Sad News

This has got to be the hardest thing to write and really no words can express how I am feeling but my courageous, beautiful, fun loving, husband and best friend sadly past away last Friday 21st June. He was so brave and put up such a good fight, staying positive until the end with hope that the Doctors could buy him a little more time.

He has left us with so many happy memories, he really did live life to the full, enjoying all sorts of hobbies including, cycling, motorbikes, shooting, diving, cars, his allotment, to name but a few over the years and most of all family life. He was so proud of all of our children and their achievements in life and I know they will continue to make him proud. He made us extremely proud too especially with his amazing achievement of riding around the country on his Honda C90 last year and his Olympics volunteering all since his diagnosis.

Dene was the love of my life and soul mate, we had been together since I was  15 and him 19 and have grown through life together. I know with the support and love from the children, family and our wonderful friends I will be carried through, but this is going to be the hardest thing I am ever going to do people say it gets easier but I can't see that at the moment, the only thing I know is that Dene would want us to enjoy everything we do and always live every single as if it was our last.

So on that note I will say goodbye and leave you with details of "The celebration of his life"
Wednesday 3 rd July at 12 noon, St Matthews Church, Redhill, Surrey. Internment at Redstone Cemetery followed by a party at The Harlequin Theatre Redhill.

Dene's wishes are that everyone wears bright colours to the church No Black and all those that want to wear fancy dress to the party afterwards!!!

We are having family flowers only and donations to St Catherine's Hospice and Epsom Canine Rescue as Dene got great comfort from our dog while we were out at school and work.

All welcome

Missing you already xxxx

Short update

As promised here is a short update on treatment this week.

Well I met with my new consultant Wednesday, and this was a very productive meeting, and the trialhe wants me to go on sounds very interesting. Its basically using trojan horse viruses to get inside the tumours and then the virus kills the tumour. There are only 32 people on this trial in the UK and around 2000 worldwide, so once again I am part of a select group. The downside is that I will need to spend a few days in hospital after each treatment, so I can be closely monitored, which is to be expected as its a trial. We asked what the measure of success is, and as a phase 1 trial, they are looking to see if the virus gets into the tumour. Now of course they would not do this if they did not expect this to also have a major benefit for me. In the labs this approach is very successful, so hopefully this will also work for me too.

My biospy, which was booked for Thursday, was cancelled as they want to carry out the biopsy in their own labs next Thursday. I will need regular biopsies throughout the treatment, as this is the only way they can check the virus is in the tumour. At the first biopsy they will also send a sample to another lab in London where a separate trial is looking at the genetics of tumours, and the benefit for me here is much more information about my tumours, and hopefully more targeted tresatment.

Now on returning from seeing the consultant, there was an update letter from my oncologist, which he sends to the whole clinical team, and a copy to me, after each visit. Both Sarah and I were srprised to see a statement in the letter that it had also spread to my lungs, which had not been mentioned to us before. I ncould not get hold of my consultant but did speak to my radiologist who confirmed this bad news, but he was extremely sorry it had not been explained to us in person. So thats another worry for us to deal with.

However to end on a positive note, Jackie, Sarah's big sister, has sent us 2 tickets to see rod Stewart at the O2 next Tuesday. She was worried I would not be up to it, I replied that I will dose myself up with morphine and Red Bull, but I will be there. Yesterday I booked the disabled parking, and was somewhat surprised to find this is in the cap park furthest from the O2, I feel a letter coming on ....