I don't know how to tell you this, but we received some 'not good' scan results last month and in the run up to Ken flying in, we managed to fit in the usual CT scan, an additional MRI scan, ultrasound, hospital and then, more ablation (ie, the zapping Tash had once before.)

Results:
Natasha's liver is universally refered to as 'hard to read', the couple of years of Chemo, old tumour sites, ablation and the ongoing hormone treatment has left it in a bit if a state however it gives the radiologists something to concentrate on! (they are responsible for ultrasound, CT and MRI scans, interpreting the results and providing a report to 'The Slev' our Oncologist, who decides what to do next).. Her usual radiologist saw a 3.4mm area on her CT that he could not properly diagnose and so requested an MRI to confirm or disprove the notion that there was something to be worried about, still unsure we went off to see "Dr Lazer" who performed the zapping last October, she confirmed that there was a 'local reoccurrence' and ablated it out the next day.

Now you need to understand how our decision making schema works with these situations, it is not how you would expect - I know this as I have received a few too many odd reactions to my casual 'oh it's OK she has more cancer' comment, it is good cancer, that is what you have to understand.

Pete, from Pete and Lucy is Tash's friend from the Croft clan . Tash, as I may have said before, has been lucky in that she has been adopted by families in every country that she has lived in. It seemed appropriate then, that Ken should meet Mr and Mrs Croft.
You have to appreciate at this point that two storey houses are a rarity in a country with so much open space as Australia, let alone the three story 17th century, seven bedroom mini manor house, that is the Croft home, so Ken spent a reasonable amount of time just walking through the house exclaiming "how many bloody bedrooms does this place have", ohh yes and he nearly fell down the stairs, as he pointed out, there are not so many stairs in Sydney.

Ken is a straight forward Australian guy, if you can remove the negative connotations from the concept of an Alpha male, then my father-in-law is just that, he really is the leader of the pack and though it is sometimes funny to see otherwise normally dominant men fawn around seeking favour in his company (though sometimes not, I have to say), most of us are just happy to be in the big guy's presence.
So it was a great relief to walk into the kitchen on Sunday morning to see early riser Ken and equally early riser Mr Croft discussing how finicky and messy these coffee making machines are (they, like us have an espresso machine) and why can't people just stick with instant coffee as Mr Croft emptied the kettle into two workman sized Maxwell House infused mugs (I was so pleased to see Ken find a like minded soul so early in his trip, that I ignored the fact that they were inadvertently referring to people like me in their conversations, feminine coffee drinkers that we are!).

My sister lives in Swanage and rather conveniently runs a weekend Bed and Breakfast house, so it was fortuitous that we turned up at the beginning of the week. Ken knows Lesley and Jason from our wedding, so after meeting the Crofts, this was more of a 'downtime' visit. We turned up, opened a bottle of wine, had a barbecue and chilled out.

On Tuesday we left Swangage and drove up to Basingstoke, first to see my Mother and then in the evening, out for dinner so Ken could meet my Father and the rest of my family that didn't make it over to our wedding. All in all it went well, Ken being the smoothy that he is, sweet talked all the ladies at the table, almost distracting us all from the England match going on in the bar area.

He's big, he's bold, he's 60 years old.....

You can take the boy out of Sydney...

As a celebration, Tash took Ken and I to 'Rhodes on 24', a restaurant owned by the British (was super famous in the early 90's) chef, Gary Rhodes. This restaurant is on the 24th floor of the NatWest Tower in the heart of the city, the second tallest building in England after Canary Wharf by the way and no it is not the most imaginative of names for a food business. I think that revolving restaurants are the height of kitsch and Sydney has two of them (which cancels the kitsch aspect out somewhat, to have one is embarrassing, but having two is celebrating the fact!), the best we could do was this, static, but with better food. Though I did suggest to Ken that if he wanted to rotate his chair around during the course of the meal, he could obtain the same Centrepoint Tower (Sydney) effect, should he desire.

But you cannot take Sydney out of the boy.

By six in the evening, we had arrived at the pub and were sat in front of the big screen, pint in hand ready for the big match, Australia Vs. Croatia. We were joined by most of our extended social group (who you might recognise from previous entries); representatives from "the girls", Marisa and Nathan, Vic and Bonney and 'last time we saw you, you looked like a Greek fisherman and tonight I see that you have progressed to dressing like a Kebab shop owner' Matthew.

As you might know, Australia won over Croatia only to loose out to Italy. We celebrated that night and I have only heard moaning about how they were robbed since. This is despite pointing out to them that this is the best showing Australia have ever managed and that England will probably go out 'like girls' at their next match, no valiant battles lost by a piece of bad luck for the great England squad, oh no, just embarrassing under achievement all the way.

Photos of the night here

I don't know if this bit is standard for such situations, but I was getting a bit concerned as we left the Bortesi house in convoy heading for Verona's main church, we were guests and the bridal car was right behind me for the entire way. You would usually think that there might be a gap of about, ohh I don't know, enough time for the guests to park their cars (not abandon, as I noticed some did), casually walk to the church, get seated and cool down, apparently not here!
Ali, Francesca's boyfriend and the driver I was following, cheerfully advised me not to worry as Churches in Italy were made of stone and it would be much cooler in there as we marched across the square sweating in our suits and then trying to find an open entrance as the wedding had already started. HE WAS WRONG!!!

