Cosmo Blog Awards 2013

Hello beautiful people, as some of you may already know I was lucky enough to be shortlisted for the Best Newcomer Award sponsored by Next at the Cosmo Blog Awards. So on Wednesday I donned my glad rags and made my way over to the OXO tower in London for the Blog Awards Bash to find out who the winners were.

My outfit choice for the evening…

Dress ASOS, necklace Debenhams, shoes Miss KG, coat Topshop and handbag TK MAXX.

The most beautiful shoe boots in the world?

Gorgeous green clutch.

My nails for the evening.

You weren’t allowed a plus one and so I put my brave face on and with a glass of bubbles in my hand, I went to introduce myself to some friendly looking bloggers. I met some lovely people but the most lovely of all was Rachel, the very same lady that had alerted me to the fact that my blog was shortlisted in the first place. Rachel and I found each other within about 10 minutes of arriving and we had many giggles over some cocktails whilst we waited to find out the results. You can check out her awesome blog here. 

After about an hour and a half of mingling, all of the bloggers gathered at one end of the room to hear the results we had all been waiting for. Louise Court the Editor and Pat McNulty the Digital Editor of Cosmopolitan took to the stage to announce the winner and the highly commended blogger in each category. After watching some of my favourite bloggers walk home with one of the coveted awards finally last up was my category. The highly commended blogger was fashionista Gillian Lee Rose (you can check out her blog here) I was really pleased for her as I love her blog. The last award of the night went to LAURA LOUISE AND HER NAUGHTY DISEASE! Yes ladies and gents this little old blog WON an award I didn’t even know I was nominated for until 2 weeks before the end of voting. I was in total shock when they called my name but I tentatively made my way to the stage to collect my award, posed for a few photos and then made my way back towards a very smiley Rachel for a hug. Check out the list of all the winners here.

The rest of the evening was spent drinking one too many of the delicious cocktails provided by Pinky Vodka, meeting fellow bloggers, posing for photos and smiling so much my cheeks hurt. I was in such a daze from winning that I forgot to take many photos, big error I know, but luckily a photographer from Cosmopolitan was on hand snapping away. You can check out the amazing photos here and here. Unbelievably I also managed to make their style gallery *I chuckled muchly when I discovered this* but you can view some of the other amazing outfits worn here. Below are the two photos that I did remember to take…

 

Me and the lovely Rachel who is wearing a gorgeous Boohoo playsuit.

Me posing with my award at the Best British Blogger stand.

So there you have it, after what can only be described as a rollercoaster of a year so far for me something great has come out of an otherwise rubbish situation. It still hasn’t settled in yet. It was an honour to even make the shortlist out of 43000 entries but to win is something else entirely. I can honestly say that it was the best day of my year so far. Thank you to all of you for following me and my journey so far and providing me with so many lovely messages of love and support and a big fat thank you to everyone who voted for me too. The lovely people at Next have written a great blog post all about the evening which you can read here. I have lots of other things to tell you all about from my London trip so I will be blogging again soon but for now I shall leave you with this image.

Love you long time. X

Laura does (attempts) baking...

BANANARAMA LOAF

One of my all time favourite TV shows is The Great British Bake Off. I am a big fan of all things cake but I am also a big fan of all things banana so one of my favourite treats is a warm slice of banana loaf. I had a few overripe bananas left this week so I thought I’d go in search of my inner baker and give baking my own a go. I used a Mary Berry recipe but tweaked it to make it slightly more healthy and predominantly dairy free (apart from the eggs). Are eggs dairy? I never really know the answer. Anyway I eat them and tend to just avoid cows milk produce.

Ingredients

2 over ripe bananas (or 3 if really small ones)

Small handful of sultanas

100g wholewheat self raising flour

125g self raising flour

100g dairy free margarine (room temperature)

175g caster sugar

2 large eggs

1 tsp baking powder

2 tbsp coconut milk (or other dairy free milk)

Method

1.     Preheat oven to 180 °C.

2.     Mash bananas and add in the sultanas.

3.     Combine the flours and baking powder.

4.     Mix the sugar and butter together.

5.     Whisk eggs and add milk.

6.     Add the eggs and fruit to the sugar and butter and mix well.

7.     Finally fold in the flour.

8.     Grease and line a loaf tin.

9.     Bake in the oven for about 45 mins or until the loaf is well risen and a lovely golden brown colour. If you are unsure insert a skewer into the centre of the loaf and it should come out clean.

