In Kalmar town

Sorry I have not updated my blog so much recently. I will get better I promise.
Today Jayne and Leah left to go back to England. They have stayed here in Sweden for 10 days and it has gone by so quickly. I gave them a lift to the train station this morning at 8.00. Their flight leaves from Gothenburg (Gbg). I wish that I would have had more energy, then I would have gone with them to show them around there. Years ago I had a boyfriend in Gbg , so I know my way around that city. It’s a beautiful city that I would not mind living in some day.
After I dropped the girls off at the train station, I went to Ida´s and made pancakes. Then I went to have a bath at my moms.

On Sunday my energy level was very low. Mike was working, so I and Jayne just relaxed all day. We went for a short walk with the dog but that was it.

Yesterday Jayne, Leah and I went to Kalmar to have a stroll around town. Neither of us had any money to spend to we were only window shopping. We ate lunch at McDonalds. It was a nice and sunny day. In the evening me and Jayne cooked a nice dinner and saw the film “Grown-ups”, it was funny.

Me and Leah next to the fountain at the square
Me and Jayne at the harbour

At the square in Kalmar

Kalmar castle

Great news!

I have great news to tell; the scan showed that the tumors have shrunk with 75% which is really good! I am so happy :)
I can not believe that I now have had 5 out of 8 treatments already. Time has flown past so fast.
I had my 5:th treatment on Thursday and Jayne came with me.
On Wednesday I took Jayne and Leah around town in Nybro. We had some lunch in Dolce Vita and went into some of the shops. I took my car for a motor vehicle inspection but unfortunately I did not pass. I have to fix a break pipe and the “spindellederna” (wishbones?) which will be quite expensive.
Yesterday Jayne made me pancakes for breakfast and later she went out for a dinner party + “Milles Place” so me and Mike made some yummy nachos and watched a film. Mike is working extra this weekend.
Today we made a BBQ for Carls 40:th b-day. It was raining but we still managed to cook the meat. We had to eat inside though, but it was nice. We had apple pie with ice-cream for dessert. Jayne and I watched “I am Legend” and now I am soon off to bed. I just have to take care of my Countryville (Facebook) farm first, hehe.

Hospital and motorcross

Today I went to the hospital and had some bloodtests and a X-ray scan done. This scan will show if the tumour has got any smaller or not. I am a bit nervous about it. The result will be told to me on Thursday.
After that we celebrated Carls 40:th birtday with some home made cake (me and Jayne baked) and later a trip to the motorcross track to watch Mike and Carl go riding.

Jayne is here :)

Carl, Jayne and Leah
Leah, Jayne and me

On Saturday Carl´s sister Jayne and his daughter Leah came over from England. They are here for a 10 day holiday. Jayne is staying with me and Mike in the house.
Yesterday me and Jayne went out for a walk to the lake with the dog, while we were out it started to rain. We got soaked…haha. We also went to town to go food shopping and to go on the sunbeds. In the evening we made a roast Sunday dinner and after we eaten we went out in-line skating in Örsjö.

Today me, Carl, Jayne and Leah drove over to Öland. First stop was "Slottsruinen" the old castle. Then we walked around in Borgholm and we had some nice lunch at “Robinsson Cruise” restaurant. We also got some ice-cream. It was very warm and sunny in Borgholm (as always). On the way back we stopped at Ekerums Konstmuseum to have a look at Kjell Engmans (designer for Kosta Boda) exhibition of art and glass sculptures. It was a nice day.

Now we are chilling while Mike is cutting the grass. Later we will make some dinner and perhaps watch a film. I am very tired because I did not go to sleep until 3.00 in the morning. I stayed up last night watching “Seven pounds” and “Crossing Over” and another film too. They are two really great films.

Busy two days

Before

Almost finished
Now


I have been busy these past two days. Yesterday I did not stop all day. My mission was to finish painting the balcony and I managed. It looks a lot better now than before. I did also cut the grass and replanted some plants and flowers.
Today I have been out on a bicycle ride and I also went to see my mom. Now I am going to make dinner for Mike and Jayne (Carls sister) that came over from England today. She will stay with us for a while now :) Perhaps we will have a glass o red wine too. Yumm!

Before


Painting


Now

My wigs

Wig nr 1

Wig nr 2


"Boldie"

Normal


Finally I have decided what wigs to get. I am happy with the result. I dont have to start wearing them yet but maybe later or whenever I feel like it :)

Feed your cat some grass!

Our cats; Cairo, Gypsey, Tequila and Wilda

Lately I have mostly written about myself and my illness in my blog. I feel like I have "forgotten" about the cats. They are a big part of my life and they are purrrfect :) company for me at home when Mike is working.
I just want to make sure that whoever reads this that has got a cat or more should really feed your cat some grass once in a while. It will stop them from eating your plants at home and is good for their little stomachs. I fed mine this morning.

