.

As you know she has done the unforgivable to my dying brother, making these last months of life for him and his family, more painful and unhappy that they could have been. For that, ‘unconditional’ doesn’t get a look in. If I had read in the news, that a young woman had ‘conned a dying man’ out of thousands of pounds, I would certainly not have liked them, let alone loved them whoever they were. Why should I? How could I? So why should a mother’s unconditional love keep me loving someone so cruel, dishonest and without compassion?

She has told my grandsons and anyone else who she feels would be interested, that the man she was told is her father, is not her father and that as I slept around, she has no idea who he is. This is libel and I can’t let this stay around the internet, on social media, in the form she has taken on sites under her pseudonyms, any longer. She has also told then I tried to stop her adopting her little girl Hannah, I didn’t. I just told her,the truth about another child whom she was treating, in my eyes in a cruel manner. I wanted her to adopt the baby girl she was fostering but couldn’t lie on an official statement that said we were ‘very close, and that I was her ‘pivotal support’,when after my comments around the foster child, she shut me out of her life and blocked any way I had of communicating with her. That is the truth and Lisa knows this.I value my reputation and have worked hard to keep it honest and good. I begin my Professional work again tomorrow ,so have to put this evil to bed as soon as possible. I have taken enough. Three years of enough! Do I still love her? Yes. Or rather I love the child I gave birth to, the child and young woman I raised, although I failed somewhere, obviously, as she was like her sister, brought up honest, caring and kind. Marie is still a loving, straight talking, open and honest young woman who shows respect for others. As for Lisa,I love the daughter I raised, who I saw through motherhood, who gave me grandchildren. I still love that Lisa. But I don’t even like the person she is now. How could I when she is so destructive, so uncaring in what she does to others. Who lies, steals and maligns me. Why should I even consider ‘unconditional love’? Should it at least go both ways? In the past few weeks I have tried to give her a chance to make things right as I have written in earlier blogs but all I had in return were more lies and abuse. So that tact doesn’t work. I need to change.

Today after another sleepless night I decided it is time to act.

‘If you always do what you have always done. You will always get what you have always got!”

I am having to play the game their way. Not lie, I don’t mean that but to stop the bullying and the lies I have to take steps to stop this. I don’t like writing this, but telling myself this is the only way to stop them from making me ill again and to redress the things she has done to me and others I love. Maybe, like them, no holds barred. Hit them where it hurts!  Stealing my love of writing, although I worked hard to get it back, maybe I have to do similar to her, take something from her and her aunt that they love. Spoil their ‘name’ and help Karma on its way. You think that wrong? That no mother should think like this?Lisa has told the world that I am no longer her Mum. That she hates me. So now maybe I have given her reason to hate me but I have to do something. After talking to my brother today, I have to act now. For those of you who have a belief in God, the bible says ‘ An eye for an eye’. I have allowed too many ‘eyes’ being damaged so now need to fight back. As a child, as I have told you all before, I was never allowed to say ‘It’s not fair’. When David was first diagnosed with PC, I said it. Talking to Tony and knowing his suffering has been made worse by my daughter’s lies and cheating. My having put up with constant bullying and verbal wickedness for many years, afraid to open my computer in case she has verbally abused me on social media. Today I shout it from the roof tops. ‘ITS NOT FAIR’!

I have now to take a stand. I have begun, I have to. Fight back with everything I have to gain some normality and peace ‘here on the farm’.

Fo those of you who think this wrong,;either to think as I am thinking, or writing as I have written, I can only talk and act as I think right. My way. I don’t like who I have become, for today at least, but I have to stop this and stop future pain for myself and those I love. Those of you who are able to keep your ‘unconditional’ love for your child, I envy you. It means that maybe you have not suffered in the way my family have. I wish you all the very best and hope nothing like this happens to change that love for your child. I still have it for 2 of mine and they for me, but as you see, the third has wavered under the strain.

Thankyou for reading x

 

Today’s blog marks a change in content of what I write. I began my entries back in June 2016, writing for family who I know read it, who didn’t know my side of a ‘war’ I found myself an unwitting and unwilling participant of. It was the only way I could tell the truth of what had I had become part of, and of what I was being accused. It was futile back then, as I know how believable those blackening my name could be, lying and maligning me at every opportunity. For 3 years plus, I was being worn down by this evil and found myself trying to put up a defence, the only one I had was my truth, my honesty trying to withstand this cruel  vendetta based on lies from my daughter Lisa. I wasn’t ready for what came next.

