Monday… wet, wet, wet!

Well after writing the blog up on Friday, I ended up going out for a pub lunch again!

The steak and ale pie, washed down with a pint of bitter and, as it was someone’s birthday, a glass of champagne, was very enjoyable!

So there are definite signs that my sense of taste might be showing some recovery. It is really odd, of the 5 recognised taste senses (sweet, bitter, sour, salt and savoury) the one most affected is my ability to taste sweet things, followed by salt and savoury. Consequently things that I expect to taste bitter (like beer!) taste fine, but things that don’t have that component either taste odd, very bland or just unpleasant. The oddest things are chocolate and honey, both of which have sweet and bitter components, but I can only taste the bitterness! Fizzy drinks can be strange too because while artificial sweetners like aspartame have always tasted bitter to me – even under normal circumstances – any hint of them now really affects me. Unfortunately some normally sweetened drinks contain artificial sweeteners, so they are off the menu too.

As for the rest of the weekend, after Friday’s sun Saturday was wet and cold, which was a pity as we have some runner beans to plant out. Sunday started cold but dry, but the sun came out mid-morning, middle daughter cut the grass (thank you!) while I did a load of ironing – and we still didn’t get the beans planted! However I did enjoy roast beef last night (more evidence of the returning sense of taste?) with a glass or two of red wine!

This morning also started wet – the skies were really dark and thundery half an hour ago, but seem brighter now.

On the health front the GvHd seems to be calming down. My skin is still very dry, itchy and flaky, but not as bad has it has been, and the cracks and fissures on my fingers are starting to heal. However my legs and feet are suffering the same sort of thing, so walking can be a bit uncomfortable – I feel a bit like Hans Christian Andersons “Little Mermaid” for whom every step on land felt like walking on knives! (For those of you who don’t know the real version, you can read the story here). Still they will heal in time too!

Next event on the social calendar is the review with Linny at Guy’s on Wednesday – perhaps all will become clear about the radiotherapy – I’ll post more then!

2 Responses to “Monday… wet, wet, wet!”

  1. Stephen Benson on 09 May 2006 at 6:58 pm #

    All you seem to do is drink! Perhaps it eases the itching.

  2. Peter on 09 May 2006 at 7:07 pm #

    Well my consultant is always telling me I must drink more… 🙂