Been A While

This could refer to many things; 'been a while' since we last wrote and 'been a while' since we began this blog and our very personal journey with cancer. Well it is almost over - treatments that is, we wont be able to get rid of PMH that quickly (Bless Them) as we will have tests & scans and then routine check ups for a while, but one thing at a time I keep reminding myself.

So here it is, Oliver's treatment concludes next Monday - by which time we will be in Busselton having what some would class as a holiday, but I am thinking I should term it something different like 'A home away from home', so that I dont get too disappointed. Dont get me wrong, I am very thankful to be able to get away and I do love staying in Busselton in the winter enjoying the rain and what some would term 'miserable' weather - we both do, but the catch is Oliver will be on treatment & then recovering from it for most of while were away. As I write I realise what I need to keep in mind is that one day soon we will be able to have a holiday free from anything to do with cancer - hopefully!

I am kind of wondering if we will get presented with some kind of medal on Wednesday as we venture into PMH for Oliver's last treatment, I definitely feel like we deserve one. I know that the nurses will mention it & that people will be excited for us. This is lovely, but what I myself have been realising of late, is that there are a lot of thoughts and emotions that Simon and I have not been able to process during this time of surviving Oliver's treatment that will now have the opportunity to surface. As well as hearing from other parents whose children have been through treatment for cancer, that the end of the treatment spells CRASH for the parents. I guess I want to warn some of you that I am not expecting life to be all sunshine & roses as soon as Oliver has finished his treatment.

On a positive note, we are off to buy gumboots tomorrow in preparation for lots of 'puddle jumps' down south. Oliver thoroughly enjoys puddles, in fact Simon has some footage of this & I am talking huge puddles at Hyde Park so I will have to get him to include that. Right now he is cooking us dinner, which he has been doing a lot, he does it so well, I figure I might as well give him the satisfaction of producing lovely meals, hee hee. I am thankful that Simon is creative and happy to cook, because it is certainly a daily task that I struggle with. In the past we have called ourselves 'Team Roebuck' and I think this rings true, as we do work well as a team.

Well I wonder how life has been for everyone reading this of late? I would love to hear updates on how you are all going.

Bye for now

Love the Roebucks

Resorting to Chocolate

It is only just after 6am and already I am into the chocolate. Oliver has been awake since 5:15am, with a poo which I changed & then put him back to bed, since then he has continued to chatter, mostly to say Dad, Dad, Dad. I gave up the notion of going back to sleep a while ago & then was getting so agitated in bed I decided to get up. My rule is that I won’t get Oliver up until 6:30am.

I just read Simons latest blog entry and so softened that I went in to settle my son as he had been crying for the last 10 minutes, at last there is silence – for how long? I don’t know!

I am losing my patience. Yesterday I was very close to losing it too. I picked/swung Oliver up yesterday roughly & he just looked at me with these wide eyes, he knew I was mad & we stared at each other for half a second & then I just made a funny exasperated noise. I know it is still the drugs affecting his behaviour, he has about a 5 second attention span, perhaps it is actually a few minutes, but to me it feels like 5 seconds.

Another favourite in his vocabulary is Nan Nan to which following he makes a dog noise, which means he wants to go and see Nanna & Bindi (their dog). So because the weather was yucky & I felt we needed to get out of our house to a different scene, we drove down to Nanna’s just to visit Bindi as everyone else was at work. This is where I noticed the 5 second attention span, as I was hoping he would be enamoured enough with the dog & the different toys at Nanna’s that I could have a cup of tea – silly me! Silly me for even making a cup of tea as that ended up spilt on Nanna & Grandad’s rug, lucky it is a colourful one, so the spilt tea is not too noticeable, it was whilst cleaning this up with Oliver motioning that he was ready to go home, followed by him playing on the stairs & then hurting himself that I then picked him up roughly.

Needless to say yesterday was a long, tough day. We both missed Simon as he had been home with us for the past 5 days.

You may well notice that it has been a long while since I have written on the blog & I admire Simon's dedicaton to being able to do so, despite how he is feeling. For me I have been battling with anxiety & depression and so therefore have not felt like writing.

So back to the tea & chocolate, I confess to being at it again, but I have had breakfast in between. After giving Oliver his 1st breakfast of cornflakes & peaches in his highchair, then his 2nd breakfast of toast & milk at his table, doing some chores, playing trucks, reading stories - I am exhausted and you would not believe it, I am not even finished my cup of tea and my little blessing is awake again - so off I go for Round 2 of the day, knowing that Simon will be home shortly makes it not so overwhelming.

