The Cancer Chronicles – Page 3

#48 Windows

Windows. I’m gunna talk about windows for a bit.

Before I get into it though, let’s look through the rectangle window and what do we see? What we don’t see is the kiss a son just gave his Mama after taking her for a drive.

We look through windows and most open and shut. Our little issue with windows right now though is that my first wife’s window of health is getting shorter and shorter and it’s a dirty fucking cunt of a window to be honest.

I started this particular blog well over a month ago and have struggled big time with it. It may feel a little disjointed as I couldn’t get the original draft out way back when, so apologies if it comes across too long and clunky.

Somewhere amongst the disjointed-ness we did manage a high school graduation dinner recently.

We may or may not be laughing at the fact a Winslow graduated high school

Chemo obviously helps fight cancer and shit but like I tell our kids, every action has a reaction and the same can be said about Chernobyl Day. The good that comes from chemo goes hand in hand with the bad as Marjana feels like shit for a while after.

Initially, it wasn’t too bad but as time’s ticked away over the last year or so, the effects have worsened and with that the window of being healthy enough to do shit seems to be closing more and more.

About six weeks ago for example, my poor little cancer riddled first wife felt like shit and had temperatures before her last Chernobyl Day. We even got a growling for not going to hospital the night before when she had a temperature.

She was healthy enough that they still gave her chemo on the Wednesday and it went ok. Back on Friday to get the chemo bottle detached and all good. Come Monday though, she was back to shaking like an earthquake with shivers and the loudest clattering teeth I’ve ever seen. Seriously man, I thought she was going to snap a couple of teeth, it was that bad. Was like those chomping chattery teeth toys but with a whole head and body attached.

Spoke to our oncologist who I’m not allowed to call a gnome even though he looks like one and he told us to attend Mater Private Emergency. A $400 privilege, most of which we got back from Medicare because Marjana’s reached the yearly threshold. There’s a positive right. Spend untold on health so you get reimbursed more when you spend even more. Being sick ain’t cheap. Fact.

We got to meet a hot young nurse and there in stops the compliments for her. She was a real ruthless impolite bitch neither of us wish to deal with ever again. Her and her fake eyebrows all but scraped the remains of my snorer’s brains out during a Covid swab. Apart from her though, all other medical staff were very nice and professional… almost like real life doctors and nurses and not pretty little girls pretending to be one.

I worked that Monday and didn’t get home from hospital until about 2.30am so was a little rooted for work Tuesday. I really am blessed that my bosses are good cunts and have had our back from day one. Seriously man, it makes so much difference.

They found a room for my cook in the ward and done so many tests, it reminded me of the French nuclear testing at Mururoa Atoll… but they couldn’t find out what was fucking her up so much.

The first wife missed Dilan’s awards presentation night but I did manage to break her out Friday morning so she could attend the final assembly and morning tea. She loved it and was so happy to make it.

The Great Escape that misses the sloth like sprint across a busy road

Then home to do fuck all but lay prone until I returned her to hospital before they sent a posse out a huntin’. By this stage she was buggered anyway and was definitely not up to housework level of energy levels.

She was released from custody the following morning and by midmorning was back home doing nothing. We managed a day trip to the Gold Coast to see if our son and his new mullet were still alive at schoolies. Thanks to our raggedy ol’ hag mate, he even had a bed to sleep in and a shower to do more than just clean.

Domanis Cafe Restaurant Bar owned by long time no see, Kaz

Sunday night, the ol’ girl was back to her shaking like one of my favourite Elvis songs, Burning Love.

The following morning though, she was ok. Average but ok enough to attend a lunch with about 20 workmates who came to hang out and drink piss with her. Ok, maybe she wasn’t healthy enough to drink piss but I was, so I took one for the team and fitted in the best I could with some of Marjana’s good mates from Brisbane Women’s Correctional Centre (BWCC). I had written pissheads but she made me change it.

It was an awesome little afternoon for the first wife and her mates. She was happy as fuck, on a high and really enjoyed herself… until we got home when she laid down just in time for Burning Love lyrics to play out in real life, except the temperature reason wasn’t from being in love.

After another touching base check with our oncologist who I’m not allowed to call a gnome even though he looks like one, we decided to try and survive until Wednesday’s Chernobyl Day. It was a struggle with Marjana shaking like an epileptic from a continual temperatures which we nullified somewhat with panadol every few hours.

The first wife walked into chemo very much unlike a cool sounding crouching tiger. But man, did she nail the crouched over snail speed shuffling spastic type of walk..

The Queen and her walking stick would smash my first wife in a walking race right now. Actually, the Queen without her walking stick would clean her up too. Hmmm, you know what? Marjana would even struggle in a race against just the Queen’s walking stick.

You see, she gets blood tests done the day before every chemo session and there’s something in the white cells of blood called neutrophils. I probably didn’t quite get that right but in normal, or at least healthy people is around 2 mcL. With cancer patients they give chemo when it’s as low as half that which caused a bit of concern for our nurse sheilas as my first wife’s was a quarter of that at .24 mcL, I think. That’s the shit that fights infections. So the long and the short of it was, no chemo for wifey and once they filled her up with hop-less fluids she got a free ride back to hospital in an ambulance.

One of our awesome chemo nurses who I like too much to give one of my nicknames told me the fever shaking thing Marjana’s been getting every four hours is called rigor, so that might save my word count instead of talking about Elvis songs or shattering teeth. I dig Elvis though so fuck the word count.

Another of our lovely chemo nurses and they really are lovely at Redland’s Mater Cancer Care Centre, reckons Marjana has febrile neutropenia, which is the fever during a period of neutropenia. I’m sure you’ll all die happier knowing that too aye.

