Mike - in memorium

Mike with Ryan, Lucy and Andy, and me

To talk of Mike is hard - hard because he was such a unique character, almost beyond desciption, and hard because he has died at so young an age, just 51, leaving an immense air of grief and loss. His death was harsh too, both in its catastrophic suddenness, and yet in a quiet inevitability, for he had much chronic illness but refused to follow advice to moderate his lifestyle; his motto always was to live for the day, and enjoy life to its fullest degree. 

Mike was eighteen months old when he came to us, first for fostering, then through adoption, having suffered one of the worst starts to life of any child I knew. Dan tells me his first proper memory was of the (then three) children being taken from the court room during the hearing and left in a side office with a car each to play, while the hearing continued. For it was not straightforward, but argumentative with his natural father, and social services.

With us, he came to a somewhat chaotic family, but in some ways chaos suited him, for that was how he seemed to cope with life, living through the pain of rejection and physical hurt with Freudian resiliance, yet always seeming to search for someone to love him. In his husband, Ryan, he found that love and he found a strength to build a new life. Though nearly twenty years his junior, Ryan brought the love and maturity Mike needed, although his restless spirity still could not settle easily. Together, they moved house several times, often in quick succession, but always together they built a new home each time, and always with such professional ability that the homes, furniture and interiors could have graced the pages of a high fashion magazine. 

Here, I have expressed only his outward restlessness. His personality was beyond compare and impossible to capture in these few weak lines, although the wonderful tributes from his brothers and Lucy have said so much I find it difficult to equal them. As his nephew Luke wrote to me, "...all I can think about are the many hilarious stories of his I've heard over the years. At the endof the day, life is all about the memories we have and share. All we can do over the next few weeks is mourn, share those laughter-inducing memories, and for ever keep them alive." Thank you Luke. I think you say what we all feel. We miss you, Mike.

A tale of lumps and bumps

Annie and I have turned into each others carers and this is a tale of gloom and ill health. If, dear reader, you do not care to journey down such corridors, please logout now. I gloss over the time just before Christmas when Annie had her major heart attack and was confined for several days in Papworth; likewise her second recent admission when she relapsed in Kelly's hairdresser salon and was admitted by blue light ambulance to WSH with acute and severe heart failure. On both occasions, I was too distressed to write of it, and even to talk of it now brings me to the brink of tears, for the anguish was extreme. No, I write to keep people informed of my own illness, my constant and present companion, metastatic melanoma.

In addition to the breathlessness, weakness and cough, I have now acquired a series of 'lumps'. The one above the shoulder is about marble-sized, but on the arms I have one in each biceps the size of eggs: one like a hard-boiled shelled egg, the other more like a flat rubbery fried egg. They are larger than my flabby muscles, and make me look like Popeye, but they beat me up more like his rival, Bluto. I mentioned the first to the dermatology consultant in November, but she shrugged it off. I then mentioned them to the Respiratory nurse in January, but these people are too specialised to take interest in anything outside their immediate remit. I phoned the MacMillan and oncology nurses at Addenbrooke's who had especially given me their cards, but both said just to see my doctor. So, after some prevarication, I have listed to Annie who also said to make an appointment with Doctor Bone. I know there will be no more surgery or radiotherapy offered (A visit to Dr Doom), so I have doubts that he can do much either. But I now have a new one on my back near the site where a previous one was removed (A growing tumour) and  have agreed to see him to ask if he can offer new suggestions. For those still reading this, the tale is to be continued. 

In the meantime, Annie and I continue to manage the house between us with its cleaning, its maintenance, and a thousand unthought of jobs, shopping, or tax returns, as they crop up. I even got to the tip last week with a microwave that has sat in the back of the car for over a month with Byron, to his intense annoyance. But I then took him for a walk in the park, which cheered him. I judge the length of a walk by the number of times I have to sit down on it; this one was a two-bench walk, about my maximum now.