Another year

This blog is now a year old - plus a few days! I don't update it as regularly as I might and my journal still receives more attention, but the blog continues to chart my wanderings through the Land of New Normal.

It is also a year since I switched from tamoxifen to Aromasin and this anniversary has been marked by the drug going generic in the U.K. So I have just started on the generic exemestane and seem to have gone back to a few of the early, but happily temporary, side effects I had - notably headaches, some dizziness and some gastric upset. Hopefully these will settle down as quickly they did last year. With regard to the more major side effects, the joint pain and stiffness is much worse than it was on tamoxifen and there are some other unpleasant effects. On the up side, the hot flushes and fatigue are a bit better. Overall I feel that the switch has been a good move for me.

This time last year I was in the thick of Appointments Season with annual, quarterly and four monthly appointments all seeming to run together. This year things are a bit different and so far the only seasonal appointment has been last week's regular "medication review" with my GP - probably not the greatest use of time for either of us really! Now that I'm down to two appointments a year, I haven't seen my oncologist this month, and with the genetics issue "done" and the UKFOCSS study over the pressure on my overcrowded diary has eased considerably.

The anniversary day (as opposed to date) of the fateful mammogram was the day of Cat's memorial, while 29th October and 5th November are significant dates too - so I'm now into Anniversary Season. This will run onto this year's shortened Appointments Season with mammogram and seeing my surgeon from the end of November through to mid December. I hope to emerge still clutching the hand of our good friend NED.

Fortunately there are also a lot of pleasant things dotted around this time; seeing friends, autumn walks (lovely one yesterday!), curling and Christmas card making. With all the busyness of summer over I will also return to working on the Storm Rider Quilt project.

Looking back to this time three years ago, I was on holiday and blissfully unaware of the recall letter that was sitting on my doormat at home. Sometimes it seems as if it was only yesterday, while at others it feels a lifetime away. I suspect that feeling is all part of living here in the Land of New Normal.