Acute Myeloid Leukemia

 So back on the 21st of June 2020 I suffered an avulsion fracture on my ankle while at a Bouldering Gym.

I spent a bit off time off from work, before eventually going in three times a week on half days while my Wife was working from home during Covid. Eventually when I was able to drive, though still on crutches I returned to work 5 days a week for half days. My injury seemed to be taking ages to heal and the bruise under my foot took ages to go away. After many weeks when it disappeared I was finally able to put some pressure down and in a short amount of time I was walking (with a bit of a limp). I eventually got medical clearance and was finally able to return to work full time, glad to be up and walking around stretching my ankle muscle and looking forward to getting back in to hiking. 

I had noticed some small bruises on my arms but put it down to where the crutches had constantly been rubbing on my arms. I had called my Dad and was wanting to organise hiking at Barren Ground as my first hike since my injury, and first hike with him since his rock climbing accident. I thought it was a good walk for the two of us as it was a long and mostly flat walk. I had also really wanted to finally blog about it, as I had actually done the hike a few times and at one point photographed the whole thing in preparation for a blog post. However time got away from me and I forgot the walk or anything to write about sitting with a folder of photos and a draft blog from 25th August 2015, which if I had wrote it would have made it my blogs fourth ever blog post.

However random bruises kept appearing on my body, and I began to get concerned (although I only thought it was a Vitamin D deficiency from being stuck inside due to my ankle). I booked a Doctors appointment for the next Monday as my Wife was concerned about a freckle on my back and locked in hiking with my Dad for the weekend.

Before the weekend came my Dad called to inform me my Nan was in hospital with pneumonia, which she has been in hospital for 4 times the previous year. He was going to travel up to Woy Woy to visit her and I asked if he wanted me to come. He told me not to worry because of Covid restrictions. My Nan ended up recovering.

I enjoyed a nice weekend with my Wife and Dog before returning to work Monday the 24th August, where I went to the Doctors on my lunch break. My back freckle was fine but I was sent for a blood test about the bruises.

I continued my day at work when around 4pm nearing the end of my work day my Doctor called saying my results where concerning and to go to a hospital straight away, this threw me completely and I barely remember the call, going numb and fuzzy. As I went to my desk to try to collect my bag I tried to tell my team members I had to go to hospital, breaking down as I said it. My work colleague ran after me as I left telling me I couldn't drive in my condition as he drove me to Shellharbour Hospital. 

I called my Wife who was very upset and her and her parents came, as they needed to collect my car. They did a bunch of tests and eventually the Doctor told me it was Leukemia. I broke down crying, saying I was going to die and even if I beat it, it would come back and kill me.

Eventually they transported me to Wollongong Hospital, while I sat stunned and dazed feeling pretty defeated. I was taken into a room where I guess more tests where done as it got very late into the night and my Wife eventually had to leave. I was left on this long chair over night with all the loud sounds from the emergency department and all the lights. I eventually passed out from exhaustion.

The next morning they had a bed for me in the emergency department where they did tests on me and fed me a sandwich. My Wife eventually arrived and was able to be with me. I was taken into a small children's room to get some bone marrow taken and given the green whistle. The nurses and doctors were all friendly but as soon as the needle was put into me I sucked hard on that whistle, which tasted like paint smells. Eventually that ordeal was over and I was moved into the hematology department into a bed and a room to myself (after many tests including heart scans and X-Rays). I was introduced to the Doctor and his team who explained it was Acute Myeloid Leukemia and explained about chemo therapy. It was organised for me to go to Concord Hospital in Sydney, to store semen for the future as chemo has the possibility to make you sterile. They wanted me to go three times, however I only went twice and it was enough to get the amount they needed. I began my chemo the next week. One called 7/3 or 3/7 or something. One was attached 24/7 for 7 days while the other took about 15 minutes and was bright pink and changed the colour of my urine and making me, cytotoxic. I managed to make it through the chemo, though it gave me some bad nausea and I began to struggle with the hospital food to the point where I was barely eating.

My friend and often hiking buddy Tristan straight away offered to donate his bone marrow. I told him they will only test close family and he went and signed up at a registry anyway. He also started a go fund me page for me, which I insisted I didn't need (not wanting to take peoples money). He didn't care he said it was for peace of mind seeing as I would be off work and just to ease that mental stress about bills. I told him no one would donate anyway, but he promoted and even shaved his head and vowed to quit smoking if it reached it's target (which it eventually did).

I also got back in contact with my estranged Mother, telling my Wife life was too short to stay bitter about the past.

I tried a video call early on to see my Dog, but it just broke me and I began crying.