Ta ta for now

Love Karli

Resilience

Resilience is the word that comes to mind whenever I think of my little man. People are always asking us how he is, and my reply is usually "Great. Without his tube you wouldn't know he was sick. It's like water off a ducks back". I feel this is true - only he can really say - but I also feel as if I'm devaluing Oliver's experience and struggle.

He can't tell us what he is really feeling. We can only go on what he displays to us. I often wonder if he feels rotten sometimes, but is so used to it, it's normal. I wonder what sort of threshold he will have for pain and illness when he is older. I have no doubt he'll be a lot tougher than his soft dad.

A few weeks back I took Oliver to see his Grandpa and his wife in York. Uncle Jason and cousin Kaitlin were there too. Oliver loved spending time with Uncle Jason, and I think Uncle Jason liked it too.

In The Park

My favourite place to take Oliver is Hyde Park. He doesn't mind it either.

As Oliver has grown, he has changed what he does and likes to do. He's happy to wander around without his trolley now, although it still gives him more balance and pace so we take it just in case. Although he get's so excited about seeing the ducks, he doesn't seem that interested once we get there - but he's happy to sit and watch them during his rest and snack periods. He started to chase the magpies and mudlarks yesterday, and will plop himself down in a pile of leaves and just start picking them up, looking at them quizzically, then putting them down. One of his favourite pass times at the park has been to push his little Tonka truck along the benches and walls. He has also taken to the slide. The park has a few different play areas for different ages which means that there is a slide with a much gentler slope and distance. He will climb up the stairs, back himself onto the slide, then slip down on his belly, feet first. Very ingenious, and it brings a lovely smile to his face too.

In The Garden

As our little man has grown he has become more and more adventurous. He never liked to touch the grass, but now, as you can see, he doesn't mind it at all. He helped his mum rake up some leaves the other day. Now we just need to get him to keep them in the bucket.

Friday On My Mind

Well, it's the last day of the week and the start of my days off with my little man and beautiful wife. Despite the reason behind it, I enjoy the days to spend time with my family.

I had to go back in to PMH today because we forgot to restock our mouthcare stuff for the monkey. While I sat in the pharmacy, a recognisable name was called out. The mum was sort of familiar, so I asked the young girl she was with if it was who I suspected - I was right (unsurprisingly - just kidding. I fake being wrong sometimes) I was at a loss as to who the young girl was. The last time I had seen her she was mid-thigh height at most. Admittedly that was 7-odd years ago. Now she's taller than me - not a difficult task you might think, but she is only 15, and her mum's a shorty too. How strange it was to run into them, particularly at the PMH dispensary. But it was great. Hopefully, we will get a chance to catch up another time, and maybe reaquaint ourselves with a game of 500 aswell. I hope we can catch up soon Q-family.

Since some of you have missed out on the last month of our little man's life, I'll be sure to put up some more photo's and video's. He is confidently walking on his own now, though still a little shakey. I did notice today, however, that he seems to be steadier when he is on his treatment. Very perculiar. Here are a couple of photo's of him in his new dressing gown bought by Oma. He loves the holographic eye's on the hood, and he looks so cute.

He's also become quite adept at opening and closing drawers and doors. Fortunately, he prefers to close things, especially the fridge while Dad is getting things out of it.

Better Late Than Never

Oops. It's been a while. It's not that anything hasn't happened worth reporting, just that we haven't really been able to get up the enthusiasm to write. Rather than this be a massive entry, I'll promise to write regularly over the coming days.

Since our last entry, Oliver has been through two more rounds of chemo. Yesterday was his second last. It took practically all day due to staffing issues at the hospital, but we don't plan to do anything else on those days anyway. Yesterday was a bit of deja vu. We were given a room to ourselves, which always makes it a bit easier. We were placed in Rm 6, however, and combined with the wet and dreary start to the day, it seemed as though we were back at the start of it all over again. Rm 6 was the room we spent our initial stint in, and was home for almost 4 weeks, if I remember correctly. Of course, our little man is so much healthier now, but it just had all the hallmarks of those days 11 months ago.

You wouldn't know that he had just had chemo

I am taking July off. Oliver has his last treatment on the 1st, and so we have decided we will take off down south when we can and enjoy some time together before I need to be back for my university orientation day on the 14th, ready to start on the 20th. We didn't see much of July last year as most of it was spent in PMH. Hopefully we will get a chance to have some semi-normal time as a family without any chemo on the horizon - although there are a number of tests he will need during July and August.

Reading with Nanna.

Oliver's favourite on-line song.