August 26th 2016, our lives ‘here on the farm’ took a different turn, David was diagnosed with Prostate cancer and I began logging my journey with PC; telling you of my perception of my life and everything in it. Oh how I needed some ‘normal’ back then. I needed to see photos of nieces, nephews and family, back in my home town, on Social media as I had always done. My way of keeping in touch. But when I was finding nasty comments, swearing and lies, on my social media ,even though I had blocked those already causing me pain, I had to take all family off my pages, after explaining to them why, to keep my sanity. Social media is important to me but having abuse from all corners every time I logged on, was making me ill. So I had no choice but to take family off. I so wanted to explain to them but was afraid of any repercussions for them and for me, so didn’t. Over the next few months, I was ostracized because family were turned against me. As I have said before, I don’t blame them. They were being fed such horrendous lies by a person expert in the field of lying. My sister Trisha. Life was already painful and difficult and then my beloved David had cancer and when that hit, it left me reeling. This was far worse than anything my sister or daughter who has been brainwashed by her evil aunt, worse than anything they could send my way.

David was the ‘victim’ of this horrid disease that changed our lives forever, but I felt like I had it too. Our life together, already hurt by family, was now being threatened in a different way. One we had no control over and I was terrified. Our marriage, our relationship was and is very strong and I am grateful for that. He was the brave one. He is so pragmatic and I tried hard not to show him my fear. As I have told before in my blog, the years before cancer struck, he had stood by me, supported me and helped me put my writing career back together after my sister and daughter, with lies and deceit, threatened to take my publisher to court for something they themselves did. Publishers are renowned for being afraid of litigation so my book was taken down. I was devastated but not for long. With David’s help I found another publisher and my books are back on sale. So in the end they failed. He has spent so many nights holding me while I cried, mostly for how my daughter was changing, how easily she found it to hurt me and to lie and cheat. David has always been there for me, for my children and my family and yet these two women have treated him so badly. He is my rock and he had a life threatening illness and I was helpless to do anything to stop it. I changed my blog entries and began my Journey.

My Journey with cancer with a little ‘c’ has taught me that I am stronger than I thought. Yes I almost fell apart ,as those of you who have read from the beginning, will know. If life had been easier, kinder before it hit us, maybe I would have coped better, I don’t know. But I did cope, just. My own health has not been good for the last few years and currently I am dealing with the fallout of the emotional stress caused me by family, and have been rendered quite poorly but I will bounce back. I always do. I’m still standing as they say. It hasn’t been easy, the worry , the F word, fear but those on the same journey know how hard it can be. All of you on here, reading this, know that although PC physically attacks our men, it affects us both, bigtime. I call it the ‘Couples cancer’ because that’s what it is. We both struggle with the diagnosis, we both have to battle with the endless waiting, it may be the men who have the treatment but in our own way, we suffer to the same extent. The changes forced upon us as a couple can, for some, be too huge to accept. Our man changes, our relationship changes and so do we. But for the fortunate ones, still here, I believe we can come out of the Journey stronger. That’s what I need to tell myself, because it is true.

We are now happy in the knowledge that David’s PSA is undetectable and the surgeon tells us that the cancer has gone! I will continue to support those on here, in the groups to which I belong, those who are just beginning their journey, those in it and struggling as I did and those, sadly at the end. I will raise awareness of the importance of PSA tests being carried out early in men and help raise money for PCUK. when I can. But my blog will go back, to the reasons I began writing ,early last year, after horrible nasty comments on my pages on Mothers Day by my daughter Lisa. My way of using the written word, as well as letting family know, how life is here, for me and most importantly to help me process the many events that keep happening in my ‘ordinary life’. I am coping, with the help from David and my daughter Marie and her husband Jason. I should have a large extended family and I am sure if I did, I wouldn’t be blogging but I don’t. Lisa and Trisha made sure of that, but I am not giving up having them all back in my life now they know the truth. I should have another sister, her family, one of which is still in touch, my daughter in Hampshire and my two grandsons, Harrison and Jordan and my granddaughter Hannah. They should all be part of my life but they are not and I will deal with that. I have to remove their power to hurt me and not allow the pain in. No, life is not how I envisaged it would be, not what I wanted back in the day but this is where I am. I don’t feel sad, well not as much now, because last night I had tried to contact my grandson who is 27 and so now a man and ask him to persuade his Mum, to see sense and do the right thing, for her own sake, I don’t like the thought of her being taken to court.Only to receive many tweets of abuse over open Twitter, using the name of her dog!! Not having the courage to use her own name;still telling her libelous lies and making me realize that he is under her thumb. I feel so sorry for him and my other grandchildren. I know he didn’t make this choice, I know how nasty she can make his life so I have to accept that our relationship won’t get back on track. All of this because I wouldn’t lie for her. But I have begun to realise that you should only want those in your life who want to be there, for you and so I accept things as they are. I have 2 beautiful nieces and my beloved brother Tony. And that’s the rub. As you know he has lung cancer and is currently very poorly. None of us know how long he may have, I am praying he doesn’t leave us yet, for himself, his family and for me. He is a dad, granddad and great granddad, brother and uncle and we all love him very much .His children and grandchildren are looking after him and spending time with him and for that I am so grateful. To me, he was my only childhood ally in an otherwise hostile childhood. All of my life Tony has been there, my only constant. In adulthood, it was Tony who I would call upon before I met David. It was Tony who rushed down to Portsmouth if I needed him. I have so much to thank him for and living so far away, with poor health myself and commitments that keep me here, distance sucks!  He is my brother, my ally and my friend. Losing him will be a huge blow. But not yet.