A facebook memory came up of me visiting my Aunt Corinne in hospital 3 years ago to the day as she was in for Leukemia too. This made me very sad as my Aunt had died of sepsis.

8th September 2017

The dietitian eventually saw me and changed my menu to the 'kids menu' and I began eating pies, sausage rolls and chicken nuggets with supplement drinks called 'ensures'. I was weighed and I had lost 7kg. After the chemo finished I felt a little better but began on some new medication to inhibit the cancer cell growth called 'Midostauren'. Which was fine at first, but the more I took it the more it progressively made me sick, to the point the smell of the pills made me want to throw up. However I finished my treatment of those managing to keep them all down. Soon my hairs began to fall out, starting with my pubes and then my beard.

Soon my hair began to fall out as the Doctors talked about letting me go home for a bit before my bone marrow biopsy (to see how chemo went).

I began to struggle severely eating the hospital food as well as my mental health, being in a single room for a month and really wanted to be home with my Wife and Dog. Eventually I was released. For 10 days. Currently on my third day home as I write this, with much more in store for me and an uncertain future. Only wanting to beat this thing and enjoy my life with my excellent family and friends and enjoy the beautiful adventures life offers.

By the time I got home I was so excited to see my Dog, however after a month she didn't seem to recognise me and I had a breakdown, crying, my most extreme one yet. Being home I could just think about how much I had to lose and how badly I wanted to beat this thing. It was my lowest point yet.

Eventually I calmed down and tried to focus on just enjoying being home with the family, and finally shaved my head.

I need to defeat Superman

I have to go back in today for a blood test (to see if I need any blood transfusion or platelets), Friday for the same (plus my PICC Line bandage change), Monday for the Bone Marrow Biopsy and then backin hospital Wednesday for more treatment. There's a lot ahead and I'll keep everyone informed and we can just hope I can beat this and be back out on the trails having a Steventure. But for now I'll enjoy the quiet time with my lovely Wife, cute Dog and just watching the new Jurassic Park cartoon on Netflix.

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Thanks for reading! - Steven

Cruise to Fiji and New Caledonia

So last year for Christmas my fiancée surprised me with this:

Turns out she'd purchased us a cruise. Sailing with Royal Caribbean onboard the Explorer of the Seas. Now, a cruise would never be my choice for an adventure, being stuck on a boat with a group of strangers, however there were at least 4 stops, Lautoka in Fiji, Suava in Fiji, Nouméa in New Caledonia and Isle of Pines in New Caledonia. The rest of the days were at sea, which I would have been worried about but I actually thought it would be nice spending the time with my (at this point recently became) fiancée, also, because I was a huge fan of trivia finding out there was many sessions of trivia on the cruise I was excited.

Lautoka and Suva were swapped

And so the date finally came around, and we set sail!

We obviously instantly headed to the buffet for a good feed. Lucky, and to save you the wondering, no, there was no outbreak of Gastro. However at one point a real creepy old guy did cough all over the food however people saw him and reported it right away and the food was removed. However it continued to prove my point that certain people are filth. We had a restaurant dinner the first night and were excited to discover they were serving escargot. Which, if you don't know, is snails cooked in garlic butter. Sound gross? I'd always thought so too, but I'm a pretty adventurous eater and we were unable to try it on our Eurotrip while in France (I swear I'll write about it one day!) so we'd had to travel to Darling Harbour in Sydney and try it at a French restaurant called The Little Snail which I took the dive an ate first to find... THEY'RE DELICIOUS! We have since been back to the restaurant a few times and the food is always amazing. But back to the cruise! So I skipped ahead to dinner, but long before that and after our lunch at the buffet we explored the ship stopping in at the Schooner Bar and getting the cocktail of the day (which we got whatever it was every day).

