9. A Time To Celebrate ?

After a very restless night Tony was eventually made comfortable as the dosage for the epidural was increased making him virtually pain free.
Unfortunately though he was now having trouble with ‘weeing’ and had to have a catheter fitted. Not very nice for a 15 year old to endure, especially when all that surrounded him and the other patients was a curtain. Still he was brave and it also helped him tremendously.

We were introduced to the Social Worker for Clic (Cancer and leukaemia in children) and were told that as he had now been officially diagnosed they could help us with things like accommodation.
To us this was a huge relief as the hospital was more than 125 miles from home and there was no way I intended to leave him there on his own.

Anyone who has read my previous posts will know that as this was all going on I was also deeply concerned for the welfare of my youngest son who was living with his father.
Just days before Tony was taken ill my youngest had drawn a picture and told me things that sent alarm bells ringing once again that all was not as it should be at home.
I had taped our conversation and taken it along with the drawing to our local Social Services Welfare Officer as well as a transcript of the conversation that they had requested.(This was the first time we had managed to get a recording )
I was told that they would look into it for me, but sadly Tony was taken ill and we were whisked off to Bristol before I had a chance to follow it through.
I was now able to relay these concerns to the Clic Social Worker who promised to find out what action had been taken….another relief (or so I thought)

The day seemed to get better, Tony was able to sleep most of it away, and was responding really well to the treatment.
Then the best news of all , our consultant came back from London to tell us personally that early indication showed that the Cancer he had was the one that could be treated !!
It felt like Christmas had arrived 2 weeks early….all the rest of my family were busy preparing for celebrations with their children and here I was celebrating that my eldest son had a ‘good cancer’ and my youngest was being investigated by Social Services for exhibiting unusual sexualised behaviour at the age of 5.
What did I have to complain about???
I was so torn between my boys and my daughter, I had Tony possibly dying in front of me, my youngest living with his father whom I was only allow to speak to when his father dictated I could ,and who I was worried sick about, and my daughter, at home, aged 17 who was worrying about us all.
How I missed my Mum so much… sadly she had died from breast cancer 8 years before at the age or 57 , and my Dad ?... living in Spain with his new wife who he married 4 months after Mum had died.(Perhaps a little bit of resentment there do you think ?)