10.  Leave to cool in the tin for a couple of minutes before placing on a wire rack to finish cooling.

11.  Serve warm and try not to gobble it all at once. YUM

So there you go, simples, a yummy scrummy banana loaf recipe for all to try. In my view it is the perfect Autumnal snack. Let me know how you get on.

Love you long time. X

The other side of the big C...

Hi everyone, sorry for my absence from the blogging world. I don’t have an excuse other than the fact that for once in my life I haven’t really had much to say! *cue sniggers* Life has just been ticking along really. I got struck down with a nasty chest and throat infection last week which resulted in a few days in bed and yet more antibiotics but I managed to stay out of hospital which is a big bonus.

I am aware that as I write this I have a few new followers thanks to the lovely people at Fabulous magazine. I wrote an article that made a guest appearance in their mag a couple of Sundays ago *see below.

I had an overwhelming response from some readers and lots of lovely emails and tweets. I apologise for not replying to you all personally. I do my best, but please know that I really do love hearing from you and I massively appreciate the support you all give me.

What else have I been up to? Well I have had some lovely hospital appointments including some Herceptin drugs and CT scans/radio planning funness. I have also been spending some time with friends doing normal stuff like going to the cinema and having girls nights and do you know what? It has been great. I even did some nice make up…

I have lots of fun stuff coming up to look forward to before radio including a couple of trips to London and one mystery weekend away! In fact I am so excited I could burst.

One of the most important things that I have been doing of late is reflecting. I have finally had some time to myself and now that my brain isn’t fogged up from various drugs I can just sit and think. Sometimes all I think is woah. I mean WOAH. Seriously, this year has been crazy. I think when you are going through active treatment you don’t really let yourself think/dwell too much, well I didn’t anyway, you just sort of get on with things. It’s only when I’ve started feeling well again that I have really realised just how unwell I was and how much I have been through. I mean don’t get me wrong the scars I see everyday are a constant reminder but it’s only recently that I have really begun to understand what they mean and what they stand for. I know they will fade but they will never go away completely and I think that’s the thing about having cancer, even though you may be in remission for now there is always that fear niggling away in the corner of your brain making you think will it come back? Over time the worries fade but they never really go away.

Don’t get me wrong I am all for positive thinking but I think it is important for those of you lucky enough not to have met a Kenneth of your own to understand that it’s not just the physical side of having cancer that’s the problem, mentally it is exhausting too. Physically I may be mostly better but realistically mentally I think it could take a bit longer. This is not easy for me to admit. But the truth is that I am still a little bit scared. I may even be a little bit scared forever. However I have come to realise that this is normal and I am not the only one that will have a few worries from time to time. Not many people really talk about the mental side effects of cancer but I just wanted anyone else in the same situation as me to know that they are not alone in their thoughts and really it is OK to talk about it. What is it they say? A problem shared is a problem halved. So here I am sharing a problem with you and d’ya know what it really does feel a bit better.

 

In other news I am sure you will all be excited to know that I am now finally able to have baths.

I have once again been on some lovely walks.

And I have two new roommates. Two spiders living on my ceiling. George and Harry. Don’t worry they aren’t the big fat hairy kind of spider they are the thin whispery kind. We’ve made friends and the deal is that they are allowed to stay there (I am a bit too scared to try and capture them plus I can’t actually reach them) as long as they don’t come down to my level. My only worry is if George is actually a Georgina and then they have babies. Actually I’m also a bit frightened they’ll tell their mates they’ve found a safe place to live where they aren’t being hunted for once and then I’ll have some sort of spider clan living in my bedroom. But for now they seem to have listened to my demands and are staying put and there are no signs of baby spiders as of yet. This time last year I would have been on the phone frantically trying to find someone to get rid of them for me so I actually feel quite triumphant at my bravery. There is also a Cedric living in the top corner of my shower we have a similar deal, he stays where he is and he’s alright but if he comes anywhere near me whilst I’m in the shower then we’ve got a problem. 

I saw the most amazing rainbow the other day so I thought I would share it with you.

That’s all from me this week folks.

Love you long time. X

My doctors have got a RAD new idea...