Couple of quotes of the Day for good measure…

Nurse: Your temperature is 39.4*

Marjana: Do I still have a temperature?

Me holding Marjana’s hand: Yeah of course you do. Your hand was burning mine it was so hot.

Marjana: That’s because I had my hands on the wheat bag and I was hot.

Me: Oooh, calling yourself hot now aye.

Making the mrs laugh

Urine samples are very routine for the mother of my children nowadays…

Me (telling nurse): You might wanna wear gloves for this one as she pissed all over the piss cup.

Nurse: Yes, I overheard her telling you. It is a little bit hard trying to keep your hand still when shaking with fever though.

What you’ve just read was a draft up until a few weeks ago now. If I posted it by itself, it would be outdated. Rather than deleting the whole thing or editing it heaps as that takes fucking ages, I’ll just add the rest now. It’s almost like a two for one which is cool when talking about drinking piss but this ain’t that sorry.

Well anyway, the last few weeks have mostly been a bit of a cunt to be honest. Before we start that catch up though, check out this short clip of Dane Coles calling ol mate a mouthy cunt. A deserved win for Ireland, same with the Frogs and the Boks a few weeks earlier, fuck it. Congrats enemies on your deserved wins.

Fuck, he’s a mouthy cunt aint he

I think those that know me, or even those that subscribe to these blogs could accede to the fact I like telling stories and on occasion have been known to call a spade a spade. This probably ain’t the appropriate forum for me to write a whinge about my first wife’s last hospital stay because we did make a complaint and you cunts don’t want to read about sad whinging shit anyway. But I will say it really fucked up my first wife big time and I don’t like that very much at all.

On top of that, a week of long visits cost fucking heaps when paying hospital parking in the city. Lucky we’ve got so many good bastards on our side that’ve donated to help with this sort of shit. It is kinda sad though that people who are either sick or visiting someone sick are charged so much for the privilege of parking within walking distance.

Almost, but not entirely unrelated, we still love our surgeon Peter Yuide. He’s still a good cunt.

Keeping the above in perspective though, as much as that hospital stay was a little bit shit, if my girl didn’t actually have cancer she wouldn’t even need to go to hospital. We don’t like cancer very much at all! In fact, it’s even heaps worse than some recent All Black performances.

Might throw in a little quote of the day here…

Marjana: Brendon, why don’t you have an M tattooed into your head like Homer does for Marge?

Me to a doctor mate of mine: It must sound like we’re whinging about first world problems.

Doctor mate: But we do live in the first world so fair enough.

Going back to that windows analogy briefly, since starting this particular blog, my first wife’s window of health has pretty much remained closed since that hospital visit. Not trying to sound like a whinging cunt but in all honesty she hasn’t been feeling very flash lately.

She’s nearly always fatigued. So much so that some days she needs to sit down for a rest immediately after standing up.

She’s nearly always in pain. That causes tears of pain and cries of agony.

Sometimes those tears aren’t even from the physical pain as are emotional tears of frustration and dire contempt at what the future holds… and doesn’t hold. Not all the tears are even from her. If I thought paying $500 for a week’s hospital parking was painful, that pales in comparison to watching one’s first wife or mother suffer.

She ain’t exactly blind (well that, along with deafness is actually quite debatable) and still has nerve sensors so can blatantly see and feel how it’s fucking her up. I know it hurts her to experience it in the first person her health deteriorating. So much so, that for some reason she continually apologises to me for having to witness it myself. As much as it’s fucked for me, that’s miniscule in comparison her dealing with it.

Cheers to a few of Marjana’s workmates, there’s been continual visits of love, gifts and champas on a new balcony setting by Val have been had and appreciated muchly. Balcony Settings by Val sounds flash as, actually.

On three…

Funny how a shitty sleep can affect ya though aye. We all had a fucked night’s sleep Thursday night ‘cos my bathroom space hogger was in heaps of pain. We both woke up feeling pretty fucked and the world had that weird twilight zone atmosphere where it felt half a degree off centre. I drove to the supermarket where for the first time in the history of the world, there were no carparks at this shopping centre. Drove around slow as and swerve to avoid being crashed into as three separate cars almost reversed into me. Done a few more carpark hunting laps and after about five minutes, still no parking. Drove around the block and find one of those street carparks where ya have to reverse into angled parking. As I’m reversing into it some cunt runs across the road using my half parked in carpark as his footpath entrance and I almost ran him over. Then tried to do a quick grocery shop but failed in the quickness part because Queensland had opened up to interstate travellers and every single one of them decided to visit my grocery store. Finally, while driving home some sheila so old she probably partied with Jesus put her blinker on to turn left into the street in front. Thing is she wasn’t turning into that street and was doing a reversed angle park like I did earlier but had gone too far forward. She too would’ve reversed into me if I wasn’t all paranoid already after the previous incidents. I quickly reversed out of her way but of course this is the Twilight Zone thing remember and some other cunt was crossing the road just behind me and I almost ran him over too. Survived without killing anyone and made it home where I spent the next few hours dropping shit and knocking shit over. I mean, in the end, no cunt died or was even injured but some days just aren’t meant to be. I hate those days.

Enough negative shit though and I should apologise as we ain’t dead yet and life could be way worse, so on a positive…

Anyone who even remotely knows my first wife would be aware she’s a proud Catholic, as are her family and almost 90% of Croatians. She must’ve quite liked me. My first wife I mean, as in January 1998 she married me and I wasn’t even a Catholic, or christened any other faith for that matter… apart from just trying to be a good cunt. I did say trying.