Apparently the marriage ceremony was lovely, particularly the sermon which drew attention to how wonderful it is when each partner compliments each other, it was very stirring and romantic, well at least that's what Roby, one of the Groomsmen told me later on in the evening, but he had been drinking all day. As it was all in Italian I had to take him at his word "I expect <sweeping hand gesture> that you guy's will put that on your website, yeah <another sweeping hand gesture, almost colliding with his girlfriend next to him>, but I am drunk and we are all feeling romantic tonight". Yes Roby, you are quite correct, I have included it.

Spending 13 hours in sweltering heat with a large number of heavily drinking men would in England, almost certainly end in a fight or two, but not here.... Italian men are here to love, feel romantic and as I noticed as the evening drew in and everybody either sloped off home to get changed, or as the boys did, just slowly disrobe down to there undershirts, not showing any sign of being sweaty at all but continuing to dance like loons.

As you would expect, photos are here, of the occasion, not of sweaty men. This is Enrico by the way, he is Roby's brother, he doesn't usually look like a nightclub bouncer, which is the reason for this picture.

Italian weddings are big food affairs, as we were informed earlier on in the day by our slightly less inebriated (at the time) 'social narrator' Roby, couples try to out do each other with the number of courses on offer and so it is not unheard of, in the south where this happens more (think the wedding scene from the Godfather), for guests to be seated for food for 8 hours or more. We managed a glorious 4 hours seated by the Adige River that runs through the middle of Verona before making our way back into the Castelvecchio (Old Castle) for more drinks and dancing to an outrageous 70's cover band.

Piero is one of my most favourite Italian's, he is is funny, appreciative of my British sense of humour (always a bonus) and happy to share his emotions with you - which speaking as an Englishman is something that I am always impressed with. On this day, he put a lot of Love into the proceedings, a couple of bottles of wine in his stomach and a few songs into the microphone, culminating in the evenings final tune 'Albachiara' (Sunrise) by the very famous Italian rock star Vasco Rossi. Now I haven't a clue who this dude is, but it is a Rock love song, so I was told and well what can I say, in front of every one he belted this tune out to Laura, his wife with such passion, it makes me teary eyed just writing this down. By the way Piero can sing, this was no crappy Karaoke-in-the-pub-on-a-Friday-night job. See what I mean here with the song Vita Spericolata (Natasha apologises for the odd video work, she now realises that turning the camera 90 degrees whilst filming only produces on-its-side video footage and more work for me to fix it)

In England we have rain, odd looking 'contemporary' new churches (mostly built in the 1960's when the future was brick and concrete), shit buffets in village halls and the pain of that first shuffling bride and groom's dance, followed by the hell on earth that is the macarena and the birdie song whining out of a mobile Disco. These guys get married in a medieval church, lunch in a Castle and then the groom sings to his bride - we are soo out classed.

Laura, one of the twins in Natasha's Italian host family was getting married to Piero, her long term boyfriend.

Both the wedding and day were out of character for a normal Italian matrimonial event. The day started hot, carried on being hot and ended hot, ohh and did I mention that it was humid too?

At about 3 in the morning I awoke to find Tash doubled over on the edge of the bed complaining that she had pains in her liver. From our previous ablation experience, Tash was expecting to have a day or two of discomfort as her liver can 'flare up' at any time in the six weeks after the treatment, but this turned out to be something entirely different indeed.

We made our way back to the Bortesi house for lunch and it turned out to be another 40 degree day. Piero and Laura came over to open our wedding presents to them, if there was a Italian tradition for giving and receiving of gifts we managed to ignore it, but it wasn't a problem. Tash had managed to find some typically 'funky' salad bowls for the newly weds and as you can see by the pictures we also gave them a Addis mop, which I had prepared with almost Industrial strength cardboard packaging (which inadvertently ended up looking like a missile, not so good for air travel!) - the previous attempt to get one to them had ended at the hands of the Ryanair baggage handlers who without any display of guilt sent the previous one round the airport carousel with a neat 90 degree bend in the middle of the handle.

During lunch both the heat and the pain started to get to Tash and her discomfort was obvious, eventually she disappeared inside the house and then 30 minutes later I was tapped on the shoulder by a concerned Laura simply saying 'Tash'

Even though both Stefania and Lorenzo practice in very different fields of medicine (orthadontics and pathology), in Italy they had to qualify as Doctors first and then specialise, no half measures for these guys, which was lucky for us. Tash was found in the girls bedroom in a bit of a state with concerned host parents and sisters fluttering around. It took a while to calm her down, no mean feet on such a humid day and so far from home, but the pain was stubborn no matter what painkillers we gave her so in the evening Stefania drove the three of us to the hospital, just in case.

