My Lousy Liver

The two worst feelings in the world, after grief, are surely hope and fear .  Hope is not always good you know, there is that desperate clung-to hope that comes with a cheery 'Let's wait and see, it might not be all that bad!' whilst deep down you feel impending doom. And then there are times when hope doesn't even get a look in.  Her sunshine demeanour is blotted out by a steam-roller of dread.  As winter drew in, fear was my constant companion.  All the usual, well-known sensible liver problems had given a negative result, so in the knowledge that my mother had died of pancreatic cancer, I was placed on the 'urgent oncology screening' list.  Christmas 2017 was a weird one.  My first born was 5,000 miles away.  All good here, I chirruped by text.  But it wasn't.  Scott and I cried buckets, curled up in a two person ball.  Fixated on a worst case scenario, Dr Google had already found me a place in a hospice before I had even ha...

When I am teaching, I often ask the child who answers a question, 'How do you know?'  This is to check for misunderstandings and help others, who were unsure, learn how the solution was derived through that child's explanation. Answers require some prior knowledge.  But what if there is no prior knowledge? This was my experience with my liver.  I had felt not quite right for some time.  Nothing stood out as being amiss; I was just always exhausted, a bit old-lady achy, and I developed what I assumed was stress related itching.  Menopause, I thought.  Stress of teaching, I felt.  Not a must see the doctor issue, I believed. I now know that there are no symptoms for the early stages of liver disease except fatigue and itching.  It is only when the liver is so damaged it is unable to cope with the usual onslaught of normal daily life and a typical 'not quite as healthy as we'd like to think' diet that doctor-trip-worthy symptoms appear. For me...