Yesterday was David s birthday and we spent the day with our daughter and son-in-law. They came again today for Sunday lunch. I wanted it to be special and it was. I haven’t told him about Lisa’s rants yesterday and I possibly won’t. We have given Marie and Jason a gift that will help them in the future and it was good to see their happiness. So my blog will continue to tell it as it is. It will always be truthful, honest and personal, my perception, my life. I need to do this. I have to do this, write I mean, you do not have to read it. I don’t want to upset anyone, hurt anyone but will always only tell it as it happens. My blog, my life, my page. I want to thank everyone who has commented, emailed me or messaged me throughout my journey and ask you to continue if you feel you want to . So in the future, when you see my blog, please remember that although PC will be mentioned, my relationship with David will be mentioned, PC is not now the reason for the blog. I will go back to writing ‘my Journal’ warts ‘n all, for anyone interested, as I know others also struggle with what we feel is an ‘ordinary’ life. As long as you only expect the truth.

For everything that has happened, in a way I am grateful. Yesterday, the nastiness from my daughter helped me move on, make decisions about how I can put right all that she has made wrong for me and David. officially. No, my life is not how I envisaged it but it is good if I let it be. Someone told me last week, ‘Get out of your own way’. I didn’t at first understand, but today I do. I have a loving husband and friend in David, a wonderful daughter in Marie and a son-in-law of whom I am very fond. I am living in the most amazing part of West Wales and today can see the beauty out of my window, something I have not been able to see of late. I am surrounded by my lakes, ponds, ponies in their fields, ducks, and wildlife, dogs and cats. Who could want for more. Yes I will still bemoan the happenings in my world, but who doesn’t. I will still struggle at times, but today I feel I am a very lucky lady. I have so much more than little Carol Ann from her dysfunctional family would ever have dreamt of. We have worked hard for it all and will continue to work hard. Both here ‘on the farm’ and me in my Psychotherapy practice that I go back to next week. So life, bring it on!

I hope your Sunday is good and Thankyou for reading. Hopefully see some of you next week. x

 

 

In last weeks blog I was trying to say how the events of the past few years have taken their toll. How PC and family stuff has left legacies that are hard to shift. I had got into a kind of habit of worrying, being scared and now, even though I am overjoyed at David’s recovery, I can’t quite relax and feel safe in the moment. Disease can do this. Bullying can do this. Ill-health can do this so I am not really surprised at how I feel, having had all three. Not surprised but concerned.

I know only too well that PC and other cancers have and are, taking loved ones away. My beloved brother, is as we speak, fighting hard to stay with us, fighting lung cancer with all his might. I know ladies on here are, suffering pre-emptive grief, knowing the man they love will not win this horrid fight. Maybe that is part of my problem, thinking of my brother’s imminent departure and feeling the grief already. I don’t know. My heart goes out to all of you in this position today and those who have sadly been there. I won’t insult those whose husbands or partners are struggling or who have lost their men to PC, and say I know how you feel. Thankfully, I don’t. But I do know the terror of the early days, post diagnosis, when the fear took me almost to breaking point. David is my life, apart from my daughter, he is all I have. We don’t have extended family now, many have died, some, have for selfish reasons, turned their backs on us. So David is my all. Losing him would have sent me over the edge I am sure. Writing my story on here, with all its seemingly self indulgence, is my way of processing the things that scare me, those that I can’t make sense of and those that I want to tell others about so that they don’t feel alone in their own struggles. Nothing I write on here is ever meant to demean or belittle other struggles that the reader might have. I never write to hurt anyone who might be reading my blog, on any of the groups I belong to.I can only speak for me, my struggles, my truth.

