The Gorging

Well, it turns out that dropping a stone in a fortnight is cause for doctorly concern; they like to be able to intervene at around about 5% mass loss, rather than the twelve-ish points I've dropped. It is with heavy stomach, therefore, that I report on the first day of the Great Crash Anti-Diet 2007: I've been prescribed four meals a day, plus a meal-size snack, in addition to one thousand calories of sugar-and-protein milkshake. Oh, yeah, and it'd be great if I could get a couple of desserts down me too, if I can manage. Total food tally for today: toast for breakfast, macaroni cheese and chips plus an aloo saag and rice for lunch, veggie lasagne plus soup and a roll for dinner, three milkshakes in between meals, and a couple of satsumas. I'll be meeting with the dietician again on Monday, by which point things will have started to turn around.

In addition to today's ridiculous amount of food, I was also given a couple of units of blood. Blood is wonderful stuff, it's no wonder athletes dope on it; I did my exercises today while the second pack was going in, and I would have just cycled forever if I hadn't been interrupted to eat more. If things keep going like that, I'll be fitter leaving this place than I ever was before.

Speaking of leaving, Dr Tansy had another chat with me about my treatment schedule; we didn't cover anything new, in particular, he was just keen to double-check that I understood the time-scales involved. Barring complications, my stem cell treatment has been pencilled-in for the end of February; everything up until then should just be one routine course of chemotherapy after another. Maybe I should get a hobby. A time-intensive one.