Quietly confident

As the days turn to weeks and creep into months, memories of my time in hospital are starting to fade. Reading blog entries from the first 10 days post-op made me wince, as some of the "valley" moments came back to life again. It really does seem like a long time has passed since the operation and those first difficult few days.

Now, slowly but surely, i'm reclaiming more of the day from my bed. I can walk further without becoming short of breath and the anti-sickness tablets are proving effective. The last 3 days have been very positive, regarding the nausea and fatigue that have otherwise frustrated progress. This has been encouraging.

Eating remains a chore though, as most of my 6 mini-meals are preceeded by sicky feelings in my chest, instead of the hunger pangs most people feel in their abdomen. I'm hoping these pangs will evolve over time, although there's not much i can do to influence where i'll feel them!

As regards WHAT i eat, i'm managing to eat more or less the kind of food that Claudia and the boys usually tuck away, however in much smaller quantities. Max can still eat more for breakfast than i can.. and Claudia claims she eats 3x my daily intake, but i'm not sure about that. How can she look so gorgeous and eat that much?!!

My portions are steadily increasing in size and my aim is to move from 6 mini-meals a day to 3-4 normal-ish sized meals over the next year to 18 months. One of my recovery companions Andrew (a fellow believer), who had his oesophagectomy 18 months ago has just about managed this. He is an incredibly positive guy, who gave me confidence even before my operation, to believe that life would be liveable in the aftermath of such major surgery. I hope to emulate not only his positive attitude but also his eating habits!!