So over the last few months, I did a Right of Christian Initiation of Adults (RCIA) course that Marjana also attended with me. I think, only to make sure I didn’t wag.

But a couple Sunday’s ago in what some may consider Marjana’s greatest ever living achievement, I was baptised a real life Catholic. It was an awesome occasion. The event itself was great, as was the fact that both our boys were present, Marjana’s family, including her Mama watched the livestream from Croatia, the company of our Croatian Connection including my Kum, Vjeko. Plus we had a decent feed, drank some piss and basically had a great day celebrating the occasion. For me though and without a doubt the highlight was the absolute joy it brought my first wife. We met in January 1996 so it may have taken her a while (and quite possibly a little bout of cancer) to get me across the line but here’s a ‘Fuck Yeah’ for my first wife’s belief and yeah, maybe her persistence too.

Christening at Star of the Sea Parish, Cleveland

Quote of the day:

Me talking to my ol’ man on the phone: Oh yeah, I got Christened a few days ago.

Dad: What?

Me: I got Christened. You know, Baptised. Like Catholics do.

Dad: Aye…? What? Why’d ya go and do that. Fucken hell. You’re probably the first Winslow ever.

Me: Haha, well considering you never passed the fucken ball in rugby, I think I may have also been the first Winslow to ever pass a rugby ball to a team mate too. Plus, I think I’m also the first Winslow to ever become a cop. Dilan graduated high school last week and Kodi a few years ago too so surely, they gotta be up there with first for Winslows too aye. We’re like trailblazers us fellas aye. You’re still the first Winslow to ever be stabbed in the guts by his Chinese Mrs, taken to hospital where your ex said good job and if she’d had the guts she would’ve shot ya years ago haha. You got me fucked on that one, Dad.

And another one for good measure.

Marjana is trying different painkillers including Cannabidiol (CBD oil). She doesn’t like it much and her face cringes at the taste of it so…

Me: They should make an olive oil tasting one for wogs like you aye.

Well peeps, that about does it for this instalment and saying I struggled a little getting this one out there is an understatement. But quite a few have been asking when this blog was coming, if everything is ok etc, and I’m learning quick smart that these updates are kinda important for some of y’all. They certainly are for my favourite Catholic and I.

Thank you for subscribing to this blog, for the generosity of those who still giving us shit and for having us in your thoughts. We don’t like drama much but we do like good cunts just like y’all.

#47 Radiation and doing shit

Been a while since I last blogged and this one’s probably a little overdue. But fuck man, it’s kinda hard finding the time to get these updates down on paper and that’s with me still only working a couple days per week. You’d think I’d have heaps of time on my hands but nah, not even. A slave’s work is never done. You’ll probably need about 15 minutes to read this so depending where you are and what you’re doing, ya might wanna grab a coffee or beer and settle in for a bit.

It’s the small things in life like finding a heart when eating chips at chemo

We can’t start this chapter without first mentioning one of Marjana’s workmates, Michelle. She absolutely loves her dog but it’s Michelle we call a naughty little bitch and not her dog but for good reason. Firstly, her dog is actually a boy, so technically he can’t be a bitch but also because it was Michelle who set up another GoFundMe page. Both of us (especially Marjana) felt like paupers putting our hands out when it really wasn’t that at all. Not that we didn’t or don’t appreciate it because we definitely do, as we appreciate every single donation sent our way. We’ve done our best to personally thank every single person and apart from a couple we couldn’t work out who they were, we did pretty well considering. Check it out here.

Y’all must be rich as wanting to throw money at us like that. Reminds me of my ol’ man-whore days but a lot easier on my body. Don’t get me wrong though because there’s still plenty of pain. Just a different concentrated kind of pain with longer lasting effects than that caused from standing under a dimly lit streetlight on a cold stormy night. That pain is of course cancer which is not contagious at all, unless of course you’re talking of the emotional pain in which case it spreads far and wide like an ol’ westy sheila’s legs back in the day.

As evidenced by the lack of long haired ringlets, this is very much a *post* man-whore days pic

As embarrassing as it is, the targeted total of $30,000 has well and truly been achieved and then some. As I write, the amount sits at $27,688 but so many have donated personally rather than going under the GoFundMe page, which leaves us richer than we’ve ever been in our lives. By richer, I don’t actually mean monetary wise. I’m talking about having so many good cunts in our lives that try and help anyway they can.

Our life would be heaps better without cunty cancer coming a knocking but it could seriously be heaps worse too. We are surrounded by people who genuinely give a fuck, want to help and do actually help. The love and support we feel is so so so humbling and makes us tear up whenever we try to disect it.

Remember too that this is actually the second GoFundMe page that was set up for us.

🙏 Thank you 🙏 Hvala 🙏 Thank you 🙏 Hvala 🙏 Thank you 🙏 Hvala 🙏

Moving right along though, I now need to let y’all know how bitterly disappointed I was when ‘No Bra Day’ came and went with what I would call, a very piss poor effort by many of you on this great day for all mankind. October 13 isn’t just about admiring the cheeky little jiggle of licentious tits or the teasing of perky erect nipples under a t-shirt. Oh no, it’s way more than that as it’s also a sneaky little reminder for you sheilas to go get ya checks and balances done. If you’re due for a mammogram, smear test, skin cancer check, bowel cancer test or even if ya just like the old school prostate cancer check for fun, the go sort that shit out man, please. Since drafting this a good mate has since been diagnosed with breast cancer, another has had a heart attack and yet another was admitted to hospital for some other fucked up shit, so very topical.

