A passionate traveller turning into a cancer fighter
I spontaneously decided to write this blog part, as I have the feeling my recent posts are not exactly showing how I am really doing. Too many questions have come up from friends and family who live far away and do not see me frequently.
So what has really changed for me? Well things have turned a bit differently since I have started with the new pills. Before the new therapy I was pretty independent, I hardly had any back pain and I was able to play a bit of tennis and golf.
Our Mozambique trips have been the best holidays of my life and I totally fell in love with this country: probably because it is a mixture of African and Portuguese culture. Their mentality has something in common with the Spanish and Italians, and I immediately I felt connected to the people there.
We have been 3 times in Mozambique, each time for 1 week during New Year’s Eve period in the following years: 1999/2000, 2000/01 & 2002/03.
My story here is about the adventures and highlights I have experienced during these 3 trips, and what made them so memorable.
It’s been a while since I have updated my blog, and I would like to apologize to those who keep asking me when the next one would be published. After my holidays in the Maldives, I changed into my research mode, as things didn’t happen as planned.
I mentioned in one of my last blogs “No bad news at last” that the CT-scan wasn’t too bad, and I left for my holidays with the impression that the latest chemo did sort of help. Upon my return however, I was informed that two lung metastases did grow a bit as my scan was analyzed more in detail whilst I was gone. Even my blood platelets count had the tendency of picking up, they still remained quite low, which was a sign that my spinal marrow had gotten highly damaged by the many chemotherapies I had undergone in the past few years. The risk would be too high if my blood cells may not recover at all at some point. Hence no more chemotherapy for me!
I am now sitting in my garden in Germany, enjoying the sun and going through my African memories. Since I got ill I keep looking back on the things I have done, going through my amazing travels memories, and South Africa is the one that keeps coming up in my mind the most. Probably because I haven’t been there in 7 years and I am starting to have withdrawal symptoms. But I guess it is also because I have been in touch lately with all my South Africans friends who keep praying for my health and keep asking me when I will be returning for a visit. As mentioned in my previous blog “Africa – Love at first sight”, I would like to share a few of those childhood memories and I begin with during our Transkei holiday in 1998.
I have been contemplating for a while if this blog should be a travel journey story, and I have decided not to do so. What to write after spending 10 amazing days in the Maldives? How beautiful the beaches and waters are? What an amazing resort I have stayed in? Well, I don’t think this would be very interesting to read and anyway pictures and videos give a much better insight to what heaven on earth is like!
But what I guess is more interesting for you to read is how I coped walking on sand, and what a life changing experience this has been for me. It’s not the fact of having spent a holiday in the Maldives (yeah, who doesn’t dream to visit one of those islands at least once in a lifetime), but it helped me to overcome my “weaker self”.
Almost a month has passed by since my latest treatment updates and I can finally say things have sort of paid off. I don’t have good news, but no bad news either. So let me tell you what has happened in the past 4 weeks.
I have done 2 cycles of chemotherapy, which means I have done 2 times of 4 days with a break of 21 days in between. Additionally within 3 weeks I have done 13 irradiation sessions on the spine and 8 sessions on the two big lung metastases. Surprisingly, I had no side effects throughout the entire 4 weeks, besides some crazy low blood values. As we had expected my white blood cells were low for a few days, but this time I had low hemoglobin, in short HB, and platelets values.
I have decided to tell you a bit about the various challenges I have faced since my illness, as bureaucracy in most countries can be insane and extreme.
If you think the illness itself is the biggest challenge, you are wrong! It is actually the entire paper work involved in the process for insurance companies and citizen centers. I totally underestimated this part and I am so thankful I got my parent’s help with all this.
So let me tell you a bit about my experiences…
Most of you know about my love (actually my family’s love) for Africa, and for many of you isn’t a surprise looking at my blog website having an African touch. It is said that once you are “infected” with the “African fever” you will remain infected and return to that continent constantly.
I woke up this morning thinking about the things I have been doing over the past years, and the things I haven’t been able to do since I got sick.
It is incredible how much such an illness affects your day-to-day life, and how you suddenly have to adapt with the situation.
I would simply like to share a few thoughts that came into my mind in the past two years, and perhaps someone who may be in a similar situation or may understand what I am trying to say.
Besides all my day hospital stays, the treatments I am undergoing and fighting for my life, I have learnt to enjoy life to the fullest and make the most out of it. To get a change of scenery and start ticking off some points on my bucket list, my mum arranged tickets to watch the last Italian league soccer match of Juventus in Torino.
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