The warrior granny’s guide to living with terminal cancer
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Christine Lewis 1942-2020
Christine sadly passed away on Sunday, 6 December, at Chelsea and Westminster Hospital, with her family at her bedside. Her cancer had progressed suddenly but she was comfortable, well cared for and at peace during her final few days. The love and support of Christine’s friends, including your responses to this blog, were an enormous…
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Remembering David
27th November is David’s birthday. He would be eighty. Gwil, Larissa, Alun and I spend a very pleasant evening together and we talk to Huw on the phone. As always on David’s special days it is fish and chips for tea, and I bake a coffee and walnut cake. We watch “Kind Hearts and Coronets”,…
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“Let there be light”
An eventful week I have got my smile back, and can face the world again! Thank you, Battersea Preventive Dental Surgery. A CT scan last week was quite reassuring and my consultant is considering next steps which of course, start with another scan. I have put the lights on my little pavement Christmas tree. While…
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Make a Wish
Getting ahead for Christmas I am making an early start on the Christmas preparations while I still feel well and energetic. (I don’t know what might round the corner). Any day now, I will be putting the lights on my little tree on the pavement. “Do you like all this domestic stuff?”, Harvey asks. Well,…
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Intimations of mortality
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste ….. well. not yet ….. Christine’s latest health update We left the WG sitting on the pavement on Lavender Hill, minus her front teeth, crying her eyes out. Things are getting better, I am pleased to report. I go straight to my dental surgery, the Battersea Preventive Dental Practice,…
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Hydref. October: lengthening shadows and ghosts from the past
Dolafon The boys and I spend 3 days at Dolafon, our family house in Llanbedr. We set up the house up for winter and tidy the garden. In lovely autumn weather we visit the ancient church in the dunes at Llandanwg where David is at rest and we walk along the beach. It is beautiful,…
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September: Mellow Fruitfulness.
Damsons September is the month when I most miss Spywood, the tumbledown cottage, half-hidden in the Montgomeryshire woods that we shared with our friends the Malpas and Twyman families and where we spent many blissful holidays. In August and September there was always an abundance of fruit, bilberries on the Stiperstones, blackberries everywhere, crab apples…
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19th October: “Another character-building experience you could have done without” (Paul)
Today the sky fell in. Or rather, my front teeth fell out. I am walking up Lavender Hill carrying two bags of shopping, when I trip on the uneven pavement and fall heavily, “a real pearler” as my Ma would say. My face mask is full of blood, my teeth are on the pavement, and…
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A huge “Thank you” to my readers
I really appreciate all the warm, sympathetic and supportive responses you have sent to my blog. These are a huge source of comfort and strength to me – Thank you so much. I want to assure everyone that (apart from a short period when I was very ill and nobody seemed to care) it doesn’t…
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Hospitals and knitting
Inside the Royal Marsden 3 September: It is frightening to be referred to the specialist cancer hospital. No running away or hiding under the duvet – this is for real. I have been delivered to the door by the Charing X ambulance and Kathy is waiting for me inside. Meeting the oncologist Kathy looks relieved…