hello lovely ladies and lovely Tony,

seems i have missed so much in the few days i have been away. Well, firstly you are all wonderful, and although i have my first chemo today - i am not too daunted by it thanks to your continued support and honesty in whats involved. i know there is no telling how I will react but I feel ready to face what comes my way.

once again reading through the thread and seeing how much i have missed, i come away feeling enlightened and humbled by your words.

Caz my heart goes out to you as I know once you hit that spiral it is hard to come out of. I felt disfigured just with a scar and then the thought of 5 weeks of radio followed by one weeks intensive has scared me for weeks, the thought of the breast shrinking and looking odd and so forth. However, on my pre chemo visit this week, I met two lovely ladies - and as you do when you go through this awful journey to recovery, i was looking to see who was wearing a wig- ie was it obvious to all, and who had breasts and who didn't. What suprised me was I had been talking to this woman for a good while before i noticed she had a breast removed but her wonderful smile and winning personality - and her loose cardi buttoned at the waist only, completely hid it.  I don't know that I would have had her confidence but since having this 'thing' i find myself looking at people differently and it made me realise, it is more important to us than to others. my other half cannot understand the paranoia about my hair for example. But  please take away the thought as the girls have said before, that it really is what's inside that counts. Every time i come here, i see small pictures of you all - i do not see imperfections, i see wonderful normal human beings with nothing but love warmth and understanding. Someone once said to me that you cannot understand unless you have been there yourself, and someone else said that the reward for that comes when you can hold out your hand and help someone else through it.  Allow yourself time to grieve - it is a part of you that you have lost, but then ask yourself, would it change the way you felt about your friend, mother sister? Sexuality, personality and attractiveness is determined by so many things, its not about physical looks, look at Simon Weston, he had no face, he couldn't hide his imperfections and found true love. I am sending you my love and extra hugs as i might not be on here for a couple of days, but i will be thinking of you and hoping you will find the strength to turn that corner.  Love to you all,

sara x

Nice one Sara

Rosexxx

hi sara its lovely your are giving so much strength to people out there,i dropped down to see my sister today she so upset as she has been told,her cancer is not curable now,and she had been doing so well for 18months now, and her most recent scan had revealed the cancer had spread to her lungs and liver,i had been wondering if my visits were doing her much good,but then i had a lovely message from dizzie which made me realise what my visits were doing for her,its taken me a week to convince her to fight and take the course of chemo they offering to her,which she did and is feeling so ill today,i just want to wish everybody good wishes,and best wishes to you sara,,,,,,,,,

Hi Irishman,

Sorry to hear about your sister.My cancer returned in lymph glands in neck and chest and is also non cureable but I have been on oral chemo for 2 years and ongoing so let your sister know that there are so many different treatments now so dont give up hope.

She must be so glad to have you.

Good luck to you both.

Rose xxx

hi rose, colly, lee, patrica n all you lovely ladies

sorry its been so long, took 4weeks for them to sort the phone out n still having problems with internet. had a lovely holiday but never going away again with a 2yr old! yes charly was a ntmare for about 5 days so didnt come home all relaxed n refreshed. to be truthfull ive not been that great but will tell you about that another time.

hope you had a lovely birthday lee n congrats for finishing chemo. you too colly, congratulation. i wish you both well. n rose ive missed you, hope you are well. patrica i was sorry to read about your son. hope you n he are feeling better now n we can go back to our chats.

sara good luck with your chemo, be thinking of you throughout. n caz im so sorry you have been so down. i can only imagine how you feel but hopefully we can all help to pick you back up. hows the infection now? i hope its less painful now. kylie im sorry you have joined our gang of troopers, but we'll help you through as much as we can.

im gonna get off cos mum n dad are here to help me with charly, hes not very well n found out today hes asthmatic. its also my wedding anniversary, 3 years. couldnt of married a nicer man!

lots of love, be back on soon n probably winge a lot!

leonie xxxxxxxxx

Hi Leonie, so glad to see your back at last. Sorry your hol wasnt as relaxing as you hoped it would be, it is hard work being away with a 2yr old. Im keeping fine, got a few aches in my neck but breast doc seems to think its just caused by the chemo, my nails are a mes and brittle, breaking all the time, my eyelashes at the bottom taking their time to grow back, so have watery eyes when i go out in the cold, my hair is starting to grow back in slowly but surely, how long did it take your hair and what length is it now? I start radio on 25/11 for 6 weeks so it will finish 7/1, then hopefully a wee holiday away in the sun. Congratulations on your wedding anniversary. Take care all you girlies and tony too love col x

Nice Pic Tony, very photogenic x

Winge away lovely girl,its what we are here for.You need a holiday to get over your holiday !!I have always found holidays lovely but very tiring,all that packing and washing.

Hope the weather with you isnt as cold and windy as here.Have a lovely anniversary with your smashing man,the third of many.

Lovely to have you back

Rose xxx

Thank you for your lovely messages everybody.... I am sorry I am so miserable at the moment, I just can't seem to get my head round my new body image.

But no doubt I will get there in time.....Me and Dave had a good talk last night and I tried to explain how i am feeling and why i am so upset about everything, but he told me that it is me being sef concious and nobody is staring......... In my head I know what he is saying is true..... but my heart is breaking at the loss of the person I used to be..... So he just help me and told me that he loved me and everything will be ok in the end.

Lee... I hope you had a good birthday honey, I didn't see anything in the paper about a drunk woman hitting police with her boob, so I think it must have been a good night.

Lonie... I'm sorry that your holiday wasn't as good as you hoped... congratulations on your Wedding Anniversary..... it's my 3rd anniversary on the 30th of this month too.

Take care everybody

Love Caz xxx