You know what else we did on No Bra Day? We went to visit our surgeon Peter for a bit of a catch up, chat and laugh. Took him a roll of sandpaper to top up his tissue tray for any new unsuspecting clients.

After that we went to see some radiation oncologist dude about options there and have since started and completed a radiation treatment plan consisting of five daily sessions and a few grand outlaid for the privilege of having Marjana’s life saved again.

For those who don’t know (and we didn’t really know either) radiation targets a specific area and is precise within a millimetre where as chemo shrouds the whole body with poison to combat cancer. This is probably better for metastised cancer like Marjana’s but the radiation was definitely needed because that cunt of an alien inside her bowel came back a bit angry and was bleeding and shit, so like a Wallabies scrum, it had to be stunted. That’s why the first wife was a little bit rooted for a few months, needing continual blood transfusions to top up what she was losing.

The ol’ laser beam treatment was pretty cool for what it achieved and how the process worked. Each treatment only lasted about five minutes before she was released back into my custody, usually for a sleep as it fatigued the fuck out of the poor ol’ battler. She felt heaps better than she did following her Chernobyl sessions but still slept like a… very loud train.

Adding her print to a tree of much hope and life

Here’s to hoping that radiation helped a bit sometimes experts with cool words in front of their names like Surgeon, Specialist and Bald Fat Cunt don’t always agree, but on this point we do.

When you ring a finishing radiation bell but freak out at how loud it is

The Mrs was really enjoying having time out from chemo though and after a six week break she was feeling flash as. Not too dissimilar to how she felt when she was initially diagnosed with cancer. Good, but could die any moment from her fucked up guts.

In other breaking news some fucked up shit went down recently that I’m not particularly proud of (said the spastic who has a mankini pic in this blog). I’d hung out a load of washing and the satisfaction felt when I stepped back was, to put it plainly, revolting. The strategic placement of each garment made for a perfectly filled clothesline without even one space left to spare. It really was a thing of beauty and moral corruption, for I should not be slaved so abusively. There is slavery and then there is slavery. Unfortunately, I’ve realised I’ve been moulded into the later.

A dogfish, an improved cat and a first wife

Death is inevitable but when faced with it occurring sooner rather than later, the inevitability can be very confronting. Need to sort shit out that is a cunt to sort out. Things like finding a funeral director, purchasing expensive real estate in the form of a grave, modifying wills and a whole lot of other fuckety fuck fuck shit.

Looks like we found a suitable piece of real estate for when the time comes. Mind you it did come with a prerequisite that I share the space with her. I’m always up for a deal and a two for the price of one makes me feel good in all things beer, food and graves. Gotta be a good deal, right.

As usual we’ve been busy as fuck and as much as the first wife could use a bit of a slow down, it’s not really our style doing the living life approach to life. Made a point of catching up with our inner circle as much as possible and to that I say ‘Fuck yeah!’.

Spent a primo weekend down the Gold Coast thanks to our angel of an aunty Karen who offered up their apartment for a weekend. When we were kids, the ol’ lady would take us to Karen for haircuts and this one time she used a bladed weapon (scissors) and cut my fuckin ear real bad. But with the use of their apartment and the fact she has a genuine superpower of always remembering birthdays, she can sleep contently tonight knowing she’s now forgiven.

But anyway, back to the Gold Coast, one of us drank piss and ate decent tucker and one of us closed her eyes for half an hour that turned into a 12 hour sleep. I actually blame the Mrs work mates for that as we all caught up for a feed earlier that day. It ain’t the eating though, that makes one tired but a heap of sheilas doing catch up talking certainly does. It was a primo little lunch the Mrs loved that flowed into a relaxed weekend.

Dilan finally had his (Catholic) confirmation which my first wife wasn’t gunna miss for anything and proved that by turning up feeling a little bit shit with her chemo bottle attached. Was a nice little event and if anyone deserves to go to heaven it’s him ‘cos he’s a pretty good cunt.

A lot of that is thanks to Iona College where he spent his high school years. They’ve been the perfect fit for him and have been so good to us, not only with cancer but from day one. Iona College Rector, Father Michael came around for a visit, blessed our home. gave Marjana the Sacrament of Annointing of the Sick and of course we shared a mean as feed of lamb rack.

To the other spectrum, for some reason (called Kym) we ended up at a chicks with dicks show at Redland Performing Arts Centre (RPAC). The show called Dirty Laundry gave us a few laughs including the Samoan and Tongan fa’afafine built like front row forwards but after seeing their getups I’m kinda glad I left my mankini hanging up in the closet.

Then came Melbourne Cup day and again, Kym figured she’d take my cook along to a table full of sheilas and she covered the cost of the ticket. I’m not sure where my first wife found the shoelace she put on her head but she never fails to surprise me as she somehow managed to even tie the shoelace as if it was still on a shoe. Talented to the max, I reckon. Anyway, she went with no money and came home with some, thanks to their table winning the sweepstake. As me ol’ mate Scotty says, ‘Easy money’.

I drafted this blog a few weeks ago but yesterday we returned to visit to our surgeon Peter Yuide and lucky we did because a little look around his office identified something I could use to take the piss. A piece of art work that I believe was in fact a painting, which upon closer inspection revealed the coarse grit not too dissimilar to his tissues. Of course I raised my concerns with him.

Close up pic of either a painting or a tissue

Today we went to Chernobyl Day again and were almost sent away as my first wife had a fever last night that hadn’t dissolved. Apparently she’s supposed to go to hospital whenever she gets a fever because she can get all fucked up real quick, so we’re a little bit naughty apparently.