Hello my lovely readers. How are you all? I hope you are enjoying the bank holiday weekend. I bet you are all wondering what I have been up to? Well let me fill you in…

My wounds have been healing nicely which is really great. I still have a couple of dressings on but it won’t be long until I am dressing free (*I hope) and finally able to have a bath. I also have a lot more energy that I have been putting to good use by going for some nice walks in the sunshine. I had a dose of Herceptin at the hospital that went fine and I have done the odd bit of writing. As you can see I haven’t really had a very eventful week, well I hadn’t until yesterday. Yesterday I had an appointment with my oncologists. This appointment lasted nearly and hour and a half. In this appointment I was told I would need radiotherapy. EURGH. This was not part of the plan. I thought I was going to avoid being zapped. It turns out the universe had other ideas.

As if this latest blow wasn’t enough to ruin my week I then got told that my course of radio would last for five weeks. Most people are treated for three weeks but I, being the special person I am, get to have an extra two weeks because guess what I AM SO YOUNG (*if one more doctor tells me this I think I might spontaneously combust). Seriously I do realise that I was pretty unlucky to get cancer at my age I don’t need doctors to remind me of this too. My bleedin' age has a lot to answer for you know, it often means I get the bum end of the deal. I was given the strongest chemo and the most radical surgery so I probably should have guessed radiotherapy would be no different. Silly me thinking I had gotten away without having any.

SO on hearing the action plan I made a deal with my Docs, I told them that they had to wait until after I had been to the Cosmo Blog Awards before they could start frying me. I reckon that is only fair don’t you? It means my wounds have a bit longer to fully heal and I get to have a good few more weeks of feeling normal and having some fun before my energy gets temporarily zapped away from me again. If I am honest the thing that is bumming me out the most about this news is the fact that I won’t be able to have a hot bath during and for a little while after the treatment. I still haven’t had a bath since the day before my surgery and I MISS THEM. It seems cruel that not long after I am finally able to have a bath they will once again be taken away from me. Having radio also means I get to have my first tattoo (*sorry Snoop Doggy Rob, but it is strictly for medical reasons only)! It will be a couple of tiny dots on my chest and under my arm but hey it’s a tattoo all the same!

You probably want to know why the hospital have changed their minds about giving me radiotherapy. There was a slight mix up in the beginning and I should never have been told that I wasn’t going to need it. Unfortunately my oncologist was away when I was deciding about surgery and so my surgeon consulted with other doctors and wires got crossed. I had been told radio could wreck my reconstruction results so when I was told that I wouldn’t need it I decided to have the big op, get it all done at once and reduce my scarring. After surgery I had an appointment with my actual oncologist and he started to talk to me about radio. I told him that I was told I wouldn’t need it and he wasn’t impressed. He said he would talk to some other specialists and then make a decision.

My oncology team have now decided that because my original tumour (Kenneth) was so ‘naughty’ (AKA aggressive) and chemo didn’t completely kill him, there may be a few naughty cells left. Therefore they want to be safe and give me strong treatment. They also never found out for sure that it hadn’t spread to my nodes so they want to zap them too! I am all for being safe and so although this is in no way the decision I wanted I understand the need for it. Like most cancer treatments there are some negatives to radio, these include the fact that it may very well ruin the great cosmetic result my surgeon worked so hard to achieve and it will probably make me very tired both during treatment and for a while afterwards.  BUT HEY I’ve been through worse so although this is a bit of a pain I’m hoping I’ll be able to handle it. I think that really my doctors just like me so much they want to see me more ;-).

So there you go, that’s what has been happening in my life recently. I didn’t want to have radio, I thought I was finished with the nasty bits of my treatment and I was looking forward to finally being able to escape from the hospital for a while. Now I have to spend a whole lot more time there but I would rather spend time there now than have to spend time there again later on in life! The two hours of driving everyday will be a pain and any holiday plans I had have to be put on hold for now BUT I still get to go to the Blog Awards AND I can hopefully have a lot of fun now whilst there is still (*fingers crossed) the odd bit of sunshine left in the UK.

I completely agree with Dolly Parton who once said "the way I see it, if you want the rainbow, you gotta put up with the rain".

Love you long time. X

  

A very nice surprise and a couple of wet eyes.

Today for the first time in a very long while, I cried with happiness. Not a big cry, just a few little tear drops escaped my eyes. I quickly wiped them away and replaced them with the world’s biggest smile because today something happened that made all of this nastiness worth it. Something positive has come from the biggest negative in my life. But before I tell you all my exciting news, let me just fill you in on the last couple of days.

