Crosby steals Nash and Young. The police have been called.

As promised, here is a catch up. Warning, most of this is a Grump A Thon.

All links to other pages are in blue.

My last post about my condition was over a year ago. The reasons that I have not posted since then are twofold. First, I cannot get my brain to work well enough to write a blog and second, not a lot has changed. I am still a Tamoximoron.
Tamoxifen is still messing me up and I am not sure if my continued lack of tolerance and mood swings are down to the medication or getting old, but I am fed up with it . Maybe being fed up with it  is what makes me lack tolerance and my mood swings. It’s a thorny issue.

One of the many effects from taking Tamoxifen is that my motor skills can sometimes go haywire. Most noticeably on a keyboard. I am also having trouble noticing spelling mistakes and I often write capitals in the wrong place.
I now cannot spell ‘because’ for example without the aid of spell checker. I have no idea why this happens or many of the other side effects like fatigue, dizziness , memory loss (sometimes I can forget what I was saying a few seconds before), random aches and pains oh and memory lost ( I am sure I have done that gag before)  and a massive lack of concentration. I can now only read with complete silence, which is sad because I love to read . I almost feel like Burgess Meredith in that episode of The Twilight Zone
This is of interest regarding Men and the taking of Tamoxifen .

Still, mustn’t grumble. Oh hang on. I must!

 

A packet of the bastards last night, just after it laughed in my face

I have also developed  Liver Spots on my feet . Well, I say spots, but they have covered most of both my feet and are making their way up both my legs. Where will they stop??

As I mentioned in the post from the other week , I got married last year and went on honeymoon to Rhodes. We had a fantastic time, but (Grumpy Alert again) I realised, when I was by the pool,that I was not keen to show off the scar on my chest. Stupid really, but it became an issue. I was concerned as to what other people would think, which is not really me. I refused to take off my shirt until I saw a fella with massive changing pigmentation on his upper body and I thought that if he could walk around topless , then so could I .Thanks mate, whoever you are. Although I shall call you Terry for the purposes of this blog. Thanks Tel.

Relax guys He is married

 

Anyway, I better stop the grumpiness now.

Some positive news ahoy!

I am proud that I am still connected to Breast Cancer Care

I was also chosen to help publicise the BCC’s campaign ‘Pass It On’ at Wembley with Queen of the Selfies Jill Padayachee who Raised £1260 for BCC through her pink pout selfie campaign and inspirational Sky News sports presenter Jacquie Beltrao both of whom have survived the bastard disease.

 

Jill, Jacquie  and me. I am trying hard but failing to breathe in. I begged for another angle, but to no avail

 And I have recently joined the Male Breast Cancer Coalition

‘The Male Breast Cancer Coalition (MBCC) is a collection of male survivor journeys and various medical professionals coming together to bring awareness’ and is based in the United States and they are spreading the awareness further afield. I am honoured (or should that be honored?) to have have become involved with them. There are more groups and pages  springing up on social media about MBC, which is encouraging.

http://malebreastcancercoalition.org/Survivor%20Stories/doug-harper/

And a few weeks ago, I was contacted by Kerry Quincey a PhD student at De Montfort University, regarding a research study she’s conducting into men’s experiences of living with and beyond breast cancer. We spoke via Skype for well over two hours and I was surprised at how rewarding it was for me personally. I showed Kerry 15 photographs that I had chosen from my BC experience and spoke about them. I found out things about the experience that I did not realise before. That was not the object of the exercise, but I felt enlightened. I am looking forward to reading the transcript. I reckon there are a couple of songs in there.

 

Research on men with breast cancer is also pretty rare although  in 2012 more men died of Breast Cancer than of Testicular Cancer, even though the incidences of Testicular Cancer are far, far greater so if any MBC chaps are interested in taking part , then contact Kerry from the details below.

Steve White And The Protest Family have recorded the song that I have mentioned a few times on here Never Mind Your Bollocks , about checking your man boobs and is on our album . The aptly titled This Band Is Sick.

 

I think that is it for now, except to say that we have lost a few more people to this bastard disease since I posted in June 2014. So please check ya bits lads and lasses.

 

Love peace and caaaaake!

 

Doug

xx