• The Ultra-Sound scan that reviled a tumour the size of a football in my stomach - trainee doctor doing one of his first ultra-sounds expecting to see a baby as I looked 9 months pregnant - had the screen facing away from, had a dead straight face and was silent - those that know me will know I love a good conversation “C’mon Doc’ what can you see have I still got two kidneys?” I tried everything I could to crack a smile out of him - nothing. Turned to Mum when we left the room “goodness me he was miserable wasn’t he?” - Little did we know what the poor guy was going through, just hope I didn’t scar him for life!

• Implanted Port - I didn’t get a choice on what line I had but oh boy am I grateful they had to use this. This is the device they used to deliver my chemotherapy. This option meant that I could still have proper showers, go canoeing and swimming - which was huge for me! It was always a bit of a thud when they put the needle in my chest to access the device but totally worth it to have the freedom between chemotherapy weeks.

• Morphine does some wacky and wonderful things, before any treatment, medications the nurses had to check my details and also get permission, Nurse “Is that ok Beth?”, “Yes”, Nurse “Beth, is that ok?”, “Yes”, My Brother rubs my arm “Beth you need to tell the nurse yes” “Oh sorry I thought I did yes” - the whole time I was responding it was all in my head and nothing actually come out of my mouth!!, Then a little later I was thinking I’m so thirsty and my brother handed me a drink straight away I turned to him and said “Thank you, how did you know?”, “Beth, you just said you were thirsty” Giggling at me, I giggled back I said I am thinking things and actually saying them and trying to say things and just thinking them!!

• The dreaded drain! The tumour had blocked everything going through my body as it was so big so everything I was drinking was just sitting on top of it to the point where it was squishing my lungs and making it hard to breath, luckily (I think), I was in so much pain from the tumour that when they had to put an emergency drain in my stomach to get all the liquid out I was on gas and air they pierced a needle through into my stomach I didn’t feel a thing because of the huge amount of excess fluid in my abdomen from days or maybe weeks of build up they had to leave the drain in and could only drain 200ml every hour to prevent my body from going into shock, I’m not sure how long this went on for but it felt like days so when it finally came down to pulling the drains needle out my body had started almost healing around it - save you the gory details I couldn’t breath the gas and air in fast enough, it basically felt like an apple on the end of a string and felt like a big “pop” when the coiled end of the needle broke back out of my stomach! Safe to say it was no where near as pleasant as the needle going in!

• Operations - so it’s probably granted now I am not your typical patient. Before any operation the surgeon has to explain the surgery and you sign before they can complete it. It was time for my big operation the tumour had now shrunk from a football to the size of a tennis ball. The surgeons explained the incision they wanted to use for the operation - one of them a C section cut and the other a separate cut to access my liver, I said I am not happy with that as it will take longer to recover is it possible to do the operation without cutting through my abs and we decided on a straight incision between my abs that both surgeons could get to what they needed from too.

Operation time I wake up from my operation and go to sit up to grab a drink, I couldn’t sit up so I panicked called a nurse “Everything ok?”, “I can’t sit up to get my drink”, “I can pass it to you”, “No I can’t sit up”, “If you hold that button it’ll sit you up”, “No I want to sit up myself”, “Beth you’ve just had major surgery on your abdomen, your not supposed to be able to sit up right away”, well who would have known that! In the first major operation they took; 1.5 ovaries, Peritoneum curtain, 1/3 Liver, laser gunned part of the bowel and lungs. The second operation around a year later there was a blip where they thought it had come back and gone to my bowel as well as the ovary. So in preparation for the second operation they were trying to teach me how to use a colostomy bag and I refused to learn they said it is a possibility that you will wake up with a bag after this operation and we won’t be able to let you go home until you can empty it on your own, that’s ok I said I’m not having one and if I do I will have to learn then but until I have to I don’t want to think about it. So the second I woke up from the operation I was madly tapping my stomach wishing there wasn’t a bag and as everything was still completely numb I couldn’t feel if there was or not so I asked the nurse in the recovery room if I had one and she said I can’t see one in your notes, I was so relieved as my sport is a contact sport I couldn’t see me being allowed to play if I had a bag, also it meant I was right when I was being stubborn with the doctor which was very satisfying. Operation 2 just a quarter of my remaining ovary taken, phew!