Sorry for the long silence. I'm not that good in bringing less happy news. Tests in the last few weeks have shown that the illness did not vanish, notwithstanding the operation which I had in March. It means I will have to start a second round of chemo therapy this week. The treatment will take place once every four weeks, six times, till the end of October. We have scheduled it in such a way that I will be able to attend the upcoming CHIME meeting in England, and hopefully we can enjoy some vacation there as well. The good news is that I'm still feeling very well, and do all the things I like to do. Another positive note: one of the CT scans seemed to indicate suspect spots in one breast, but this turned out to be 'false alarm'. At least one worry less...

The tokens of attention of some of you are like soothing spring showers on dry soil. Thank you sooo much! I'm absolutely convinced all your positive thoughts have a healing effect.

Photo made by Frank, 29 March 2011

When Frank suggested to me in January to set up a blog about my health, my first reaction was quite hesitant. Put news about myself online? Specifically news about something as personal as my own health? It felt like a weird kind of exhibitionism, something totally against my nature. Questions of concerned collegues and friends however did start to get in the way of our daily Chime-correspondence, and I decided to give it a try and go with modern times. Frank helped me with the first message, and after that (read: after another month of hesitation) , I finally found the courage to write my own messages.

Now I'd like to go a step further and report in some detail about my last operation. This is in total contradiction to my upbringing: traditionally, within my family, talking about ilnesses is simply 'not done'! But the story is actually pretty exciting, and I'm sure some of you will enjoy reading it. In the end, you're reading this blog to know about my health, isn't it? If you're not interested in medical details, simply skip the rest of this message.

When the first CT scan was made after the big operation last year, the doctors told me with some reluctance that it had shown a piece of disputable material somewhere on the top of my liver. Their first idea was to wait and see how chemotherapy influenced this spot, and perhaps stop the chemo treatment halfway and operate first, if scans showed this was urgent. Nothing had changed halfway down the treatment, and chemo was continued as planned until December. Scans showed no change, and the urgency of this 'detail' seemed to be forgotten. In February, I decided to call the oncologist myself and ask whether it wouldn't be a good idea to get rid of this piece of meat (knowing the liver can be pretty vulnerable)! She reacted enthousiastically and immediately made an appointment with my gynaecologist and a liver specialist to get the job done. So I went into hospital on 15 March thinking that I would come out with a, perhaps a tiny bit smaller, but healthier liver.

The operation was quite heavy, quite successfull and quite surprising. It turned out that the nasty bit of material was not on my liver, but on my diaphragm! So there they were, a liver specialist and three gynaecologists cutting away at my diaphragm. When I woke up, the first thing they asked me was to take a deep breath. Ouch! That hurt! But I did it, and survived. Like a newly born, taking its first breath... The days that followed, to my vague surprise, I was treated like a lung patient: I was on oxygine, had to inhale some kind of medicinal steam three times a day, was visited by physiotherapists who gave me 'swimming' and breathing excercises, and had to practice my lungs with a little plastic cup with an orange ping pong ball in it which I had to get floating for five seconds by inhaling deeply (of course the kids were eager to try this toy too!). Nobody at the gynaecology department (where I was nursed) could explain to me clearly why all this was necessary, all they told me was that the surgeons had cut a hole in my diaphragm which they had neatly sewn up again. Finally my own (much admired) gynaecologist came to see me just before I left hospital again. He explained that the diaphragm is a kind of muscle which regulates your breathing (so it's a moving life force, like your heart!) And it's the boundary between your ventral cavity and your breast cavity. Normally, there is a vacuum between the diaphragm and the lungs, so that the lungs can be properly effected by the pulling force of this breathing muscle. During the operation, by making an opening in my diaphragm, this vacuum was lifted! I have no idea how they restored it (or perhaps my own body did this), but they made several lung photos to be sure that everything was all right. And my body has been doing a lot of recovering since. I must admit I have my hi and lo days, but over all speaking I'm quite proud at the way I'm coping. I was told it takes about six weeks to heal from a biggy like this.

Picture taken 15 March: Nuria and me trying out the comfortable hospital bed, one day before the operation. Like me, Nuria was feeling quite at home there, and even suggested to jump from the window in order to be able to stay next to me. (Thank goodness no windows can be opened in Dutch hospitals...)

I must admit that my own bed feels better, even though it lacks these wonderful devices of lifting you up to the ceiling, folding you up like a concertina or driving you around the house. Of course these buttons and their effects were a major attraction to Nuria and Elias. To my relief, the nurses did not come in when they were trying out all technical possibilities...

Hip hip hurray, I'm home again since Monday, the first day of spring! I'm recovering at olympic speed. Had a vey encouraging talk with my gynaecologist who was genuinely impressed with the way I have responded to the various treatments.

To say the truth, I could do with a little bit of (preferably written) attention, so do drop me a line if you have time! You could use my personal gmail address, which consists of my full name with a dot in between the first and last name, followed by @gmail.com. If that doesn't work, simply use our chime address. Or send me a postcard... (Vliet 35, 2311 RD Leiden, The Netherlands)

Hi folks, just a short note to let you know I'm ok. The operation on Wednesday went well, and I'll be in hospital for another few days to recover. I'm being treated very well, have a quiet single room and already started eating light crackers and soup and the like. Am writing this on our new iPad, feel quite excited that this is possible!

The Kouwenhoven Quartet, Christmas 2010

Better late then never... this picture should have been here long ago. But I've no idea how to get it in the former message. So I use it to cheer up this one. Actually quite a rare picture to be honest, we haven't been practicing much lately... But my cello gets a lot of attention every day!

I feel as energetic as ever, and just got good news today that there were no new nasty surprises on a recent CT scan. Operation will go ahead as planned on 16 March, to get rid of a bit of unwanted material that was already visible after the last operation and did not disappear during chemo.

Thanks for keeping me in your thoughts!