Schooner Bar

So we soon, during trivia events (of which there was usually morning trivia, battle of the sexes trivia, afternoon trivia and music trivia) learned about our hosts. Paul Poppe, Gustavo, Johnny Cash, Jessie and the lady we referred to as "The Aussie One", which was our least favourite. Gustavo was Mexican, and was fun, feminine and we thought he was awesome, Jessie, Johnny Cash and Paul Poppe were all American I found myself doing a great impression of Paul Poppe that apparently sounded completely accurate in which I quoted him "Hi I'm Paul Poppe and I'm from Miiiiamiiii Floriiidaaa!" He was our favourite. I questioned bringing them up and talking about these people because they are real people. However Gustavo and Jessie didn't give last names, Johnny Cash's was obviously fake and Paul Poppe had stated he did theatre and dreamed of being an actor so being called out on some random Australians travel/hiking/adventure blog that isn't read would hardly phase him I think. We won the trivia a couple of times and came close second or third a lot which we thought was pretty good considering you could be in a team of up to 6 and we always did it just the 2 of us. People started getting real competitive by the end and more and more people started coming to them. The battle of the sexes started ok, but as it always does it reverted and became very petty. The room was meant to be divided but my fiancée ended up sitting over with the men and complaining that the women where particularly obnoxious, she also complained saying that Jessie, the female trivia host for that battle tried to make it easier for them. As the men started to take the lead towards the end of the cruise the women began to get angry and actually complained to Jessie the host who then decided to change the rules. As it was if you answered it right, you got the next question and it continued that way, until you got it wrong then the other side got a chance, however if they got it wrong too you would continue. The women had no problem with this until the men started getting them all right and they couldn't get a shoe-in. So the very final day of it the rules changed to be each team gets a question and if wrong the other team got a chance to answer it, so everyone got a question turn per turn causing the women to jump ahead, and win the entire game and gloat, causing my fiancée to actually be really shitty and annoyed more so then the men who really didn't seem to care.

Now I'm a huge Batman fan, and during one trivia hosted by our favourite Paul Poppe (who it turns out was apparently a super geek like myself) we got the question "Batman is Bruce Wayne, who is Robin" causing me to yell out "Which Robin?" because multiple people have been Robin. To which he says to the captive audience "Ladies and Gentlemen you have our Batman nerd!" Insisting he was too and that we'd have to talk after the trivia. When reading out the answers he asked who else I put besides the obvious 'Dick Greyson' I replied, Jason Todd, Tim Drake, Damian Wayne and 'some chick" which I had actually wrote because I couldn't remember the name of Carrie Kelley. He laughed and repeated "some chick" I turned to my fiancée and said "Some chick WAS Robin, it was in The Dark Knight Returns, I can't remember her name." I never ended up going and talking to him because I'm naturally a socially anxious person despite my fiancée insisting because she wanted me to make friends with him, she insisted this the entire time causing me to be super awkward around him. But I'll bring that up later.

Our first stop was Lautoka. The one place we had prepaid in order to do a tour to a Fijian village with a thermal mudpool and try Kava also known as Yaqona. Our first stop off the ship we took a photo to show the size of it before catching a bus to what I believe was Sabeto to the thermal mud pool.

As we took the bus out a local Fijian Lady filled us in on Fijian history and culture explaining what side of the head you wear your flower indicates whether you are taken or single. We then selected someone from the bus to stand in a chief, for the Kava ceremony. As we continued to drive the rain began to fall heavily. So as we arrived we had to run from the bus under the shelter as wait for the ceremony. Kava itself actually didn't taste too bad, I didn't get too much of an effect from it myself but my fiancée felt really relaxed. We couldn't go properly into the mud pool because of the rain so as it slowed down we instead covered ourselves with the mineral rich mud and let it dry. As we were pretty much half naked for this, and both being self-conscious we took no photos instead we tried to focus on the experience. After walking around the village covered in the mud we then washed off it the thermal pool.

The next day our stop was Suva. Which, if I'm going to be completely honest was a fucking shithole. I don't know if it was alright for people who payed for a tour maybe, but it was just a crowded city of people hassling you and trying to sell you overpriced shit, think the streets of Kuta in Bali but 1000 times worse. We then had an old Fijian man bump into us and start talking and not wanting to be rude we talked back. He explained he was with the Suva council even showing some ID and saying he lived in Australia years ago and he was very nice, however weird as the entire time he held what looked like a tea towel in one hand, he then proceeded to say he new the best places to shop and kept taking us around to overpriced very expensive stores and we struggled to find a way to get away from him, hiding out in one for a while looking around hoping he'd have left and he was always there waiting to take us to the next one. I eventually said to my fiancée my plan to get away from him, so as we left from maybe the 4th shop I said we had to go as we were meeting friends who were leaving the ship, he then said he'd take us back to it... but that wasn't where we wanted to go, we just wanted to get away and explore on our own. So I said "Oh we're not meeting them back at the ship it's alright we'll find them." Hoping that would be it. He then proceeds to say because he helped us (by dragging us all over the fucking place to the most overpriced tourist trap shops) that we should help him (ie, give him some fucking money). I just told him we didn't have anything and we left. If you ever meet that guy, just fucking avoid him. We explored Suva for a bit and decided it was shit and we were sick of being hassled to we went back on the ship. That night during trivia, even Paul Poppe said he had no idea Suva was like that and that he walked past a movie theatre and was tempted to just go watch something, which, we walked past the same one and suggested the same idea. I would honestly (if I didn't have a tour book) if I was on a cruise again that stopped at Suva, stay on the ship.