Some cat owners make the mistake of preventing their cat from eating grass. There are various reasons for this, one being that they think it makes their cat ill or upsets their stomach. This is an incorrect assumption and in fact the eating of grass followed by regurgitation is a perfectly natural behavior for all cats.

The habit of eating grass triggers the natural process of regurgitation of indigestible foods including its own fur balls which would otherwise obstruct the system. This can appear to us humans as if the cat is being violently ill but this is not the case and in fact is very beneficial to the cat.

Halfway through chemotherapy

I have now had 4 treatments out of 8. I am halfway through it!
This needs to be celebrated. I had a glass of red wine yesterday and I had a glass of white wine today :) so nice. It is the first alcoholic drink I have had in 8 weeks.
Now I am going to watch “Worst-Case Scenario” with Bear Grylls. Brilliant show.

Yesterday
Today

Longing back to Ayia Napa

It is still crap weather here in Sweden. The rain is hanging in the air, its cloudy and the air is really thick. Days like these are so boring and I keep longing for a holiday. Because I am sick I am not allowed to travel. My economy does not allow me either...I spoke to Försäkringskassan yesterday. I have not received any sick pay now for two months and I am totally broke. They said that I am now under investigation so they are going to figure out how much money I will get. Hopefully it won’t take much longer now. I have bills to pay the same as everyone else.
To “get away” from the boring weather and my non existing economy I live on my memories from sunny holidays in the past. I have been lucky enough to go on many.

I have been to: (only sunny holidays included)
Gran Canaria (lived and worked for 2 yrs)
Teneriffe (twice)
Dominican Republic
Vietnam
Thailand (for 9 weeks)
Greece (Kos)
Mallorca (Magaluf)
Cyprus (Ayia Napa)

The one holiday out of them all that I do miss most right now is Ayia Napa, Cyprus. Me and Mike lived and worked there for 4 months in the summer of 2004. At this time last year in August, me and the girls went there for a holiday and it was brilliant! We had so much fun, the weather was great and I miss it a lot.
So, on rainy, boring days like today, I think back at the good times we had there and just wish that I could turn back the time.





This song was played all the time at the clubs, and it was true. Every night was a good night!

Rainy Day

Today I got up at 5.15. I have been in stomach pain all night and all day yesterday as well :( I will have to call the doctor later to see if he/she can prescribe me something.
So far I have met 3 different doctors on my treatments at the hospital and I will meet yet another one at my next appointment. I don’t know if it is a good or a bad thing.
The weather today here in the south of Sweden is crap. It is raining, windy and cloudy. Not that I have the energy to do anything anyway, but it is still boring weather. But I guess then in a way I do not have to feel that bad for staying indoors. Therefore I will now put the TV on, hopefully I will find a good film :)

4:th treatment of Chemotherapy

Oh, so adorable! I have just held a little 2.5 weeks old kitten in my hands. My neighbor Tina has got some cute little kittens. I think that kittens are the cutest things in the whole world.
Today I do not feel that great. I feel sick, but the medicine for it helps me quite a lot. I have not yet vomited since I started the treatments. I thought that I most definitely would, but so far I have managed not to witch I am very glad for.
I have no plans for today more than relaxing on the sofa in front of facebook/countrylife and the tv.
I just finished reading the book “Handdockan” by Inger Frimansson. It was good. I can recommend it. Now I have started on “Nobels testamente” by Liza Marklund. If I feel better later I might take Jimmy (dog) out for a walk in the forest.

Yesterday I went to Kalmar to see my friend Ida.A. We rented a film “Green Zone” with Matt Damon. We were mostly sat talking and eating snacks so I don’t know if the film was any good or not, hehe. But Matt was cute though :)

On Thursday I had my 4:th treatment of Chemotherapy. Mike came with me and my mom came later as well. It was the same as always, but this time I did not get to see the doctor. When I got home I slept for 3 hrs.
I really want to go on a holiday and forget about being sick for a while.

I wish I was back on this beach in Thailand right now!

I´ve got more energy now :)

On Saturday evening Susan came to see me. We had some dinner together (mackerel and salad) then we made blueberry muffins. Around 22.00 she went home. It was nice to see her again.

