15th April, Royal Marsden Hospital, Sutton Branch, Surrey, England

It’s like the first day in a new job

I’m at the Royal Marsden in Surrey today. It’s a shining example of what the NHS could be if we started shooting political activists.

I expected to use the one in Chelsea, but while everyone’s on COVID holiday this works for me. I have a new consultant on board. An academic, and clinical oncologist who’ll decide on the best routes for my radiotherapy.

The doctor is one of the leads at the institute for cancer research, I couldn’t be in safer hands.

My surgery wounds are all healed now, and I’m feeling ready. It’s time to get this over and done with, or at least – most of it.

Next week I’ll have another CT scan, then I have radiotherapy for 5 days a week for 5 weeks. With 5G being big news, I wonder if they’ll just replace all of those expensive Linea accelerators with a mast in the carpark? (I also wonder how well 5G jokes will age?)

5 weeks of this, then a scan every 3 months for 2 years. After that, it’s one every 6 months for 5 years. How very thorough.