What I do know is, that if the family ‘stuff’, the bullying and cowardly insults on social media and beyond had not happened, I would have been writing a completely different blog. I would have then and now, been able to cope so much better than I have done. I always did. Throughout the worries that a single mother has with 2 daughters, the financial and emotional battles I fought, ill-health etc. I coped. With everything thrown at me by ‘family, I coped, but I must admit, only just. But as I have said before, PC and other cancers don’t care about the other painful issues happening in your life, doesn’t care if you are already at rock bottom. It will still barge in and cause havoc and pain. Even if you ‘beat it’, even if you survive it will have changed you and often leave you reeling before it leaves.

Because PC does not only affect the sufferer but his wife or partner, it can change family dynamics. Often a man who has always been happy and positive, can become down and sad. In the same way this can happen to his partner. Becoming a carer to the man you married and chose to spend your life with, can sometimes seem a burden. Looking after him during the illness and any subsequent treatment can often change the way you feel about him. Most of the time this is temporary. It can be really hard to see the man you love, the man you married amidst all of the pills and treatment. If you are not careful you can lose yourself and your identity as a wife and woman and lose the relationship you once had. I have seen this with carers I work with but also seen that with the right help, this can be averted. The most important thing is to look after yourself in this process. That can be hard.

I have read on here of ladies who say they are at screaming pitch, wanting to shout and their men, even thinking about leaving them. I feel so sad and angry that a disease can do this to a couple. Again it makes me grateful that we did not get to that stage, that David is hopefully now, okay. But it doesn’t stop me feeling for those affected in this way. I hear women apologising for beginning to feel differently towards their men and that this is making them feel guilty. I don’t believe that guilt is justified and have written in earlier blogs about this. PC is a couple’s disease, it is different from most cancers, most illnesses, because the side effects involve the couple, not just the sufferer.Blog entitled (EMOTIONS I NEVER KNEW I HAD.THE WE IN PLACE OF HE) The blog talks of how the worries, the waiting and the changes, in us all, during and after this cancer, are unique. It’s very nature and the consequences of treatment make it such. It is a an illness that is physical for the man but emotionally hard for both in the relationship. As such, we as wives should give ourselves a break.

I was reminded this past week, that I need to be kinder to myself. I think every partner/wife of a man with PC should do the same. After the shock of diagnosis wears off, if it ever does, the anger sets in. The ‘why me? Why us?’ Then the sadness and the worry and apprehension, bring the ‘F’. word. Fear. All the waiting along the way, accompanied by the fear and ‘what if’s’, traumatise us, leaving us with the legacies I wrote about last week. Whether our men survive and will live many years or if the cancer metastasizes and becomes terminal, we are all on this journey none of us signed up for and it affects us all. For some of us this trauma and shock, along with whatever is going on in our emotional life, everything that life is already throwing at us, this trauma can cement the bad things into our minds. Sometimes making it hard for us to see the good things. Leaving us changed and worn down and in my case somewhat a lesser woman than I was before. As I said earlier, this is just my perspective, how I feel today.

I have read back over some of my blog entries and am shocked at some of the really black places my head visited on this journey. Shocked at the low days I experienced and am, to some extent still visiting on and off today. It is, not has been but still is, like a rollercoaster of emotions. One day I am strong, the woman I know I can be and am, when working in my professional role. I am positive, strong and can see the beauty around me. I am grateful for what I have and where I find myself. I have a wonderful husband and a beautiful caring daughter and now a new son-in-law who loves us all. I have horses and ponies, cats and dogs, ducks on my lake and I live in a beautiful house in a wonderful part of the country. I am grateful for all of this. But on other days, I am down, worried, sad and yes, scared. The ‘what ifs’ barge in uninvited, the past, few years, the wicked lies spread about me and my family by my daughter Lisa and her aunt, leave me saddened beyond words. None of it deserved but given so easily. I am still reeling from the wicked thing my daughter did to my brother at this critical time of his life, when all he did was trust her. I no longer feel her guilt as I acknowledge that she is not a child but a grown woman and is responsible for her own actions. None of any of this is down to me. So the guilt has gone but not the shame.

So back to my blog, what I promised from day one of writing, is the truth. ‘Say it as it is’ is my mantra. As long as it doesn’t offend or hurt, the truth is what you read here, on my page. I promised in the beginning and in all my works, my poetry, my books and on here, to write honestly, raw and open. It is only ever my perspective, and how I feel on the day I am writing. I could pretend on here, pretend all is well as I do ‘here on the farm’ on a daily basis. But I won’t. The whole reason for writing is to offload, to show how it really is for me, not everyone, but for me. I also write to let anyone identifying with my words, identifying themselves on their personal journey, to know they are no alone. That actually, for some of us, this is how we feel on this journey, the journey none of us signed up for , that this is the norm. Our norm. So that’s okay.

