Pheeewwweeeeeeeee!

Confused about the title of this post? Well, it's the sound of me heaving a huge sigh of relief, after holding my breath for the last week. Yes, folks, it's good news: I am officially cancer-free.

It may have been apparent from my last blog that we were worried about the hole in my neck. Not just us, though: the medical professionals were sufficiently concerned that they arranged a CT scan, and frowned a lot when examining me. When Charlie the registrar shook his head and said to me, "it looks suspicious" and "healthy skin doesn't behave like that", what I was hearing was, "you're going to die".

Well, I'm not going to die, at least for a while yet. The scan has confirmed that there is no cancer in my mouth or chest. Great news. I've been cautious about saying this, but I'm finally coming to the view that maybe everything's going to be alright.

So what's the latest on the hole in my chin? On the basis that every silver lining has a cloud, all is not completely well there. The old wound has indeed opened up, and it goes all the way through from the underside of my chin into my mouth. There's no infection, or anything nasty there, fortunately. The short term implication of this is that I've been prescribed some drugs to dry up my saliva, as the wound needs to be dry in order to heal. The real sting in the tail is that I'm nil-by-mouth for another two weeks at least: i.e. until 29 December; i.e. no eating or drinking over Christmas. Bang goes my dream of a glass of Champagne on Christmas Day. Oh well, maybe New Years Eve.

But it would be churlish of me to go into a sulk over an inconvenience for a couple of weeks, when the main news is so overwhelmingly positive. It will be a Happy Christmas, because I'm still here, and - relatively - healthy.

Here are ten songs about my feeling of relief.

1. Everything's Gonna Be Alright - PP Arnold
2. I Think It's Gonna Work Out Fine - Ike & Tina Turner
3. Walking Back To Happiness - Helen Shapiro
4. Feelin' Good - Nina Simone
5. Everybody's Gonna Be Happy - The Kinks
6. Everything Will Be Alright - The Killers
7. Happiness Is Here - Tobi Lark
8. I'm So Thankful - The Ikettes
9. Get Happy - Judy Garland
10. When You're Smiling - Louis Armstrong

Sweet relief!

RP