I’ve had better years. Who knew when I started depending on live comedy to earn a living that years later it wouldn’t be that compatible during a pandemic; then last November a new neighbour moved upstairs who has made my life a living hell: you try living under a construction site for several months during lockdown when you’re legally not allowed to go anywhere while someone drills upwards to 10 hours a day, installing dodgy electrics and a dodgy gas pipe (through your brickwork) in the process and let me know how well you cope: and last but not least in May this year I was diagnosed with cancer.

Without wishing to tempt fate (I haven’t had the all clear yet) and I did have a setback on Wednesday which saw me back at A&E, all things considered I’ve been very lucky. The cancer was caught in its early stages thanks to my GP. It was also in a part of my body – the womb – which is more or less self-contained. Moreover, I was diagnosed with cancer this year and not last which meant I could be operated on within a month of the diagnosis. And most fortunate of all, the Tories haven’t managed to privatise the NHS yet which means while dealing with cancer I didn’t have to stress over a crowdfunder and/or ask myself if I really needed an MRI scan or the blood-thinning syringes. Having lived abroad, I can’t reiterate enough how vital a health service is which is free at point of access. Last but definitely not least, I’ve been shown a lot of love by those people I shared my diagnosis with.

Finding out I had cancer in the first place was due to a fortunate happenstance. Much to my annoyance I had to ask for a doctor’s appointment online in order to get the necessary forms for a blood test. My Zen-like temperament was further irked when I had to write down a symptom in order to complete the online rubric. I didn’t have a symptom. All I wanted was the blood tests forms. In desperation I put down that I had some bleeding. Having gone through the menopause years ago (without noticing I hasten to add: don’t ask), it was unusual but I didn’t think anything of it. Later as the GP asked about the bleeding, I hadn’t the heart to tell him I just wrote it in to complete the online rubric. He, however, was concerned and said he would recommend me to see a gynaecologist. Personally, I thought he was overreacting. After all he might have spent years at medical school but I had watched several episodes of ER (George Clooney period) but I decided not to gainsay him.

Days later I am at the hospital being examined when the doctor informs me my womb lining is unusually thick and they need to take another look. For some reason, totally inexplicable in hindsight, I presume they are being overcautious. Even when they take the biopsy and inform me it too looks suspicious, I am still on Planet Denial.

Then one morning I’m recording a short video clip for the WTB podcast with Jen Brister and Allyson June Smith when the hospital rings. They give me an appointment for later that week and suggest ‘You may want to bring a friend’. That’s when the alarm bells finally start ringing. I know from previous hospital appointments you’re not allowed to bring anyone. Ergo if the hospital is actively telling me to bring someone with me, then it can’t be good news. Jen reassures me it means no such thing but nevertheless within minutes of us ending our recording, Jen phones me back having rescheduled her holiday so she can come to the hospital with me.

That Friday Jen and I are at the hospital. Admittedly, Jen and I look an incongruous couple. Whereas I decide the most appropriate clothing to find out if I have cancer or not is to put on heels and an evening dress, adorned with a diamante brooch, Jen opts for sensible shoes, smart trousers, shirt and jacket. The doctor seems confused by the pair of us. As we walk in, he asks who Jen is. Ever the stand up comedians both Jen and I are tempted to say ‘my son’, given that the last time Jen visited me in hospital the nurse assumed that Jen was my 45-year-old son. Wisely we both decide against it given the seriousness of the situation.

Minutes later I learn I have cancer. I say ‘learn’ but to be honest I am not taking it in. I can’t quite believe it has happened to me as I try not to cry. One in two might get cancer in this country but I always assumed I would not be the one in that two. It is as if the doctor is talking to someone else. There is good news however. They have caught it early; it is in the womb: a hysterectomy should remove the cancerous cells assuming it hasn’t spread, but I will need an MRI scan to be sure. That’s when the panic sets in: what if the cancer has spread. I am assured it is unlikely and for the time being to assume it hasn’t, and then I am taken away by a wonderful nurse who sits me down and gives me the assurance I need.

The next day I make the mistake of telling several friends. I say mistake because what I hadn’t take into account is that if you tell a mate you have cancer then, not surprisingly, they phone you to find out how you are. It doesn’t take long before I realise I don’t want to talk about my cancer ad infinitum, relating the same set of facts over and over again, and this is coming from someone who usually finds talking about herself fascinating. The situation is exacerbated when I talk to one particular close friend and admit to him and inadvertently to myself how scared I am about the possible MRI results. Following that call, I decide I can’t talk to anyone else about it.  Take it from me that if a mate doesn’t open up to you about their cancer diagnosis, don’t take it as a personal affront. They are simply protecting themselves.

