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One of the many advantages of having had cancer is that you get regular check ups to make sure it's not come back. Those check ups, of course can also reveal other stuff that you might not have noticed was wrong, nice and early so you get a chance to do something about it.
As with my last check up in November when my oncologist noticed my white blood count was low. This can happen for a variety of reasons, so nobody was too worried about it, but I'd go in for blood tests every month or so to see if it was getting better or worse.
Having seen how fast things go when the NHS thinks you might have cancer, I was somewhat reassured when my next haematology phone call will be on June 2nd. They did say the test results would take three weeks and that if there was anything concerning that my appointment might be changed.
It's been nearly five weeks now and I've not heard anything, so that's probably good news, but these days you have to take into account the pressures on the NHS, so there's the possibility that results have gone missing or got sent to the wrong place.
It's sort of crazy that I am taking no news as being good news. It isn't any kind of solution. And it's reliant on the NHS knowing what they're doing (I have to say that so far they have proven themselves to be excellent in my experience).
Obviously I am keen to know why my white blood cells are slacking off. On the last phone call my oncologist told me to try to avoid injuring myself as my blood will not be as good at clotting as it should be. Even when I have a full compliment of white blood cells I do make an effort not to injure myself. Loads of white blood cells don't make me blase. I don't think, I'll chuck myself off this cliff because it won't matter if I get hurt as my blood will clot efficiently.
Having been through a more serious medical emergency, it's obviously a little nerve wracking to have something else going on. I don't feel ill. My blood still seems to clot when I have minor bumps or scratches. I am a bit tired, but that's been going on for eleven years (wish I could work out the cause of that).
The part of this that I don't really want to face up to is that I am 59 this year and this kind of stuff is just going to be the background (and then foreground) of the rest of my life, however long that might be. If you talk to anyone my age and ask them how they are, you are unlikely to get a "really well" and instead there will be a list of aches and pills and maybe worse.
I am not bloodist, but I always preferred by red blood cells anyway. Is it not normal to be a bit suspicious of white blood cells. Blood is red, not white. Who are these white blood cells, coming over here, fighting our infections and clotting our blood? I am no doctor, but it seems to me we'd all be better off with no white blood cells at all. Let's make blood red again.
Anyway fingers crossed that whatever this might be is a passing thing or easily treatable. Or that it's so serious that I can do a show and a book about my struggle and monetise this thing and maybe get on the Traitors if they're ever doing a series dedicated to people who don't have enough white blood cells. If nothing else hopefully the government will give me some Mexico zipline money. Though if I fall off then I could be in big trouble.
So many bits of my body seem to be trying to kill me, even though that will mean their own death. That's OK when you can just snip the thing off and chuck it in the bin, but I guess ultimately if my blood wants me dead then I might need to get all my blood syphoned out of me and replaced by someone else's blood, like a lazy vampire.
There's the title for the show and book. Fingers crossed. I am running out of testicle money now.
Tickets are now available for my 2026 Edinburgh Fringe run of RHLSTP (I will also be doing a couple of extra gigs at another venue in the early evening - more news soon).
Book here.
Or catch them all with (the some would think essential) visuals on
my brilliant Youtube channel. It's ad free (though one bloke in the comments insists he is getting ads on my stuff - let me know if that's happening to you and I will look into it).