As the caption above says, it is easy to write the truth but also hard to bare your soul. I ask clients to do this all the time, during therapy. It was time I took that advice back a year or so ago. So write it all down is what I did and what I do. Warts ‘n all or it wouldn’t be the truth.

Thankyou for reading x

 

 

This past week has been full of days of worry and apprehension. One of the legacies of caring for a man with Prostate cancer is the worry that this will always be a worry. It’s like the ‘F’ word, fear, it renders you unable to allow yourself the indulgence of feeling safe. Of being able to stop the ‘what ifs’. To be able to relax in the recovery and enjoy the fact that at the moment, life is good. It’s like it’s always there, in the back and sometimes much nearer the front of your mind all the time. Even when, like today, I have tried to be happy, enjoy my family being here. It’s my birthday but even now, the nagging feeling is present in my head. This time last year I didn’t know whether this year, on our birthdays, both in November, my beloved man would still be with me. We didn’t know the extent of the cancer with a little ‘c’. We didn’t know how fate was going to treat us. We just didn’t know much. What we did know was the PC had barged into our lives, trampling over our ‘happy’ trying to destroy our peace. I know that this disease and others can leave legacies , symptoms of PTSD that can last a long time. I recognise some of the symptoms back from writing my book about my life, Remembering where these horrid feelings came from. My childhood.  Revisiting the horrors of my abuse,I began once again back then, experiencing many of the symptoms  such as Heightened startle reflex, jumping at every little sound. Ruminating, going over everything that happened and then catastrophising them. One day being happy then falling into deep depression and sadness. After the bullying from my daughter Lisa and her aunt Trisha, these came back big time. Just as I needed to be strong to fight the cancer with David, they rendered me almost unable to cope.Now, my birthday being here, my wonderful husband spoiling me along with my daughter and son-in-law and friends, life should be good. Don’t get me wrong, I am happy and so glad he has recovered so well, but a little voice inside keeps telling me not to relax, don’t take this respite for granted. Don’t get smug about your life.Then they are back. The ‘what if it comes back.’ ‘What if he is ill again’. What if, what if. Damn the what ifs!

November is a hard month but with happy parts if that makes sense. As a little girl my birthday was always a day to worry about, not one to look forward to. Not only did I get treated differently than my siblings on their day, not in a good way but life was always painful for other reasons. So my adult birthdays and those of my children and now husband, I always made a great deal of them and spoilt the person whose day it was. I married my first husband Terry, Lisa’s dad, on my 21st birthday so this, at the time was a happy. Recently, for a few years, my birthday was ruined by my daughter’s comments on my social media.At least this year, the nasties haven’t ruined my day and are leaving me alone, thank goodness. My dad, William, whose photo I placed as my profile on Facebook, had his birthday in November and so does my husband David. So it is a special month. Then of course there is so much to be thankful for. Remembrance day being the day before my birthday, Dad always made an extra effort, was always extra smart and stood wherever he was at 11am on the 11th day of the 11th month, and gave a salute. I often saw tears in his eyes for those he had as friends and those who never returned. I have always made  a point of doing the same, not the salute but always stop everything at this time. This is the first year since his death in 1985, that I have been almost glad he is no longer here. I loved him although I wasn’t born to him, he was a good dad and loved us all. He adored Lisa when she was a child and a young woman and would have been horrified to know how badly she has treated me and her uncle, assisted by her aunt. It would have broken his heart to see how these two women have turned out and how easily they both hurt others. Especially me.

This past week.

Monday was a worrying time, living so far from my brother and knowing it would be a harrowing day for him, something he doesn’t need in these last months of his life. I was concerned all day and wished I was at his side. Distance sucks.

Tuesday David had an appointment with a consultant about a small lump at the side of his nose. It is a basal cell carcinoma, throwing us back to the early days of diagnosis last year. We know it is not the same but it’s that word, ‘cancer’, sends shivers down my spine. He is being referred to another hospital, Morriston in Swansea,the one he attends for the PC, to have it removed and have plastic surgery.

Wednesday saw me unwell, giddiness and unsteadiness is back and I am always concerned that I might become ill and then can’t support and care for my family.

Thursday saw us at the vets. Cody is losing his sight and ,we found, his hearing. I know he is getting old but don’t want to face that. He is 12 years and 8 months , good they say for his breed. Ellie Mae, out little Shih Tzu who has mammary cancer, is losing weight, this can be a sign of the disease progressing. She is well but slower and they both don’t eat well so I finger feed him and then she eats. I love these pets like family and can’t imagine facing their loss.