That night I can’t sleep. I’m told I will need to convalesce for weeks but I am living under a construction site. How can you convalesce if the woman above you is using an industrial drill for up to 10 hours a day? My mental health is already shot to pieces thanks to the ongoing works, and yet I’m told by the nurse that it is vital I have a positive attitude. The thought of having to deal with the cancer and my ongoing living conditions get me into such a stressed state that a few days later I berate a couple of women for blocking the path to my house. It takes a good couple of minutes for it to sink in that it isn’t my house. Yes, that’s right: I’d had a go at strangers for having the temerity to stand in their own front garden. That’s what stress will do to you apparently!

Luckily, it is good news on the MRI scan front. On hearing the results, I burst into tears. Up to then I had told myself I am not thinking about the worst case scenario, but it becomes pretty obvious how scared I have been. The necessary operation is soon in the diary and I spend the intervening days in denial. I wouldn’t necessarily recommend denial as a modus operandi but it’s what worked for me. I don’t research about the cancer or the operation: I just read the minimum I need to do: when not to eat and when to take the pre-surgical drinks. I concentrate instead on the continuing battle I am having trying to get my housing association to take the shoddy works perpetrated by my neighbour seriously. After all, the cancer is out of my hands, but I am more than able to write yet another email.

As fortune would have it, my efforts on the housing front prove effective after I get the Gas Safe Register to confirm that the gas pipe is ‘not to current standards’ (the gas pipe isn’t even sealed), while electricians from UK Power Networks confirm the electric works are a bodge job and they’re not even convinced it has been installed by a bono fide electrician. With them in my corner, Clarion finally do something. Their electrician takes one look at the electrics and disconnects it from the mains. So much for their email stating: Surveyor attended and assessed all works as being safe and to a good standard. More importantly, it means I don’t have to worry about any drilling when I get back from my operation.

As for the operation itself there is an amusing moment when the hospital loses my dress and a nurse asks me in all seriousness if I am sure I had a dress with me. I assure her I hadn’t turned up to the hospital dressed in only my coat and knickers. Luckily said dress is found on another ward minutes later.

Less amusing is arriving home from hospital to discover that I can’t get into my house. My neighbour has left massive wooden panels in the corridor which had fallen down and blocked the front door so it can only open a few inches wide. I couldn’t have moved the panels even if I hadn’t just had a major operation let alone in my current state. In my frustration I start crying at the thought that there is no feasible way I can enter my home. In the end the neighbour comes round (she doesn’t live there, she’s a ‘property developer’ albeit with an apparently woeful lack of knowledge of building and safety regulations) and after an hour I finally get into my flat.

That hiccup aside I’ve been showered with a lot of love. Scared I wouldn’t be that mobile after the operation, my mate Maggie stays the first few days with me. While I sleep, Maggie cleans the kitchen and bathroom for me despite the fact that I cleaned both rooms before I went into hospital. It would seem all my cleaning efforts had gone unnoticed by Maggie. In Maggie’s defence, even I noticed the difference between her cleaning and mine. When we tell Jen what happened, strangely she doesn’t seem that surprised! As for Jen, she orders in food for me, suspecting (rightly) that all my plans to batch cook before the operation will fail to materialise, while another friend Jenny cooks me a delicious vegetarian cottage pie.

I’ve also been the happy recipient of several bouquets of flowers, phone calls, messages, cards and various offers by mates to go shopping for me, tidy up or offer me lifts to wherever. It’s all been rather touching. It’s times like these you truly appreciate your friends.

My take away from this is that (so far) I’ve been extremely lucky: from the moment I had to think of a symptom to fill in on an online form (I would never have mentioned it to my GP otherwise), to the type and stage of cancer I had, to its quick treatment and the fact that all treatment is free at point of access (THANKS NHS) to all the friends who’ve been so supportive over the last few weeks.

If I can offer any advice is that cancer patients may not necessarily want to talk about their cancer: their cancer ISN’T them. Secondly, I discovered how much I hate the questions ‘How are things?’ and ‘You, all right?’ I was asked these questions several times a night when I was gigging. I appreciate it’s British English for Hello and therefore no one wants you to tell them how you are actually doing, but when you’ve just been diagnosed with cancer, and you’re repeatedly replying ‘all right’, ‘OK’, ‘fine’ (the only socially acceptable responses), believe me, all you really want to do is scream ‘Stop asking me that. I have cancer and I’m scared’.

Mind you, at one kebab shop (yes, I eat kebabs. After all, you don’t get a figure like mine without putting the effort in) I end up arguing with someone who I believe has pushed in front of me (but then again that week I had shouted at people for standing in their own front garden so who knows). Then in mid-argument the kebab owner asks me how I am doing. I’d been gigging that night so I already had to field that particular question several times already and I am starving. (This is not a great combination). Thus, in my most dulcet of tones, I inform him that the previous Friday I’d been diagnosed with cancer. An eerie silence sweeps over the busy kebab shop while the woman I’d been arguing with just stares at me. On the plus side, the kebab owner gives me the kebab for free!

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