This is just a short entry to mark our one year anniversary
of living with cancer. It’s been a pretty traumatic year to say the least.
However, right at the moment I am enjoying myself immensely.
As you know I left my job at Framlingham College at the end
of the summer. At first it felt quite strange knowing that I did not have to go
to work and I felt a bit lost as to what to do with myself. That feeling didn’t
last long at all! We have discovered a new found interest in going away on exotic
holidays and I am finding that I have time to do many of the things I never
have been able to. It really is a sense of freedom that I don’t think I have ever
experienced before.
Mental health is in the news quite a bit at the moment and
the combined stress of a cancer diagnosis and treatment, combined with trying
to hold down a full time job cannot be underestimated. It is this time in your
life that you need to rely on support from your friends, family and employer to
help you through a most difficult period. I would like to say thank you to
everyone who has helped us both get through the last year. So thank you!
I have been thinking about what to do as a part time job and
have come up with a few ideas. So far these have been.
·
Local handyman for the village.
·
Set up a monthly cake and old fashioned pudding
club.
·
Bed & breakfast, (Nicky’s suggestion). First
booking in May I think Nicky?
·
Volunteer worker at a lunch club.
·
Catering consultant for local schools.
·
Relief chef in local care homes.
I was keen to try out the catering consultant role and have
set up a website offering management support to local independent schools. Have
a look here if you are interested. I really enjoyed putting a simple website
together. I started to send this to a few schools, but I then realised that I
am not sure if I really want to follow this through. Sounds a bit too much like
hard work!
I have spoken to a couple of local care homes to see if they
could offer me some casual chef work, covering for holidays or sickness. I have
had a very positive response and have been taken on by two different companies
to cover five homes. I have my first shift next Thursday. I am really looking
forward to it and if I am honest, just a little bit nervous. Will I remember how
to cook? I will let you know how it goes.
We are going to ‘celebrate’ our anniversary tonight with a gin or two. I think we may have a reputation as we are now up to 13 different gin varieties in our fridge. It is a real problem trying to decide which one to try next. It’s a hard life!
I think that’s all I have to say for today. Thank you for
following our blog, it’s great to see how many people read it, right across the
world.
Cheers Everyone! 