But she got her dose of a new concoction which unfortunately comes with bad pins and needles in her fingers, thanks to the make up of that brew. Our oncologist who I’m not allowed to call a gnome even though he looks like one can stake claim to the first of a few quotes of the day.

Oncologist: I’ll give you some antibiotics. You’re not allergic to anything are you?

Marjana: Just bees.

Oncologist: Ok, I’ll make sure they’re not bee based.

Next up was our surgeon Peter who mentioned something about someone being too scared to fart.

Me: Probably for good reason as I’m scared of Marjana’s farts.

We went to visit a good friend in hospital and used google maps with the generic sheila voice. Admittedly, I was a bit stressed from some other shit going on and got a bit pissed off because her directions were shit.

Me: Should have a fucken bloke talking, not this sheila. He’d probably ask me why I even need directions, don’t stop for instructions and just do whatever I want.

Part of a slave’s job, or at least this one’s, is to massage my first wife’s feet while sitting on the couch watching tv. This in itself most definitely crosses over with flow on effect of me also having to give her a back massage. Apparently I keep getting up for beer or moving to reach for a beer causing my dear ol’ first wife to become annoyed…

Marjana: Brendon, stop moving. You’re not a very good pillow.

Rather than taking a heap of tablets and pain killers, both of which are inevitable with modern day cancer treatments, the Mrs is keen on trying the more natural approach of CBD oil. In the old days we used to just call this hash oil but apparently I’m out of touch and it’s not quite the same. There are a couple of varieties including one with THC and one without. The THC one also treats anxiety but then ya can’t drive a vehicle. My dishwasher sheila doesn’t want the hooch version and neither do I because then she can’t be my sober driver. But either way, she needs to partake in a two week trial which has quite a bit involved in being accepted. One such thing is a memory test where a short story is told to her and questions are asked about it.

Me: You’re giving her a memory test? Just ask her anything to do with any date that I’ve pissed her off over the years, she’ll nail it big time, man.

The first wife has been in a bit of pain lately as feeling more and more of the effects of cunty cancer throughout her body. Yeah, fuck you (again) cancer. You suck.

Marjana: My back hurts.

Me: Why?

Marjana (gave me her knowing look of contempt): I have cancer ljubavi.

That moment made me cry.

Candles go with prayers even if they do have devilish looking angels in the centre

Not wanting to finish on a sad note and for me the following quote is by far my favourite.

In her defence, Marjana didn’t want me to throw it in here because some might think she was being mean and I’m like ‘Fuck the cunts. Having stage four metastised bowel cancer is mean,’ so here it is.

For those that watch ABC news, you’ve probably identified that some of the presenters look or sound a little funky. Marjana was watching it and told me to come quickly to check out the spunky looking sheila reporting on something out in the field somewhere. I don’t need to be invited twice to perve on a good looking chick and not wanting to upset my first wife I did as requested and rushed to check her out.

Marjana: She looks way too pretty for ABC.

Me: Oh yeah. She’s spunky as.

Marjana: Maybe she’s missing a leg.

Fuck I laughed at that one!

For anyone even remotely interested, Bird’s still very much a cunt.

Bird admiring his handy work and watching me drink piss

A first wife’s reaction to her youngest child getting his ears pierced

Cheers y’all and feel free to spam my window cleaner with messages of whatever.

#46 Hearing facts sometimes sucks

To put it simply, yesterday was a cunt of a day.

We met with our surgeon Peter who made both me and the first wife cry.

He’s quite a brainy dude actually. Thinkin’ he picked up that I may have been lying when I said I’m still just sad about Saturday’s All Black loss to the Springboks. Full credit to the Boks and congrats heaps for your deserved victory.

At 29 – 28 with penalty kick to come this is not a laughing matter Marjana

A couple of key points taken out of our conversation were…

‘Marjana, your specific cancer is a very very nasty one and you will not win this battle. This cancer is going to kill you.

The kicker though was…

‘I can’t tell you how long you will live but I can tell you this will be your last Christmas.’

Like you reading this right now, those are powerful words that hit home with a fucking bang saying ‘cop that ya cunts’. Well that’s what it felt like for me.

Arguably, one of the worst parts of the day was Marjana putting on her nice undies for Peter and he never even gave her the chance to jump up on the bed and show him. They are Nana undies but apparently they’re quite flash ones because they’re still new.

As I’ve mentioned in previous blogs, an operation is an option but have now heard it’s not actually a very good option, at least in the interim. Firstly, her Chernobyl poison contains Avastin which slows down blood vessel growth and is great for stemming cancer growth but it also prevents healing which she’d need after another serious operation. It’s the difference between a week in hospital or potentially months in a hospital bed. So it’s not even really an available option for another six to eight weeks anyway.

Peter also said that everything he’s done so far has been to make to improve Marjana’s life and if he were to operate, there’s a very good chance I would make her life worse, rather than better.

There is also consideration for quality of life versus quantity of life.

Without even going into post op details like definitely needing a permanent stoma bag, the main issue is the cunt of a tumour and where it is inside her bowel.

So we left Peter’s office and made it back to our car feeling (uncomfortably) numb with faces as wet as a fish’s. Had some cuddles and painful howls and I said ‘Fuck you Marjana’, and she then apologised for making me sad. Gunna need a little more than a verbal apology wife.

A little advice for anyone going to see Peter for bad news… bring your own soft tissues because I think he has 80 grit sandpaper camouflaged in his tissue boxes.

Popped over to see our oncologist who I’m not allowed to call a gnome even though he looks like one.

