Inoperable Prostate Cancer
Yep! That’s what it is and that’s how I choose to label it.
But why?
Because a long term, very serious and very deadly parallel but unrelated condition of mine ensures and guarantees I must not be operated upon if or when any existing (or new) health drama requires me to ever go ‘under the knife’.
It’s a long term blood thinning / DVT / blood clot thing I won’t give much further oxygen to here now but, suffice to say, it means that while other folk get second chance or a golden ticket if or when given a routine medical operation, yours truly, as has already been proven once already, doesn’t respond at all well to having his plott britva’d and the old krovvy spilled by a tone deaf surgeon not even willing to listen to a patient who has already suffered this way. (As happened to me a couple of years ago) 🙁
Just saying … I’m kind of knitting the parachute on the way down with this, (A familiar Beachism of mine!) … and the same philosophy I applied when pursuing the discipline that won me international success and accolades when pursuing The Gravity venture.
And yeah. I know.
This is not a very cool or sexy topic, is it?
That said, this page may be good for me to use as a device to vent or find some kind of solace, assuming I’m comfy to choose to give my precious time, (I nearly added the word remaining for a bit of poignancy 🙂 to indulge in such self flagellation but, maybe, I should just go fishing instead! 🙂
Point is, I’ll use this page or even craft a whole section on something whenever I feel a need to rant or scream injustice!
Hormone Therapy
Currently, as of October 2023, to an outside observer, I probably appear pretty together, upbeat and cheery. However, living a life with cancer is not actually that thrilling. In fact, it’s quite tedious and in this post, unlike on other pages discussing this topic, I’ll just share an account of a routine, average day.
Except we have to start such a day at bedtime.
Bedtime is tough because it represents the start of a bit of a grind.
Bedtime means I’m entering the challenge of getting through the night.
That process can start as early as 8pm. ie. If I’ve been challenged by my innate natural need to present my previous day as being cool, OK or absolutely fine to the outside world, I end up just plain exhausted by the energy expended in such deceit and fall into bed relieved to be able to drop the pretence.
Then, despite my failing eyesight, (I can’t read a PC screen or mobile device without glasses any more), I generally rely on the 50″ TV in the bedroom to deliver me some escapism in the form of on demand Coronation Street drama or I pursue some YouTube related adventure watching Space X Starship progress , artificial intelligence news or current affairs fodder to occupy my incessant need for intellectual stimulation … all the while knowing that waves of hot sweat and chills will soon force me to shout “Alexa. Fan on” and “Alexa Air on” to push air my way via one of two strategically placed smart air conditioning units. (I have a third manually controlled remote air fan if I need even more additional cooling).
I also regulate my temperature with a dry towel and two water soaked flannels hanging off the bedstead while, beyond my control, I sweat into the sheets from my back, shoulders and limbs.
Yeah. It’s pretty grim.
AND, lest we forget, even if or when I eventually defy such problematic issues and drop off to sleep, my prostate condition guarantees I wake up every couple of hours to pee … which prompts the whole night sweat thing to grip me all over again.
So … yeah … bedtime … nightimes … they are not my favourite times of any given day.
Cancer is a bummer and, (pause), God, yes I feel really lousy most mornings after a now routine nightly regime of hot sweats, visits to the bathroom and constant insomnia BUT, once awake and upright, (usually by around 9:30am), I return to the regular Chris Goodland I recognise and then I just get on with life.
And getting on with life has taken on some new and profound extra meaning since the onset of the illness although, I might add, I don’t recognise any narrative that suggests that I am “battling cancer” or battling with cancer, (Not yet anyway), although, at any moment, at any time, as an obvious consequence of enduring such an insidious disease, I may discover some different part, (or parts), of my body rotting from within).
UPDATE: Actually, as of February 1st, 2024, that process may, (or may not) have already happened although the strange, burning sensation in the calf of my left leg could be a number of things including;
a) A mere pulled muscle. b) Another blood clot? c) A section of numb skin manifesting as a result of sciatica
brought about by the botched cancer biopsy? d) Bone cancer in that same leg?
Dunno. Dunno quite what is going on so I’ve just gotta wait a few days to see if the issue passes or dissipates.
