An Introduction...

An advert for one of those insurance comparison sites – I think this one is compareconfusedmeerkats.com – suggests that most of what the internet is used for these days is pretty pointless. For some reason, I’ve decided to contribute to that web of pointlessness, but hopefully in with the dull banality there’ll be some interest.

But why? I’ve not just decided to start my own blog because I feel that the web is desperate for the benefit of my opinions. To be honest I’m doing this to be selfish. No, I don’t expect to earn any sponsor money because companies will be falling over themselves to advertise here.

For the last three years essentially, I’ve been pretty ill. Worse at some times than others, and what initially was just bog standard Crohn’s Disease became more and more complicated before I was diagnosed with cancer in summer 2009.

18 months on, and not out of the woods yet, I’ve decided to start putting down some of my thoughts, and can’t really see the point of doing that and only letting them see my C Drive. I don’t think there’s any such thing as a ‘normal’ cancer patient – everybody surely deals with a very individual disease in their own way – but if by any chance reading what I’ve gone through helps somebody else get through their own situation, well, that’s a Brucie Bonus.

I’ll spare some of the more gruesome and personal details from making it to print. On the surface of it that’s because I’ll have so few readers that I don’t want to put off the ones I’ve got. On the daft side, it’s probably more because I’d be too embarrassed to put them into print (or whatever the equivalent term for the web is). Daft, because I look back now and think that had I spoken to the doctor’s earlier about some embarrassing symptoms, things in the Crohn’s chain could have been nipped in the bud earlier. Proof if ever it were needed that young blokes (and I was young at the time!) do themselves more harm than good by keeping quiet when really they ought to speak up.

In terms of where I currently am, I’m recovering from an operation six weeks ago while awaiting a date to restart chemotherapy. It’s been nearly six months since I could live on my own in my own flat, was able to go to work, or sat down and had a pint in the pub. I’m over the moon with the fact that I’ve got a whole week in my diary at the minute – a whole week!! – without a medical appointment - other than waiting in for my daily visit from the district nurse.

So through this blog I intend to keep a record of what I’m going through. It’d be daft to say ‘until I’ve beaten this thing’ because by then, blogs are likely to be a bit passé and old school and we’ll all have moved on. You’ll also get the benefit of some of my views on the sporting world – being off work and out of my usual social scene I don’t get the chance to vent those as often, so lucky you lot. If you only follow me online, you get the benefit of my wonderful sporting knowledge. If you usually ‘benefit’ from such opinions, you can now choose to ignore them with a clear conscience…

Nearly half past 9? That classes as a late night for me these days. Time for my tablets before bed…