He gave my first wife the rest of the week off chemo and will be back into it on Wednesday but with a different potion of poison.

Y’all know I take the piss out of him a little with his name but he’s actually a good little cunt and no doubt rich as fuck but good on him because the power he wields with his knowledge is without doubt life changing.

His tissues I think are 120 grit so softer that Peter’s but not as soft as a few of the All Blacks unfortunately were in last Saturday’s test match. I did sent Peter a text saying the Gnome’s tissues are way softer than his though and in his defence he did say he couldn’t compete with that.

Although the ol’ girl didn’t have her Chernobyl session they still wanted a blood sample so we popped over looking like a couple of real sad depressed cunts.

Marjana had her purse on the chair next to her and I moved it so I could sit down but fuck did I jump or what. Yeah, I moved her purse alright but didn’t see her 600ml bottle of water and when I sat down on it I pretty much took a full on length, or at least a good 400ml worth of and was even with my shorts on. Oh man, it was an extremely accurate entry and I can tell you from experience that those bottles have quite a large girth. But this made my poor little cancer suffering first wife laugh her head off and the tears that then flowed from her were tears of laughter and not pain. Not mine though. My tears were very much pain induced. In fact, those few seconds almost reminded me of my man-whore days back in San Francisco.

We’d had our inner circle mates down for a couple of days and the poor bastards decided to stay another night so they could be sad and shit with us. Sick puppies or what. Nah, cheers Biggles and Lexi for hanging around and making me drink piss with y’all.

We took a little visit to our local dog beach and spent the day and night telling family back in Croatia and New Zealand of our shitty status update. Every single conversation involved tears so rather than keep doing the same, I’m flicking this blog out to anyone who wants to read it.

Our hearts ripped apart when we told both our boys though. Hadn’t had a Winslow family hug for a while so about due for one anyway, I guess. For those that know them, please check in on them.

Just as I got to this part of the blog, Marjana received a call to book in for an appointment today with some radiation doctor fella. Here I was thinking they were phoning to check on my welfare after I took a length of that large girthed water bottle but nup, it’s all about the Mrs apparently.

Basically though, this is still an ongoing changing situation and we still have options available including the key one of not giving up and continuing to fight like a hard core streetfighter fighting for their life, because that’s exactly what’s happening here.

Also very aware that others have lived longer than times given so there’s comfort in that as there is in Marjana’s faith.

We ain’t the first people to be fucked over by COVID but it sure would be nice for Marjana to fly back to Croatia for a family visit or even have our New Zealand family be able to pop over but fuck you COVID and yeah, fuck you too cancer. You are a cunt.

These very real conversations make ya think about shitty things like sorting funerals, gravestones and even financial situations so if any of y’all have tips, wisdom or experience with these then let us know please.

Any and all are welcome to message Marjana.

A sneaky little quote of the day…

Peter the surgeon: With bowel cancer sometimes there can be so much blood in your stool you’d think you were attacked by a shark.

This vid may just bring a smile to your face. It did ours.

Who says laughing isn’t contagious

#45 First PET scan

Marjana had her first PET scan last Friday. She’d had a bunch of CT scans but this was her very first PET scan. For normal people who have no need to know the difference, a PET scan basically shows things in more detail than a CT so we were a little anxious to say the least.

Now would be an ideal time to give y’all some good news about recovery and shit but real life ain’t always perfect. I mean even the All Blacks don’t always win.

In fact, life can sometimes be a real cunt!

Colours are cool including all those rainbow colours the gay community proudly wear (not sure if there’s a crossover to my tie-dyed clothed Deadhead days at Grateful Dead concerts) but… we don’t definitely didn’t like all the bright colours that glowed in this PET scan. Nup, they’re a little bit fucked actually.

This Grateful Dead ts actually shows colours and a skeleton not too disimilar to Marjana’s PET scan

Basically, the guts of the matter is that these Chernobyl sessions have kept the cancer mostly at bay for a year except for a lesion in her liver and some ugly Chernobyl-ish looking bright colours at the same spot she had the operation in her bowel to remove some tumours.

Our surgeon Peter Yuide said from the start that they couldn’t get all the cancer out in the operation so we knew it was still there to be managed with the likes of chemo, prayers and taking the piss. The fact it didn’t just give up like I’d like teams to do when playing the All Blacks really sucked.

For you regular readers, you may recall me saying the ol’ girl has been a bit rooted over the last couple months with fatigue, well it looks like this may be a result of internal bleeding and the cancer growing.

Oh, another term for a little bit rooted is anaemic.

Marjana gets blood tests done every fortnight just before chemo and for the last couple/few months they’ve come back with numbers lower than an Aussie cricketer’s batting score. Her haemoglobin in her last blood test for example was 72 and although I think 100 is sufficient, ideal is above 120 (I think).

Plus her iron count was only nine and (again, I think) it’s supposed to be around 40. Fuck, I need to stop this thinking shit.

If I was writing a blog about other shit I’d like to write about then it would make for very different reading. But these are The Cancer Chronicles and we tend to call it how it is even if it’s an ugly cunt of a thing because that’s exactly what it is (bowel cancer) and anyone grossed out can go read Karen on Facebook.

No cancer is cool but bowel cancer certainly ain’t the most romantic of cancers because it inevitably involves shit.

This may or may not be a response to Pudding’s response to a loud fart

Some of my very best times in my life ever have involved shit though. A myriad of you have already heard a few of my real life stories about faeces (both mine and that fucken Slovenian cunt) but there is nothing worse than being in public knowing you’re about to shit your pants, unless you’re not wearing pants. Don’t try and deny it either as I know y’all been there at some stage.