Hope it does.
Anyway; I have other issues troubling me, worse than cancer, and they come from an unexpected direction.
From what I used to think was family.
Abandoned!
Yep. It’s bewildering but since telling my immediate Bridport family about my cancer diagnosis in July 2020, ex wife Jackie, son Oliver and daughter Sophie, (who, in their 30’s, still live with Jackie in our original family home), have all entirely blanked me.
I have no understanding or knowledge as to why our previously happy relationships changed once I got cancer and can only assume that none of them want to be involved with the prospect of caring for me if or when I get truly sick or mortally ill. 🙁
Fair enough. I appreciate my dying will be a challenge but is it fair or morally OK for them to just abandon and delete me entirely from their lives?
2022 Transperineal Perineal biopsy
The elephant in the room?
The elephant is … Having had 2 DVTs over time and aware of the dangers of invasive surgery, I had warned Drs, surgeons, pharmacists, nurses, specialists, EVERYONE, that the biopsy would give me a 3rd DVT ) because they intended to stop – and did stop – my Warfarin medication at the time)
But no, I was advised “I’d be fine”.
Maintaining my serious doubt and concern, I even negotiated with a special meds nurse whose job it was to prep patients to ensure they got the correct pre op medications and I said that if I was going to have to come off Warfarin, could she please see that I was prescribed Clexane as an insurance policy and while this was unlikely, they said, at the last minute I was advised that I was going to be given Clexane.
She agreed! … which soothed my anxiety, except, in reality, is was not administered to me pre op. (She never did make that situation manifest)
“You’ll be fine, Mr Goodland” (Long pause) … but I wasn’t and I DID get a 3rd DVT – plus my healed sciatica issue of 15 years prior was awoken and I ended up with a numb right foot as well!
And the sick irony? After the dangerous and subsequently life threatening situation that happened directly after that surgery, that biopsy, after I did develop a 3rd life threatening DVT bloodclot in my already twice compromised right leg, with hindsight, my Dr acknowledged that I had been right all along when, with the stable door now shut after the horse had already bolted, he deemed that, yes, I did, in fact, suffer from a Chronic DVT condition.
Chronic DVT. So, yes, future “invasive therapy” is never going to be suitable for me. Surgery is out!
A FACT I HAD ATTEMPTED TO TELL EVERYONE PRIOR. (Doctors, Surgeons, Pharmacists, (One who burst into tears when she found out), Nurses, a Pre Op Medication Nurse, etc, etc)
NHS from my Patient perspective
As a former professional Finishing Foreman, Site Agent and Works Inspector working across both Construction and Local Government over 20+ years (at the time), it had always been my role to monitor, inspect, discipline and then highlight where improvements to a contract, work practice, regime or concept could be finessed, honed, perfected or demanded so this brief but telling section is written with my serious head on.
Meaning; Over an entirely traumatic few years, with the trinity of the cancer, the pandemic and the complete lack of personal support from my own immediate Bridport family, I found myself living in some kind of parallel Half Life / Gordon Freeman style dystopia that was both terrifying and fascinating to experience at the same time.
And yet … And yet, despite each of those individually mentioned ‘chapters’ of personal ill health, raw heartbreak and anxious detachment, (the illness, the deadly but non living virus and the family abandonment), it was the NHS as a machine and as a dysfunctional, tone deaf group of human beings that, by far, shocked and disturbed me the most.
A complete and worrisome story in its own right, we shall pick up on this particularly chilling tale elsewhere on tidesofentropy.co.uk. It isn’t written yest, as of June 2026, but when collated, edited and uploaded, you’ll find the story here. NHS Debacles (Plural) and Dr makes questionable instruction to take RIVAROXABAN immediately without INR monitoring and Unexpected digital examination and Harmful medication intercepted by pharmacist
Apologies for this page. I mean, I did confess I might use it as a place to unburden some thoughts but there. 🙁
June 2026
Oh, and its official. Being nearly 70 years old, ailments or not, my nemesis, Entropy, is beginning to get the better of me and though I’m entirely happy in my skin by day, the business of getting through the night, (always with disturbing dreams due to prostate induced insomnia), is now just a part of life.
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