If we lived in America, Sonny's treatment to date would have cost us about $708m. I made that figure up but I'm pretty sure it's close as I had to have my ear syringed once in Florida and that was about $50. This means the one thing we can never moan about again is the percentage of our tax bill that goes on the NHS. I used to work with a guy who had a handicapped brother who used to say the same thing and I never believed him. Now I know exactly what he means.
As an example (bear with me), in the early days when Sonny first had tummy ache (that's how we used to describe it) but was feeling pretty good, he woke up shouting at 5am. I tried to calm him down (well, shut him up to be honest) as I was concerned about the other kids and explained to the nurse that he had never been very good with pain. She called the doctor, the gastro team and a surgeon explaining that 'it doesn't matter if he's exagerating, we need to get to the bottom of it'. Turns out he had some of the mass in his kidney and the chemo was breaking it down. He passed it about an hour later as a series of long worms. The surgeon told me it was basically as intense as passing gall stones. From that point on, I never doubted Sonny again and realised that anything we needed was a call away. And yes, of course I felt a twat.
Anyway, there is a point to all this. As part of his treatment we're now in a programme with an outreach nurse. She comes every day at a time that suits us to change dressings, administer drugs and deliver anything we need. The picture above is the box that infuses the nasty liquid (nope I don't mean Ribena) by our wonderful, lovely nurse who makes that up in our living room. Next week the home teacher comes. The day after home physio starts. You're probably getting the picture now.
Get something like this and the NHS are pretty unbelievable. Get a sore throat and I'd advise you to drink plenty of liquids and stay in bed. The difference is that marked.
