Lightness comes with a long weekend

God, how much lighter I feel knowing I have a third day to my weekend still to come! Usually on a Sunday night I am kicking myself because the next day is Monday and another week of work starts. Dragging myself around the house getting my lunch ready, picking clothes out to wear the next day, fighting with myself because I know I need to go to bed early yet not wanting to. But tonight, I feel so relaxed just knowing I can sleep in again tomorrow morning and have another whole day to myself. This doesn’t particularly help me in my mission to talk myself into how good it is to stick it out fulltime at work. Imagine feeling like this every Sunday...knowing you have that third day to chill out. Aahhhh.......Oh well, dreams are free and guess I’ll just have to make the most of these long weekends as they come round.

Its been a lovely few days, participated in Diwali celebrations Thursday night, had lunch with my big girl yesterday after we potted round getting a few things done of which one was buying myself a new mobile phone. I’m so excited and goddam I bloody love it! What took me so long getting one???? I know, the guilt of spending so much money on something so small and what I felt was frivolous and un-necessary. But actually when I really think about it, I don’t think it either of those things. And I figure, goddam I work hard, I drag myself off to work fulltime even though I’m not the best of health, keep the household going financially and I just figured “fuck it, I deserve it!’ and mobiles are such a big part of our lives now. It’s a means of contact with others when using landlines isn’t an option. Actually if it wasn’t for hubby’s mum, I might even have contemplated cutting the landline off and just using the mobile.

Today I was able to catch up with a friend whom I have not seen for so long and I wonder what tomorrow will bring. I have a bit of a bee in my bonnet at the moment about getting a start on my Christmas shopping so who knows. I might go off tomorrow and get a start on that. Either way, its my day off and I can spend it however I choose.

I had been invited to a couple of birthday celebrations for Saturday night. I had said no to both of them. On one hand I was recently moaning about having no social life in the weekend evenings and then I get two invites for the same evening and say no to both of them. I have my reasons why I didn’t attend either of them and don’t feel I need to go into any detail to explain myself. I don’t say no for the hell of it or to be spiteful or rude, I usually just don’t have it in me to go. I would assume that people who know I have breast cancer will understand without any long winded explanations. But in actuality, one of these celebrations I would very much liked to have gone to except it was out of town and so for a number of reasons felt I wasn’t able to go.

It has taken me to get cancer to realise I don’t have to offer an explanation of any kind. I have days where I just don’t feel like doing stuff and so I won’t. I try not to muck people around. If I say I will go somewhere, I try very hard to stick to that decision but there are times when I just don’t feel up to it. I think because I ‘look well’, people assume I am and so expect me to go on with life as normal. But there are days when I just am unable to do that or just don’t want to. We have a social event coming up at work soon - I won’t be attending. In this instance, I simply don’t want to. My weekends are precious and they go so quickly as it is. Work already has me for 40 hours each week, that is enough. Do I feel guilty? Not in the slightest. I’m over doing things because I feel obliged although that still kicks in every now and then but it is getting less. Maybe I do have an attitude problem, a sense of entitlement because I have the dreaded ‘cancer’. My attitude has definitely changed, not necessarily for the better either. At least I acknowledge my faults. I’m just not sure I care enough to change them.

Monday 23rd October 2017 - 12.11am