Saturday as I was cooking dinner, my cooker went ‘Bang!’ At first I thought my birthday lunch with family would have to be postponed but then remembered, yes we had not used it for a long time, that we had a Rayburn. Easy to forget not! Stress does that, messes with your head. So although I had been thinking this week couldn’t get any worse, Bang went the cooker but crisis averted.

Throughout this past week, I haven’t slept very much. When I do I have horrendous nightmares. I dream that David is in hospital and they won’t allow him home. I fight to get him discharged only to be told, he won’t make it through the night if they do that. He desperately wants to come home but the hospital won’t let him. I am in a dilemma and because it takes so long to get  permission to have him home, I go back into his room, to find he his dead. I wake with tears streaming down my face. The other nightmare is the same or similar to one I had as a young mum. That was about having my daughter Lisa taken away from me by my ‘mother’ and my youngest sister Trisha, who always undermined me where Lisa was concerned, up until she stopped contact with us when Lisa was around 8 years old and Marie was around 3. Although no one knows why she broke contact I was relieved because of the way she was with my daughter. Now, as a Mum who knows that I have lost my daughter to her, for the wrong reasons and in a devious self-serving way on  her part, the nightmares are back. Different but back.  Maybe it is because of all the worry over the past years I don’t know. Maybe it is because PC has left me wanting, left me bereft of my life as it was. I don’t know, but they are back. Hearing in my dreams, Lisa calling out to me as I wrote in last weeks blog, and I can’t reach her, just as I couldn’t in my dreams when she was a small child, destroys me. My safe ‘here on the farm’ was stolen from me by these two women and then PC triggering all the symptoms of PTSD I had felt before.  These legacies are so hard to deal with. When awoken by the intensity of these dreams, I try not to go back to sleep in case they creep back in, so I lie awake for hours.

Last night I tried to tell myself that I am lucky. In reality and on a good day, I know that. I watched the Remembrance show on TV and felt proud to be British. Proud of my father and brother, both who saw combat in the Royal Marines. Yes today I feel relief that Dad doesn’t feel the hurt around his granddaughter but sad that she has turned into to someone I no longer can be proud of. The concert last night was as always, full of pride, bravery and people united in remembering those who died so that we could have the life we have today. I have tried every why to unite my dysfunctional family but failed.So it is time, as I know I have said before, that I step forward into a life of gratitude, happiness and love.The damage done by the disease called cancer and the cancer that is within my own family have done their best to destroy me. I am today, one year older, wiser? Not sure but older. I have to push all the negative out of my life.

We in the groups I belong to have our own fight, I have seen how good people try so hard to support those going through their own battles of PC and am immensely proud to be part of this fight, to know these brave people. This is how we should behave, helping each other as they did in both world wars. I see bravery and courage in men and their partners fighting PC. every time I look at my page. I hope, if it becomes necessary again, I can draw strength from them and be courageous in my own battles.

So yes, life continues to throw ‘stuff’ at me but I have been told, ‘you can always try to throw it back.’ So I have decided that I will.

Watch this space!

Thankyou for reading.x

 

Last week’s blog may have made some of you cross with me, the comments I received didn’t show that but today, reading it back for the first time, it was self-indulgent I suppose. I am not going to apologise because from the first blog, I have said, I will write as I feel, honest, raw and open. So I can’t apologise for my feeling that way. I still feel confused, sad and can’t summon the anger I need. Not yet.

This week we were to have travelled to Hampshire for my sister in law’s funeral. We would have seen my brother Tony and I was going to ‘drop in’ to my eldest daughter’s unannounced. That would have been interesting to say the least but I would have done it. My youngest daughter Marie was to move into our home to care for my ponies, cats and dogs and her husband was to look after their animals. Sadly, Jason, my son In law was taken ill and so Marie couldn’t leave him. We didn’t go. We both understood that illness strikes at the most inopportune times and can’t be helped. I was disappointed not to have seen Tony but know I will go down quite soon. David however surprised me by being more than disappointed, became very down and this is new to me. What this emphasized, is the one downside to living in beautiful West Wales, the distance from those we love. We never chose to move but the M.O.D. in their wisdom, moved the entire Portsmouth teams down to Bristol and David had no choice but to go. We fought it, all of us wives and families but we lost that fight. Not wanting to live in a city and having animals, horses and ponies, we chose to live just over the border in South Wales. We had 14 lovely years there and life changed drastically. I went to college then University and gained my Masters in Counselling. I wrote my autobiography and began Private Practice. When David retired, we moved over to West Wales and as they say, the rest is history.