I can report that the Verona Accident and Emergency department, Pronto Soccorso, as they like to call it, is a considerably better place to spend time than any of the English ones that I have frequented. Not only were they quick, 3.5 hours vs. 8 hours the last time I had need to be in one, but there was a refreshing lack of weirdo's in the waiting room. Ken and I sat out there whilst Stefania accompanied Tash into the treatment area. Being the master linguists that we are, both of us realised that we would have been absolutely no help, so spent our time observing that most accidents in Italy involve motorino's (small motor scooters) and old people (though not necessarily at the same time), apart from the brief excitement generated by one fainting woman, it was an uneventful stay.

After a moderate work up and ultrasound (moderate for an A&E department any way) Tash reappeared dosed up on liquid painkillers, clutching a 4 page blood and liver report (in Italian). They could find no inflammation or other obvious cause for concern in any of the tests and so did what any A&E department would do and patched her up to send home.

Tuesday morning started, like Monday, before dawn with Tash doubled over the side of the bed, the pain had returned and it was obvious that we couldn't carry on with our plans.

Throwing money at the situation, left, right and centre, we managed to stay in the hotel past check out time, ditch the hire car and fly into London and arrive at Harley street at 7pm that evening. Dr Lazer went to work on Tash with the CT scanner and eventually reported back that though this problem is obviously painful to Tash, it was not something that looked like it was going to develop into a life threatening illness (or to put it another way, it was not directly caused by the ablation). She suggested it was more likely that the Ibuprofen Tash had been taking had inflamed her stomach lining and so some more belly-friendly painkillers and industrial strength anti-acids were prescribed.

Useful pieces of information number 352: Late opening Pharmacies in London? - though not 24 Hour, there is one on the corner of Marble Arch & Edgware Road. Not the best place to park by a long shot, but Ken admirably managed to extract himself from the 'snug' rear seat of 'Hans', open the door and place himself into the middle of some of the busiest traffic in London in one near fluid movement. When he returned Ken pointed out a small flaw in our SAS-executed-Italian-evacuation-plan, none of us had any Sterling, only Euros, he had got to the counter and realised this, but then, lucky fellow that he is, remembered that he had spotted a Bureau de Change, next door - hey presto, potential show stopper avoided....

Laura, Franccesca, Ulli, Stephania and Lorenzo, thank you again for you support and concern.

So here we are, not in Seville as planned but sitting in London watching Spain loose to France, with Tash on the sofa, feeling a little better than earlier on today.

28, 29 & 30 June

These three days settled into a rhythm of sorts, the day would start, or in Tash's case on Thursday, just carry straight through from the previous day, with her doubled over the bed again in some serious pain. The rest of the day Tash would spend in her room, either asleep or after painkillers, woozy and decidedly odd.

On Thursday she saw 'The Slev' (he also specialises in gastro-intestinal issues) and he told her that is was probably just a muscle out of sorts. After a night with the hot water bottle being of no help, Dr Lazer was phoned again. I was out in the car with Ken when Tash called to tell me she was going back into Harley Street for another set of scans, it was a bit worrying as she was 'dosed up' and so sounded like you do just after leaving the dentist's.

This time Dr Lazer had a different take on things, using all the scanning equipment she seemed to have at her disposal, she spotted something odd, fluid.......

1st July

Opening my Panini sticker book of Natasha's collection of Medical Specialists, I spotted that there was a new entry, 'Dr Liver'.

Dr Liver, or Dr Pierier as others might know him, also lives on Harley Street in, it has to be said, less impressive surroundings than we are used to, 'someone should go in there with a duster' I could hear my mother say....

The most current prognosis for my love's discomfort is that one of the ablation sites has cut through a minor bile duct (apparently you have many, forming a 'root system' draining out the bile from the liver into your intestine). So as the liver tissue has healed this has created a leak, both out into the liver sack (well, who would have thought that we had one of those) and most likely tracking the route of the ablation needle back into the stomach cavity.

How does this happen? Well, so we are told, this root system (think inverted tree) flows into a trunk (main bile duct) that holds the fluid under pressure by way of a muscle valve before excreting it for disposal into the intestinal tract. So rather like a radiator (which is also a closed pressurised system girls, and the rest of you men, who know nothing about cars and should be ashamed of yourself), when there is chance to escape the fluid will always take it.

The pain, Dr Liver theorised, was most likely due to the presence of the bile collecting in this liver sack, bile should be on the inside, not the outside after all.

What are we doing about it? Well on Monday Tash is going for her 15th surgical procedure in six years, her first endoscopy, not she points out a procedure that she ever wanted to have, but what can we do?

Actually if anyone feels that we are hogging the medical limelight and wants to step in and take some of the heat off of us, please, feel free, we could do with the time off.

The endoscopy will end with the addition of a little plastic tube (stent) to this main bile duct so that the muscle valve stays open and, hopefully, without a build up of pressure, give this problem mini branch time to repair itself.

Tash is adamant that we continue with plans to have he party next Saturday and though it may not turn out to be the rollicking drink ladened affair that the last one was for her , she is determined not to let this recent episode spoil these plans. If things do go 'down the shitter' off of the back of today's operation we will post it here Wednesday or Thurday, well thats the plan anyway, but that could equally also change.