My first hair cut!

I am continuing to feel better and better. My hair is sprouting at a rapid rate, which I hope is due to the very expensive shampoo I bought to encourage hair growth. I went to the hairdresser last week to get my hair coloured and cut! At least now I no longer look like a koala with hairy grey ears and it looks like a hair cut that I had done intentionally. I do miss my long hair and get a little cranky when I see people with long hair who do not appreciate it. I saw a girl at West End yesterday who had very long blonde hair which was matted, dreadlocked and had different things sticking out of it. I thought to myself that she didn't deserve such long hair and it looked like it needed a good wash.

I spent last weekend in Sydney - which was awesome. Great friends, great food and great rugby (apart from the fact that Giteau can't kick and the Wallabies lost by one point) - it was the perfect weekend for me. My friends took me to degustation at Quay, which was the most amazing food experience of my life. I would recommend to anyone to ignore the price and just do it! Between my trip to Tasmania and the Sydney getaway, I am starting to feel like myself again more and more. The Sydney trip had been planned during my treatment and it was great to have something to look forward to after radiation. For me, it has been a great way to mark the end of the horrid part of the treatment and the start of new beginnings. I would recommend to anyone who is going through treatment to plan something to look forward to, it doesn't have to be a decadent weekend away (although mine was fantastic!), even a nice dinner somewhere or a night away, just something that you can say after this - is the rest of my healthy new life.

Whilst in Sydney I caught up with a very close friend of mine who is currently going through dialysis. This is for six hours, three times a week. I had lunch with her and then went to the hospital for her treatment. I miss the days when we had lunch and then went shopping. I felt fine walking into the hospital with her, we were just chatting and laughing as we always do. She was shown to her chair and asked me to get some blankets for her. When I returned the nurse was there with the tray of needles and tubes. I stopped in my tracks and realised just how my mother would have felt on that first day of my chemo and every treatment after that. It hit me like a punch in the face and I burst out crying. It is a horrible feeling being on the other side and watching someone that you love so much having to go through that, and you feeling so helpless to do anything for them. I feel fine with how I coped with the treatment and how I feel at the moment, but now I have started to think about how it was for the people who are closest to me. I am beginning to understand the different reactions people had to my treatment.

The young women's group continues to go well. Yesterday there was much discussion about fertility. I didn't find this topic as confronting or draining as the last group, as I feel that fertility isn't an issue for me at the moment. Having children is so far in the future for me, it isn't even in my realm of thinking. At this point in my life, I am aiming at a first date! As for kids, I am an Aunty to nine great kids and the best thing about them - is I get to give them back to their parents at the end of the day!