I saw my plastic surgeon on Monday. When he looked at his handiwork the words “DING DONG” actually came out of his mouth *cue blushes. I mean that has got to be good news right? I still need to have a couple of other operations to finish things off but I must say that I am also pretty happy with the result so far. Once I am all healed the only unsual thing about me will be my scars. Scars that I will learn to be proud of because they will remind me of my strength. They are my battle scars. A battle that I am planning on winning. I’m trying to focus on the positives, not dwell on the negatives. I’m no psychologist but I reckon if we all did that we would be much happier.

I have also been working on how to rock the whole very short hair look. It is pretty difficult to feel feminine with hair this short. I actually turned a little diva-ish the other day and rocked it out with some pretty mega accessories…

I have also been busy thanking the Universe muchly for Beyonce, Rhianna, Jessie J and their new short hair do’s. Maybe people will now just think I’m bang on trend with my hairstyle and did it through choice. That’s what I’m hoping anyway. For once in my life maybe I’ll be one of the cool kids?! *cough cough.

I have been writing this blog for nearly eight months. I have heard from and made friends with other women unfortunate enough to meet Kenneths of their own. Some of them also named their lumps and that I see that as a big compliment. This blog has also allowed me to meet some younger people diagnosed with other forms of cancer or serious illnesses. To hear from them that reading about my experience helps them in some way is amazing. Actually, I can’t believe how many people have now read my little old blog, the majority of these people do not even have cancer themselves but read anyway and that also amazes me. I never thought so many of you would be interested in my little life. Strangers that I do not even know are rooting for me and willing me to get better and not just from this country, people from all over the world have been in touch. When I started writing I didn’t expect anyone to actually read the blog let alone like it!

Some of you lovely people must have nominated me for a pretty big award in the blogging community because today I found out that my blog is one of ten to have been shortlisted *hence the happy tears* in the best newcomer category. I got a pretty big shock to discover a comment left on one of my posts today from someone telling me they had voted for me to win and loved the blog. I didn’t even know I was shortlisted and I reread the comment about 20 times. I couldn’t believe it, it was the best surprise ever. I cried in the Tesco car park surrounded by far too many people (I'm blaming Tamoxifen for messing with my emotions). It was right up there in my top ten embarrassing moments (along with Gangnam styling on the table tops of my local bar the day after my diagnosis but the less said about that the better). I feel very honoured to be in a category with so many other great blogs.

Really what I want to say is thank you to all of you because you make my life so much better and if I have helped any of you in anyway then all my struggles have been worth it! Raising awareness and helping others was what I set out to do. I wanted people to realise life with the big C doesn’t have to be all doom and gloom. I did my best to make you smile as well as talking about difficult things. By writing about my life and experiences to you all I discovered so much about myself and wrote things that I struggled to say aloud. I fell in love with writing, I met friends and I had my faith in the world restored. Hopefully one day no blogs like mine will be needed because someone will find a cure for this naughty disease, but for now I will keep writing so please help me to continue to raise awareness. Share the blog, continue to support Coppafeel! and most importantly keep checking those boobies.

Love you long time. X

Nice nails, mocktails and a possible UFO...

Hello hello, it’s me again! 

I am getting better everyday which is really super nice! I hit a little bump last week and managed to get an infection in one of my wounds but other than that it has just been a slow slog on the road to recovery.

Since I last wrote to you all the wonderful cyclists completed their bike ride and managed to raise a whopping £6200! How amazing are they? I am so proud of them all. 

My hair and eyelashes are growing back which is SO nice and I am really enjoying putting make up back on…

I even painted my nails…

I’ve been catching up with friends…

(That is a mocktail by the way)

Going on walks…

And watching fireworks...

Firework or UFO?

In other news I have been attempting to work on the book, although it is proving more difficult than I thought it would be. I saw my oncologist a couple of weeks ago and found out that I may have to have radiotherapy too which was a slight blow. I find out in two weeks what his decision is. I trust him one hundred percent and will respect whatever decision he makes even if it isn’t the one that I want. Other than that I don't really have any more news. I’m having a check up with my plastic surgeon tomorrow so I will let you know how that goes. Seriously though I am sorry that I don’t have anything more exciting to tell you.  

I will leave you all to get back to your Sunday.

Love you long time. X