To the contrary though, there’s nothing better than successfully sucking that grogan and it’s turtlehead back up inside as far as you can and making it to a toilet just in time for that pressure release. Not sure about you fellas but personally I always hope that they people watching me beeline to the toilet doing some spastic squeezy kind of walk have left when I come out. But that’s just me.

Sorry, I got a little excited and side-tracked there but tend to do that when telling tales about shits.

Where was I… oh yeah, the first wife and her war with bowel cancer has got a few of her own shit stories. Her relationship with various versions of blood infused diarrhoea aint exactly what she likes to call a good time, especially after chemo when it feels like it’s ripping her insides out. As much as it hurts me to see how that affects her, it’s nothing compared to her living it in the first person.

So following a combo of black blooded diarrhoea, low iron, vitamin D and an extraordinary low haemoglobin count Wednesday’s Chernobyl day was kind of cancelled, but not really. Our oncologist who I’m not allowed to call a gnome even though he looks like one gave her a week off chemo but ordered my first wife a couple more pints of blood and a pint of iron. Lately, she’s been going through blood bags like I go through piss (for you Americans, I mean beer, not urine). If ol mate’s gunna order pints I could do with a few of my own. Beer though, not blood.

A look of guilt upon being spotted by a chemo nurse with nice smelling Pad Thai to chomp on

A few hours later my first wife came out feeling a bit more energetic… not energetic enough to vacuum though but energetic enough to compete with our dog Bella about who gives me the most kisses.

Although she felt better from her blood transfusions and the iron infusion, this was actually a cunt of a day. We’ve had a few of them and they don’t certainly don’t get any easier.

The PET scan shows heaps but they still need to check internally and rather than just do a colonoscopy (up the ass), they need to do an endoscopy (down the throat) as well. Sounds a lot more erotic than what this one is, believe me. I think my first wife is hoping they use different equipment or at least do the endoscopy before the colonoscopy. With the amount of kisses she gives me, I’m actually hoping that too.

She’s booked in for both procedures this afternoon.

She may piss on my clothes on occasion but Pudding loves her Mama so much and makes her feel heaps better

Now I know what you’re thinking right. She just loves operations and shit like suffering the pre op diets, the pain, the inconvenience to life and the financial cost of being a as crook as a dog but nah man. She’s gotta have these procedures because quite simple, cancer is a cunt.

Following our Wednesday day came our Wednesday night when our surgeon Peter Yuide phoned to have a very real conversation. Just because we both reckon he’s a good cunt, doesn’t mean we have to enjoy what he says and what was said during that phone call didn’t exactly fill us with elation.

I know he follows these blogs because even great surgeons deserve to see their name and laugh at the same time. He, more than most fully appreciates our situation and by situation, I mean the cards we’ve been dealt and how we’ve tried to deal with them.

Haven’t taken many photos lately so here’s a few small feeds I did on my smoker

Although not the full conversation, your first quote of the day goes against the norm as isn’t funny but gets a mention because it is what it is.

Peter the surgeon: This is not the first time you’ve received news like this and you must be almost used to it by now. We’ll know more after your procedures on Friday but another operation isn’t off the table. Ideally we do not want to go back in to that part of the bowel and will look at options after reviewing Friday’s procedures. But over this last year Marjana, you haven’t dwelt upon the bad parts or given up and just died. Instead, you’ve rolled with the punches and basically lived life to the fullest, which I’m sure you will continue to do thanks to that crazy husband of yours.

Think she’s either praying a rosary for good health or for a normal husband

Those that have had colonoscopies can appreciate the prep involved. You have to drink heaps of gross shit that makes you shit out absolutely everything inside you and believe me it ain’t fun. Actually, when I put it like that it reminds me of my partying days pre first wife.

My first wife made me have a colonoscopy because she was scared for me after she was diagnosed. Either that, or she wanted me to suffer like she does. As gross as the prep drink shit is, I just open throat skulled most of it so the pain from the taste is short and sharp. But my first wife wasn’t born a Winslow and doesn’t have those skulling genes from birth like I had and our boys have. She married into it and therein lies the difference.

It’s hard not to laugh. Too hard in fact so I overtly laughed at her when she tried to drink that shit. She actually tortures herself by making the pain last longer and sipping ever so daintily, even with pinky in the air.

Me: It’s not a fine wine wife. Just skull that shit, man!

She didn’t but she did make me laugh again when she started gagging and coughing and spluttering. My laughing made her laugh which in turn made her gag, cough, splutter and laugh at the same time. This snowballed making me laugh even harder. Now that’s living right.

And your last quote of the day…

Marjana (immediately after she sneezed in bed after drinking prep drink): Oh good, I didn’t shit the bed.

Today is a crucial day for us as to where we go forward from here so if you’re the praying kind, do your thing please.

#44 Milestone reached

Milestones are nice aye. Well at least the good ones are.

But even fucked ones can be worth celebrating. You know, like being diagnosed with stage four bowel cancer but still being alive after one full cycle around the sun.

A whole year later and she ain’t even a little bit dead.

Fuck yeah!

Obviously it hasn’t all been what we’d call a shit hot time though. Marjana’s changed heaps but the key point being she’s still alive to actually change.

There’s been some extreme hairstyle makeovers, heaps of spews and gallons of diarrhoea to compliment the constipation along the way and fuck man, those snorts she now makes when she laughs would shame a wild boar.

This cancer life we now live has changed us all as none of us are the same people we were a year ago. Fact!