On Sunday it was raining the whole day so we did not do much. Carl was here, but he and Mike were just playing Playstation all day. I was doing some laundry and cleaned up a bit more in the basement. I have now 5 boxes of stuff that I will give to a second hand shop. At least we went to the recycling center with a lot of rubbish. I am such a recycling freak, I have to recycle everything. I guess it is because we were seriously informed about the environment issue in school like 15 yrs ago, it is stuck in my brain forever :)
In the evening we watched a film called “Kidnapped”. It involved the horrible and unfortunately very common kidnapping situations in Colombia. In Columbia one person is kidnapped every 3 hrs and in 1 case of 10 the person does not make it back alive. So if you are traveling to Colombia, be aware!
I felt the energy bubbling up inside of me so at 1.30 in the morning I had to go out for a 30 minutes walk. It was so nice to be out when a whole village is asleep.

Yesterday I felt great so me and Mike (He has one week holiday from work now) went to the dump with some stuff that’s been sat in the garden and the basement for quite a while. Things like old sinks, bricks, rubbish and 3 televisions have now finally been thrown away. I really want the garden and the area around the house to look nice now. It has been too much renovation materials etc lying around outside making the place looking like shit. I even bought some flower and plant to put outside.
I went to see Ida for a while afterwards. Mike took Atlas for a walk.
Later we had to take Cairo-cat to the vet because she has got an infection in the eye. 550 kronor it cost (50£) just for the vet to take a look and spend 3 minutes with the cat. Grrr...
It is crazy how much energy I have got now. I went out for a long walk around 22.00 and did sit-ups and some boxing when I got home. Great! I finally get to use my boxing-bag and my sit-up bench, hehe.

Today I got up early to go to the local clinic for my blood tests. It went fine this time. At 11.00 I went to the hairdressers to get my wig. I tried out another one that fitted better than the other two. Mike was with me and he thought that it looked great. I don’t know if I like it or not though. When I wear it, it just feels so strange and I think it looks a lot like a wig, not real hair. I guess it will take some time to get use to it. I am not ready to put a picture up on it yet.
After getting some take away sushi I went to see Ida again today. We played cards as usual and Mike took Atlas (dog) out for a walk because her back hurts. When I came home I cleaned the house out and my cousin Erika and family came for a visit around 19.00. Nice :)
Soon Mike is coming back from riding cross and he is bringing a pizza with him home, yumm, yumm.

Tomorrow I am going to continue the painting. At the moment we are fixing up the balcony. Hopefully Mike will cut the grass and clean all the windows in the house, they are really dirty.
I just realized that I still have not put any pictures up on the bathroom that I “renovated” in the basement. It looks so much better now and some day soon I will put the pictures up. I just have to put the carpet in first.

Fixing up the house

These last few days I have been feeling a bit better. A lot of hair is falling off though. My meeting with the hairdresser went ok. I will get my wig on Tuesday next week :)
It is quite annoying when the hair falls off so I made Sofie cut it shorter for me. When it is shorter it is not as bad, but it still feels a bit nasty, especially in the shower.

Me with short hair
On Thursday and Friday I have been busy fixing up the inside of the house. Carl has been here to help out. We have been painting walls inside and outside, putting pictures and shelves up on the wall etc. It all makes the house more like a home. There is still a bit to do inside and a lot outside. But we will get there someday.

Carl painted the walls
I painted the mirror and the bookshelf

Yesterday evening I had the girls coming over. I made a taco pie with salad. We had a few games of cards and drank some wine. I gave them a lift home around 0.00. It was a really pleasant evening.


Today I have been at Ida’s for a while. We walked her dog Atlas for an hour and played some cards.
At 19.00 Susan is coming over. We will make some dinner and just relax.

Side effects of chemotherapy

It is now time to sell my beloved car. She has been by my side for nearly 4 years and it breaks my heart to sell her. I put the ad up on www.blocket.se on Saturday and I am now waiting for someone to show their interest.


I have not been feeling very well since Friday, so I have not been up to much. I have mostly just been on the couch watching TV and some good films. I saw “Snabba Cash” on Saturday, it was a really great film. Also “From Paris with Love” (John Travolta) was good.
I have finished one book and have now started on another by Inger Frimansson “Handdockan”. The genre is psychological thriller which I like a lot.
The most energetic that I have been is that I have walked the dog for a few times, but that is it. I just don’t have the energy to do anything.
I feel the side effects from the chemotherapy in my body. I am really tired (in my body), it hurts all over, the taste in my mouth is awful, I feel sick, I am constipated and I have also started to loose my hair now. Every morning when I brush my hair a lot of hair falls out. Tomorrow I have another meeting at the hairdresser.

I just finished putting some old pictures from Gran Canaria (2001-2003) up on Facebook. I miss the lifestyle that I had out there sometimes. In the daytime you could go to the beach, go shopping, or do whatever you wanted. In the evenings we went to restaurants and later working in the bar. Drinking and having fun ALL the time. I got to know so many friends there. It was amazing and I am so glad that I was brave enough to leave Sweden all by myself to go and experience something different.

In the bar at Scandic, Playa del Inglés