Welcome!

In April 2011 I was diagnosed with a rare form of cancer, Leiomyosarcoma or LMS for short. At diagnosis I had tumours in my abdomen and in my liver. The only real cure for LMS is to have all the cancerous tissue removed surgically. Unfortunately, in my case the tumours were not operable due to their number and location.

Nine months on from then I am lucky enough to still be feeling well and to have no real symptoms. I had a course of chemotherapy in the summer of 2011 that helped to shrink the tumours. From the end of August up until today I have had no more treatment, instead I've had regular CT scans to monitor for any signs that the cancer is progressing. My most recent scan was performed last week and has shown that whilst the liver tumours are stable the abdominal tumour has grown slightly. I will therefore be going back onto chemotherapy again in the next month or so.

I have created this blog to provide a source of up to date information to friends and colleagues who wish to know how I am getting along. I have decided to make the blog publicly readable as I know there are other people who share my condition and who might be interested in my experiences.

I have to warn readers up front that I may sometimes stray off topic in these posts, but you can always skip over those bits! Also I intend to be quite straightforward and open about my experiences, so I apologise in advance if anyone finds the content here to be depressing or otherwise upsetting, that is certainly not my intent.

You may be wondering about the title of this blog, well I have chosen it to remind me to always try to say something positive in each post! For this post I will just say that despite my illness and some other very sad family news, 2011 was far from all bad. My wife Katie and I had some good times too, in particular two wonderful holidays, one in Zambia and one in India. We have also been very touched by the warmth, kindness and friendship shown to us by so many people. We really appreciate all the wonderful support that so many have provided.