Susan Eileen Jenkins and Missy Anyone who watches Holby City on BBC1 regularly would have watched a recent storyline where the doctors differed over the diagnosis of a patient with a rare condition. In the end it was a young registrar who successfully diagnosed ACC [Adenoid Cystic Carcinoma] a rare cancer that usually occurs in the head and neck and which also almost always metastasizes to the lung, liver, bones and brain.
ACC is the cancer I have lived with for four decades and over the years I have learnt a great deal about it from trawling the internet. The best outcome for anyone with ACC is for surgery to remove the tumour and then for radiotherapy to mop up any cancer cells in the area. Chemotherapy is of limited value currently although an organisation ACCRF [Adenoid Cystic Carcinoma Research Foundation] in the USA supports research into this pernicious disease which almost always returns despite best efforts to eradicate it, as has been the case with me.
I underwent a total laryngectomy in 1980 for cancer in my trachea, followed by surgery for local recurrence in my thyroid gland in 1996; then in 2015 I underwent a lower lobectomy of my left lung as well as microwave ablation to my liver in the same year. There was further recurrence in my liver in 2016 and 2017 and now in 2018 significant progressive disease has appeared again in both lungs but this time the treatment options are even more limited, surgery and radiotherapy are out of the question; however, chemotherapy may buy me time, although I am not holding my breath!
So what does this mean for now? My will is updated, my family and friends informed, but then there is the dilemma as to what to do next on the writing front. Do I self publish some or all of the seven or so novels I have written for 9-13 year olds as well as those for younger children or do I start work on a new novel? I’ve had many requests to make my trilogy into a quartet, although I’m not quite sure that there is such a thing as a quartet in writing. Truth be told, a fourth novel set in outback Australia which follows on from “Beyond the Mulga Line” does appeal. I find myself thinking about the characters, the plot, and the dialogue at odd moments of the day so perhaps another novel, this time with Ruby and Jess as central characters, may be the way to go, or perhaps I should write something quite different. Either way I’m not sure I have adequate time left to complete a novel, let alone undergo the editing process that can easily eat up the weeks and months, although I do know that so long as the novel is complete my friends and family would ensure that it is edited and published.
There is also the possibility that working on the novel will be of help psychologically. There is no doubt that writing is extremely cathartic; while concentrating on the narrative the writer is immersed in another world and being able to lose yourself in this way is, I believe, as good a way as any of keeping thoughts of the dreaded Big C at bay. One thing I do know is that it will not be easy to get back into the rhythm of writing on a daily basis; it has been hard enough completing the editing process of the last novel so the thought of starting again with a new one is somewhat daunting, but daunting or not I think that writing a new novel is the way for me to go at this moment. It is at this point that perhaps I should take the advice of my friend and fellow writer, B E Hope, and write for ten minutes each day in order to get back into the rhythm of writing on a daily basis. This advice sounds good to me, ten minutes is doable for most people, even those with limited energy as is the case for me at the moment.
Finally, if any of you have comments or observations about getting back into writing after a long gap, or if you are unfortunate enough to have been diagnosed with ACC and you’d like to comment or ask a question about the disease then do contact me through the website. I will always endeavour to reply so long as I am physically able to do so.
ACC is the cancer I have lived with for four decades and over the years I have learnt a great deal about it from trawling the internet. The best outcome for anyone with ACC is for surgery to remove the tumour and then for radiotherapy to mop up any cancer cells in the area. Chemotherapy is of limited value currently although an organisation ACCRF [Adenoid Cystic Carcinoma Research Foundation] in the USA supports research into this pernicious disease which almost always returns despite best efforts to eradicate it, as has been the case with me.
I underwent a total laryngectomy in 1980 for cancer in my trachea, followed by surgery for local recurrence in my thyroid gland in 1996; then in 2015 I underwent a lower lobectomy of my left lung as well as microwave ablation to my liver in the same year. There was further recurrence in my liver in 2016 and 2017 and now in 2018 significant progressive disease has appeared again in both lungs but this time the treatment options are even more limited, surgery and radiotherapy are out of the question; however, chemotherapy may buy me time, although I am not holding my breath!
So what does this mean for now? My will is updated, my family and friends informed, but then there is the dilemma as to what to do next on the writing front. Do I self publish some or all of the seven or so novels I have written for 9-13 year olds as well as those for younger children or do I start work on a new novel? I’ve had many requests to make my trilogy into a quartet, although I’m not quite sure that there is such a thing as a quartet in writing. Truth be told, a fourth novel set in outback Australia which follows on from “Beyond the Mulga Line” does appeal. I find myself thinking about the characters, the plot, and the dialogue at odd moments of the day so perhaps another novel, this time with Ruby and Jess as central characters, may be the way to go, or perhaps I should write something quite different. Either way I’m not sure I have adequate time left to complete a novel, let alone undergo the editing process that can easily eat up the weeks and months, although I do know that so long as the novel is complete my friends and family would ensure that it is edited and published.
There is also the possibility that working on the novel will be of help psychologically. There is no doubt that writing is extremely cathartic; while concentrating on the narrative the writer is immersed in another world and being able to lose yourself in this way is, I believe, as good a way as any of keeping thoughts of the dreaded Big C at bay. One thing I do know is that it will not be easy to get back into the rhythm of writing on a daily basis; it has been hard enough completing the editing process of the last novel so the thought of starting again with a new one is somewhat daunting, but daunting or not I think that writing a new novel is the way for me to go at this moment. It is at this point that perhaps I should take the advice of my friend and fellow writer, B E Hope, and write for ten minutes each day in order to get back into the rhythm of writing on a daily basis. This advice sounds good to me, ten minutes is doable for most people, even those with limited energy as is the case for me at the moment.
Finally, if any of you have comments or observations about getting back into writing after a long gap, or if you are unfortunate enough to have been diagnosed with ACC and you’d like to comment or ask a question about the disease then do contact me through the website. I will always endeavour to reply so long as I am physically able to do so.
RSS Feed