I am not good with change, I like familiarity, people and places I know near to hand. PC brought about changes, some of which I have written in earlier blogs, so many that I couldn’t keep up. I know I changed from the day of diagnosis and am still trying to find who I am now, almost out the other side. It bestowed changes on us as a couple that we didn’t like but the alternative was unthinkable. Life changed but I still had my beloved husband. This disease, cancer with a little ’c’ has not and will not define us or beat us. But change we have. But most of what followed after the first move was the ‘Good’, from my title. Another Good that happened this week was very moving and although sad in one way, positive in another. David has never shown his feelings to others, never become emotional at TV films etc. and I am the only person in whom he confides his emotions. He openly showed his disappointment at missing his sister’s funeral. Sheila being the eldest, took on the role of ‘mum’ to the family after David’s mum’s death. I knew my husband was more upset than he had been when his brother died but was not sure why. The evening before the goodbye, he had to ring my brother-in-law and make our apologies. He was visibly moved to tears. Not like him at all. On Friday morning, while he was out with the ponies, I lit a beautiful rose candle in our sitting room, for Sheila. When he came in and we spoke about it, he cried. I felt so sad he couldn’t say goodbye but also relieved that he is now able to let his emotions show. Her death has taken its toll and took David back to his Mum’s death, both from breast cancer, I also think it reminded him of his own mortality. All of this is good. Watching TV with him since his diagnosis and more so since surgery, is enlightening. Throughout the last 3 years, he has been strong for me, holding me initially, when the things my eldest daughter Lisa and sister Trisha were doing to me, became too much to bear and I was at breaking point. He would hug me tightly while trying to make sense of things. He doesn’t know my youngest sister, had never met her in the 32 years we have been together, so she means nothing to him, but my daughter had been treated as a daughter by him since he came into our lives. But now all he can see is the damage that was being done to me and my family here, by these two, financially and emotionally, they had hurt me more than words could say. At my lowest moments from this and then PC barging into our lives, he was so brave and pragmatic about the course the cancer might take and how it would affect us both. He didn’t cry, he didn’t bemoan ‘why me’. I did. But now, he seems to have recognised his mortality, doesn’t want to waste any time on things and people who do not matter. Now, sometimes, I find myself comforting him. Holding him when I can see he is thinking of people he has lost or often of things lying ahead of us that will be sad and huge losses to come. We have elderly animals and two of them sick, these losses will be unbearable. In the past I have often felt inadequate as I am hit by the hugeness at losing a beloved pet. David again has always been very sensible and practical but I am not so sure now. He is my rock and one of the strongest men I know. I don’t see the changes in him as making him less than that but more. He no longer keeps his feelings hidden and talks more about emotions and feelings. From being a very private reticent man, he is becoming much more open and able to show how he really feels. He says now, he understand me a great deal more and can empathise with how I feel, on occasions he struggled with before. He has also developed a wonderful sense of humour, mostly to do with his private personal bodily functions. Something I struggled with at first but no longer. Humour has always been a huge part of my life, sometimes to hide fear admittedly. But David and I have always managed to smile in adversity and so can now share very funny intimate things. Again, he now has more empathy with women.

The other change in David is that he will now, ask for help. Never did, would do it himself, sometimes with difficulty and never ask for any assistance whatsoever. He has always been reluctant to get someone in to help with the fields, the gardens, the animals, saying they were his responsibility and he loved all of it. After having surgery, he had to let me do more, we had a man come in to do the garden, at first under my husband’s watchful eye. Now we have a gardener, a ‘groundsman’ and the paddocks will be cleared very soon by a couple of local men who need the work. David is still finding it hard but recognizes he now has limitations. The good if there is any, of having this nasty disease and travelling this road together. All positive. During this unwanted journey, his courage, bravery, fortitude and humour have made me so proud to be his wife. Perhaps, having PC he can now appreciate things we both took for granted. These are, the Good.

The biggest change PC has brought about and that I am still working on, is that the only people who deserve our consideration, love and time, are those who show they are in our lives because they want to be. David told me today that the only regret he has in life is that he ‘hadn’t found me sooner, so that he could love me longer’. How beautiful is that!

Now for the Bad.

