sleeping badly

This last week I have been sleeping badly. I wake up at three or four o'clock and can't get back to sleep. Or, at least, I doze and snap awake and doze and snap awake again... for an hour or two.

Tonight is worse. I doze for just half an hour -- then snap awake. And lie there, mind churning, not feeling remotely sleepy. It's because I'm worried.

Not worried about not sleeping! Worried about things that keep my mind churning and keep me awake.

I'm worried about tomorrow's MRI scan. Scared, in fact. Next week I will find out, has the cancer reappeared? Doesn't matter how well I think I'm coping, the thought of a new tumour scares me. I'm not ready! I haven't even cleared the junk out of my study!

The thought of death scares me. But not as much as the thought of dying with so much not yet done. No, not a bucket list. It's just that there's so much that I need to do to prepare Deb for life after my death. So much that I have not yet done -- because I don't yet have the feeling that death is "imminent". But what if it is? What if this next scan shows that my life expectancy has just dropped to weeks? I'm not ready!

I'm scared that the scan will show signs of impending doom... But then, that will mean that I definitely do not have time to do all that I should... So no use in rushing. And that could be something to be glad about :-)

Another worry is the kitchen cupboard. Eh?! No, not a cancer problem. But it did keep me awake for several nights.

Our gas cooktop stopped working. So we buy a new one. Which is slightly higher. So our rangehood is now too low to be legal. So we get a new rangehood. Except that it needs to be set higher, to be clear of the new cooktop. So we need to raise the lower shelf of a kitchen cupboard. Which is a good, solid affair which has lasted 30 years. And cannot easily be either raised or removed. So we will probably need to replace a row of three connected cupboards. Which will put a new, mismatched set of cupboards into the kitchen. Which will clash and -- being modern -- not last as long as the existing cupboards... And so on.

How best to deal with the kitchen cupboard? That has kept me awake for several nights. Though not tonight because I think we're making progress.

There's a fun run on Sunday. Normally, I read as much as is available about "on the day" at a fun run. This one, I have entered, that's all. Plus, my training runs have only been for half the fun run distance. Could be a worry, running the full distance on Sunday.

And the fun run starts in the city. Where the City to Surf started, last year. That's the run where I crashed out and woke up in ED. I've done one fun run since then, no worries. This will be a fun run which starts -- as did the C2S -- in the city. Another associative bridge to be crossed. You can be certain that I will be doing my VSE on Sunday: making sure that I am fully aware of where I am, what I am doing...

I will also -- before going back to bed tonight -- read the website to see what the arrangements are for the day of the race. To get a feeling that at least I am just a little bit prepared!

Oh, and I really need new running shoes. The laces are unbreakable but several of the holes for laces have ripped. No, not cheap shoes -- but cheap design, no eyelets. I hope they will hold together for the Sunday run... Or, perhaps, I will wear my second-favourite shoes. Yes, that seems like a more sensible -- less worrying -- option.

Remember the tingling that I get on the soles of my feet? It's a known but unexplained side-effect of cancer. Or of cancer treatment. My feet tingle, regularly. It's no great worry.

Tonight, the left side of my face starts to tingle. I'm lying in bed, tingling... Then pulling faces and feeling, are both sides of my face moving equally? Afraid -- though not really believing -- that brain damage may have caused a stroke. When I come downstairs I repeat the face-pulling in front of a mirror...

Both sides of my face move equally. Both sides of my body move equally. The tingling has gone now, almost entirely. After a short burst of sole-of-feet tingling. Another mysterious, idiopathic side-effect of something. But not, as far as I can tell, a stroke :-)

Wow! am I beginning to catastrophise! Mostly, a flow-on from the fear of the results of tomorrow's scan. As far as I can tell.

I'll be glad when I get the results. That will be sometime next week. I'll be glad to stop worrying. Or, at least, to know what I am worrying about! Right now, I'm afraid of something over which I have no control. And which may not happen. Next week I will find out whether I really need to worry... or whether I can put off my worries for the three months till my next scan.

And now, I'll look at the fun run website. Read all about it. Then I can at least knock one worry off my worry list :-) (a bit later: Okay, done that. And it's familiar, I did read it earlier. Just forgot what I had read :-)

Time to get back to bed. To sleep!

Dr Nick Lethbridge / Consulting Dexitroboper

...        Agamedes Consulting / Problems ? Solved

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"I know so little that it astonishes me how many people know even less." … per Ginger Meggs

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