Our next stop was Nouméa and after Suva, we weren't particularly looking forward to it, given many people had told us it wasn't great. But the lady who sold my fiancée the cruise informed her of a place called Lemon Bay or Baie des citrons. We paid for a hop on hop off bus and took our snorkeling gear and we were not disappointed. The was a reef just off the beach and once I got over my ungodly fear of Sharks it was amazing, the shops just across from it were really lovely too, I could holiday in that one spot and love it. Although I was frightened at one point by either a sea snake swimming past and touching my head, or an eel that looked exactly like one.

We then took the bus to the other side of the island (having already snorkeled there for hours on end, we snorkeled a bit here but it was mostly just a beach (although a lovely one) however we did find this guy there waiting for us.

The next day, having our spirits lifted by the joy that was Nouméa, we got up bright and early to be the first ones across to the Isle of Pines (which we had heard by everyone was the best). Upon arrival we were given a floral headband.

 However, the snorkeling wasn't great there, a lot had been bleached or destroyed and as the day progressed it got incredibly packed almost feeling like being at Bondi beach, albeit nicer.

We tried around this little island, and although there were fish, I think we were disheartened after how amazing Nouméa had been. Maybe it was the hype, and Nouméa had been talked down, but once people arrived on Isle of Pines so much sand was kicked up there was zero visibility. We decided to abandon snorkeling and just explore the island because numerous food and drink stalls had been set up by locals. One of the stalls gave us a free meal called a Bougna which is a cultural dish made with taro, yam, sweet potato, banana and a meat, it was delicious. We also made friends with some of the wild dogs of the island, at least we assumed they were wild. We also bought a lovely fresh fruit of a lady who no one was buying from. It was like a custard-apple but I think a different variety then we get in Australia because it was actually sweet and very delicious. We also paid and got a coconut to drink (I've never actually been a fan of coconut water but this one was actually very delicious) the man we bought it from the opened it with a machete so we could scoop and eat the inside of the coconut. We then went to the other side of the island where less people were and just swam around in the beach with the ship out in the background. 

After this we were back on the ship, knowing our relaxing adventures of trivia, islands, swimming pools, buffets, drinking and the other entertainment had almost come to an end. So I guess I can say now if you read for the island you can stop reading as I will simply tell a few more stories that happened on board the Explorer of the Seas.

So there were a few shows, a magician (who did a good job) and absolutely awful comedian and a hypnotist. Now, I've always wanted to be hypnotised. Why? It intrigues me and I'm unsure if I believe its real. So knowing there was going to be a show I arrived super early to the very front seat to make sure I could be chosen. However as soon as he came on he started making threats essentially. "If you don't believe it wont work on you it won't!" he said, "So don't bother coming up you're only wasting my time and everyone else's!" He was very abrasive about it, putting doubt in my head, which, was evidently a ploy and a guilt trip to stop people going up and if they did to make them feel like shit if it didn't work that they were wasting time so that they'd just go along with it. But before he'd even called people up so many people in the front row had jumped up and taken chairs, so I believed they were planted. As the woman sitting next to me, at the very front said she was there because she could barely see, yet she was one of the first people to jump up and grab a chair before he'd said it. He had also been spitting while talking into the microphone so my fiancée and I just stood up and walked out and didn't even waste our time watching the show.

A few other things we did that they had on the cruise was ice skate, rock climb, shoot hoops, play Mario Kart, a shooting game and air hockey in the arcade, mini golf, and I tried the flow rider surfing thing. I can't skateboard or surf, needless to say I sucked. However one day out by the pool Paul Poppe showed up to host a bean bag throwing competition. My fiancée begged me to be in it to talk to Paul, and so I went up and signed up. While talking to him and saying my name was Steven he said to me "My middle name is Steven" to which, in my unholy horror and supreme levels of awkardness replied "Mine's James". Clarifying to everyone that I'm surely on the spectrum.

Needless to say I actually did alright at it, but eventually psyched myself out by doing too well and missed the board completely on my last 2 throws.

And so we arrived back in Sydney, I never did have a proper conversation with Paul, however the fiancée did try to add him on facebook. She got worse that a decline. She got ignored. And after being home we had a solid two weeks of laughing at my Paul impression and quoting Johnny Cash's "Money, Money, Money, Moneyyyyyy!" that he did over the speakers to get you to play bingo.

My fiancée will be my Wife in under 2 months time and we'll have a adventurous honeymoon in Bali, and although I've already posted a Bali blog. I may indeed write a whole new one.

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Thanks for reading! - Steven