During this week, there have been many good people leaving our PC groups. Some of the posts on here took on a change, that I and many others, did not like or want. Some left for other reasons than the one I am talking about, because they did not agree with some postings on here. I have to admit to commenting and giving my opinion on one of the posts, because the whole reason for social media is to share ideas, topics, and opinions. Whilst I did not like the original post or the photo attached, I admire anyone who is now back to the life they had before PC.I am very happy for them as I am with David getting back to normal. I just didn’t need to see the photo posted. We all have the right to comment and freedom of speech, as a writer, is something I hold very dear. But photos that could upset others, I am not in favour of so I posted my comments, my opinion. Not rudely, not angry, just how I felt. Others became angry, some were very upset and I understand that, and it got out of hand and that makes me very sad. The groups on here are for support. That means supporting each other, not judging, not getting angry but being supportive. But as human beings first, and group members second, we will often have differing opinions, religious beliefs etc. We are all here for the same reason and perhaps we need to remember that at times. Me included. But I am sad because we have lost some good members and I would love them to come back. If controversial posts appear, I will have to scroll by as was suggested, I don’t want anyone else to leave this very important group. Without the men and women on social media, in the groups I belong to, these past years would have been unbearable. Make us smile, make us laugh, send in funny photos, give us uplifting news. Please keep these groups together, we all need them.

The other Bad is that I have read of many who have not survived the onslaught that is PC and my heart goes out to their families and friends. Reading of those struggling and seeing their bravery and courage uplifts me and gets me thinking that maybe having their kind of faith is the way to go. Been there before and lost faith. Maybe it is time to revisit that part of my life. Not sure yet. Maybe I can turn that into a Good.

The other bad about PC is the ‘F’ word. The fear it leaves us with. I have read that a man is never cured of PC. I won’t believe this. Naive? Maybe but I need to think positive or I can’t survive this. Many posts this week have said that no one is ever cured, even if ‘undetectable’. I disagree. I must have read everything ever written about cancer and it can be cured. We are cured. I will keep telling, myself and David this until or if, I have reason not to. I have to believe this or the fear of the ‘what ifs’ will return. The other change is how association is blotting my brain. Any new pain, ache, feeling David has brings the worry back again. Not only in our lives but that of people and animals we love. My little dog has cancer. Before David having it, I would have been very sad but would have been very sensible and not worried every-time she coughs or doesn’t eat. But now I hold my breath, wondering if this is the beginning of the end for her. As some of you know, my brother Tony is dying of lung cancer. He rings me now and again and that makes me feel so good. But now, if I see his number come up on my phone, I immediately fear the worst. My apprehension has been quadrupled by PC. A Bad.

Now for the Ugly.

Over the past weeks, I have been looking at photos, letters etc. reminiscing and holding on to the life I used to have. Bad thing to do in the circumstances. One of these memories was a photograph of my eldest daughter and her family on holiday in Tenerife. She looked so happy and the boys were loving it. She rang me a few times whilst there. When they came home and visited, her husband told us of a journey by jeep they took up into the mountains. There was a sheer drop one side and Lisa was scared and called out for me. Her Mum. Natural? Yes. I had always been there for her and she for me. It was the natural thing for a daughter to do when afraid. Now, we have no contact, her choice. There is a family matter that means she is having to face up to something she has done that was bad and yes, an ugly deed. What she has done, hurting my brother in the way that she has, I can’t be there for her even if I had wanted to be. I can’t help her. In any other circumstance, as a good Mum, I would have wanted to be at her side. Wanted to have been there for her and comforted her. But not this time. But I know, if she had not changed into the person she is now, she would not have put herself in this position. Change in this case is ugly. The beautiful girl she was has changed into someone I no longer recognise. Change is not always good.

In life, we think of cancer as always being negative and of course it is but sometimes the changes thrust upon us, if not immediately looking positive, can be. I have seen the vulnerable soft side of the man I married and I like it. Didn’t show because of anything good but because PC changes us in ways we don’t expect. It brings us changes that at first can only be negative and unwanted. It showers us with tiny subtle changes at first but them a deluge of things in our life change and the storm batters us into somewhat unrecognizable forms of ourselves. But we can retrieve the good from the bad. We can salvage positive from the Ugly and become better people from the journey. Some who read my blog have commented on my being strong. I am not. As you can see if you read right through from the beginning, I have been pushed to the points of despair with this nasty disease but somehow, always bounce back. Not the same as before, not always as the same person but bounce back I do.

I see the good in most people and I hope, they see it in me. I now also can see the bad in people, and situations especially if they do harm to me, or those I love. Now, I have been made to see the Ugly but I am still here. Change is growth so they say. Maybe that is right. Maybe it isn’t. I certainly am not the person who started out on this journey and who really, as most of us, didn’t want to be here. So, I will in the future, try to embrace anything that is different about my man, the people around me and the life I live. The seasons have moved on, Autumn is here and the silly season that is Christmas is almost knocking on our door. Try and remember that sometimes change can be for the better. As long as it is a change for the good.

Thank you for reading. x