
My garden early this morning – the tranquillity is healing
The clips are out! I am on one crutch! I can walk to the shops! I have been to the cinema! I have turned the corner…
Mind you my bum/thigh looks like a Kim Kardashian special. Hope it’s not permanent or I will be lop-sided!

Kim Kardashian or jamon Iberico?
That is not to say that the last two weeks have been easy-peasy. They have not! First the excruciating pain continued for at least 10 days, nothing, not even oxycontin (a secret stash from my sarcoma treatment), helped.

Many hours spent thus
Then the wound oozed continually, necessitating a couple of dressing changes. Enter UCLH wound nurse specialist Lucy who kept me sane and reassured me during this period that I was doing well and all was normal (infection is the danger). No District Nurse or any other support on offer. I can’t imagine what it would be like to be old and unsure of what to do, lacking in mobility – or money – to get to the GP or hospital.
Then suddenly the day before the clips are due out, the pain changes into a dull ache and I feel much more mobile (I have of course been religiously doing all the exercises).
So here I am today 14 days on, feeling more sprightly despite the continuing ache, especially at night (still have to sleep on my back) and the torture of pressure stockings for another fortnight. Yesterday two and a half hours at the hospital for Lucy to reassuringly remove the clips, before having a session with the physio, so I am armed with a new set of exercises. I have hydrotherapy to look forward to, and I am starting acupuncture again next week.
Supporting me through this I have had a bevy of girlfriends – Cousin Christine, Saint Cindy, Dr Mandy, Catherine P and Lucille all cooking, chatting and staying as required. You certainly need someone with you for the first 10-14 days to help with the stockings, cook and carry. Not forgetting Pickle, the guardian of the wound…In case you ask, Ross has been working away during the week but he puts in the weekend roster.
The physio asked me what my health objectives were. ‘To be skiing by January, scuba diving next summer but first of all to get on that plane to Barbados at the end of August for a week of aqua therapy.’ Bring it on!

Pickle, the sentinel
August 5, 2017 at 8:34 am
Reblogged this on healthy living with cancer and commented:
Again, two-for-the-price-of-one: my post-op progress report
August 5, 2017 at 11:59 am
Glad to see you’re on the mend Vicky! Keep on being positive- it’s the best medicine!
Love John & Nada x
August 5, 2017 at 12:00 pm
Thanks!
August 5, 2017 at 2:52 pm
What a wonderful, spirited recovery you are making Vicky, with Pickle and the girls, then Ross on the weekends. An inspiration to others as to how to heal and the collective effort it takes.You’ll be on that plane to Barbados in a flash. Well done xxx C and JB
August 5, 2017 at 3:09 pm
Thank you dear Clare…its been rather a tough two weeks but the only way is up….
August 7, 2017 at 2:49 am
Good on you Vicky and year of ’57 made up of strong spirits. I am researching Pacific Hibiscus and very interested in your pink Hibiscus photo from Sulawesi ….can you let me know where you took this photo and if you have any more? with kind regards, Dr Lex Thomson, University of Sunshine Coast, Qld, Australia
August 7, 2017 at 8:15 am
Thank you. cCan you tell me which blog it was? Either Bunaken or Lembeh? Lembeh I think at Black Sands Divers Resort, I checked the blog I thought most likely.
August 8, 2017 at 12:38 pm
Great news Vicky!
❤😘😻
Masses of love from
Jules x
August 8, 2017 at 12:59 pm
Hope you are doing better yourself. Will email you…Vx