Although my first wife is still kinda growly (it’s a wife thing I believe), I have to admit she doesn’t sweat the small stuff like our pre cancer days. It’s really puts things into perspective and that’s actually a positive.

life hack #101 – when ya cat spews up a feed let ya dog eat the spew – two feeds for the price of one

But as I sit here typing away my first wife is laying beside me in pain. She’s got her chemo bottle attached and is crying in agony from stomach cramps thanks to chemo.

This particular blog has taken me fucking ages to write as I know for a fact some of you come here for a laugh as well as an update and no cunt reads these aspiring to get depressed. To be honest though, sometimes I do struggle to find the words to cover off both elements. By that I mean, giving a status update without leaving you, the reader feeling like that Mona Lisa sheila looks in that painting.

I’m trying to write this and wipe away my first wife’s tears at the same time. Being the considerate poor li’l wifey though, she helped me by grabbing a tissue to wipe tears from two pairs of eyes and then whispered how romantic it is to share tear tissues. Fuck man, I’m just happy we’re finally saving money on tissue usage but seriously though, that shit can not not change anyone.

Fuck you cancer! You’re a cunt and can fuck right off if ya don’t mind.

Ya haven’t killed us yet. Came pretty close; but close don’t count for shit.

The ol’ girl has struggled a bit of late with her last few Chernobyl sessions affecting her quite badly. She’s been in heaps of pain and continually fatigued as fuck so even her good weeks ain’t like the good weeks of old.

We recently went to see our surgeon. You know the one… Peter the good cunt. Sounds a bit like one of Jesus’s disciples aye. The first wife even put on her nice perfume and a semi decent pair of undies… Nana undies can be semi decent if they are new and don’t have holes apparently.

We were trying to find out why she’s been in so much pain of late. Still not 100% sure but our oncologist who I’m not allowed to call a gnome, even though he looks like one, gave the ol’ girl an extra week off chemo which, along with a couple more blood transfusions helped our cause.

In fact the day after that decision she surprisingly woke up feeling pretty bloody good and stayed like that for almost a whole week… Sometimes we’ll take what we can get.

It’s fair to say though, we’ve probably been a tad dehydrated of late as too much eye sweat can leave one feeling not very flash at all.

For those who’ve followed these blogs since day one, you’ve no doubt shared a ride with bumps as big as an erect nipple on a lovely perky tit and lows almost as bad as food poisoning the All Blacks in rugby world cup finals. But I’d also like to think that along the way you’ve snuck in a few laughs… and maybe the odd bewildered comment along the lines of ‘Did he really just say that?’. That actually leads nicely into your our quote of the day…

Oncologist: (talking about chemo options) Hopefully we can get that all mopped up.

Me: Oooh yippeee, Marjana just loves mopping and she’s real good at it too.

we don’t always get a menu at hospital but when we do we try and get beer

Going back though to that milestone of surviving an entire year, there are actually a few significant dates we wont forget and we ain’t even sure which one/s to celebrate.

It was back on August 12, 2020 when Marjana woke up with swollen glands, called in sick to work and went to the doctor.

The next few days were an absolute cunt of a time to be honest with the worst being August 19, 2020 when she was officially diagnosed with cancer – stage four metastised bowel cancer to be precise. That’s one mean as memory scar right there.

A few days later came hospital admissions for chemo portal insertion, colonoscopy and ultimately the all important life saving ‘subtotal colectomy’ surgery, which for normal people translates to cutting her guts open, ripping out some cancer tumours followed by a little bit of realignment plumbing and sewing the guts back up.

None of the above were happy times but they are milestones that do deserve to be celebrated. Milestones (at least for me) usually involve drinking a bunch of piss so tend to end up as a good time. I’m sure I read somewhere that this month Virgos gunna luck upon some beer skulls and jager shots but in all honesty it could’ve just been my own fortune telling.

Ideally, I should compile a list of all the people who have helped us through this last year but I refuse because I’ll inevitably leave some cunt off, only to remember after posting the blog. Y’all know who ya are anyway.

People often ask how I’m going and to be honest it’s a cunt of a feeling seeing ya loved one in absolute agony and crying uncontrollably because of it.

It’s also a cunt of a feeling seeing the extreme physical change in ya first wife and not that I give a fuck if she’s getting fat or has fuck all hair or whatever but seeing how it’s affected her with a body aging many years in a single year is what’s sad. It’s not just the body but the emotion and mental state that’s affected her because of it.

To see, hear and experience that is quite simply just a cunt. But it ain’t nothing compared to her living it in the first person.

This particular blog wasn’t meant to read like an All Blacks Rugby World Cup loss but real life cancer stories more often than not are unfortunately not usually of the fluffy feel good genre.

Not sure if you’ve heard but there’s this little thing called COVID-19 that also came into the mix around cancer diagnoses time so there’s also that freaky element. Not that we’re the only ones affected by lockdowns and spastics stockpiling toilet paper but one can’t reflect upon the last year without at least mentioning Corona.

If ya are looking for a good time, I do recommend not getting cancer. If, for some reason you did fall victim to it then I personally recommend fighting that mongrel cunt of a thing like their ain’t no tomorrow because one day that may just be the case.

As this particular blog took a few weeks to write, it’s only right that I finish by adding that right now my first wife is actually feeling good this week. So good that we were even able to go on a dump run date together…

… and go to see this really cool band called Victor Bravo live.

Victor Bravo are (left to right) Ben Cutting (guitar/vocals), Jakeb Brown (drums/vocals), Jack Flack (lead vocals/guitar) and Kodi Winslow (bass/vocals)

Victor Bravo live at The Zoo

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this: