I was admitted the day before my operation, Monday 10th July, 2023, at 9:00 AM in the morning. After completing my admission form I was left mainly to my own devices until people started turning up at my bedside: McMillan nurse, doctors, the anaesthetist followed by the surgeon.

The talk with the anaesthetist went well until he informed me I’d be having an epidural whilst awake before the operation. That I wasn’t expecting. But by far the worst talk was with the surgeon who gave me a long list of things they will be doing during the operation: removing both my ovaries, my uterus and my rectum! Plus taking out the infected bowel and re-connecting it. He said that they were going to do the HIPEC surgery, filling my bowel up with chemotherapy, leaving for 90 minutes and then flushing out. The hardest thing to hear was when he told me that if the cancer has spread to my stomach lining then he would simply stitch me back up again and that would be that.

Phil came to visit me and we went down to Costa for a coffee where we discussed what was said, we both were very upset about the possibility if nothing could be done. I think the hardest thing was saying goodbye to him, not knowing for sure if I would ever see him again.

I was nil by mouth, only being allowed to sip water and some Fortisip, then the nurse came and informed me I need to have an enema. I thought that was just going to be a torpedo-shaped tablet put up my bottom, but boy was I wrong. It was a tube of lubricant or something, I’m not sure what it was, but I know it hurt like hell and as soon as she finished, I made a dash for the toilet and stayed there for a good 20 minutes. “At least that’s over,” I said to myself but unfortunately it happened twice again, each time hurt as bad as the last!

Time to try and get some sleep, which you can imagine was very difficult, not just because of the operation but also because of the noisy ward. I woke up at about four o’clock in the morning and had a bad case of cold feet, not wanting to have the surgery at all, perhaps persuade them to postpone it but then I thought about the enemas and I certainly didn’t want to go through that again.

I woke up again at seven o’clock and was given some cream to have a wash in to sterilise myself and then I was visited by the two surgeons who were performing the operation. They just wanted to say hello and make sure I was feeling okay.

I walked to the operating theatre with a theatre assistant who warned me not to get overwhelmed by the amount of people in there and when I entered the operating theatre she wasn’t kidding, there was loads of people. I sat on the bed and waited for my epidural and was asked the question by one of the theatre staff, “What would you normally be doing on a Tuesday morning?” “Watching Homes Under the Hammer,” was my reply and we had a conversation about buying and selling houses!! Meanwhile they were fiddling with my lower back preparing me for the epidural, which I have to say, didn’t hurt at all.

I noticed there was a huge blue screen down one end of the room and when I asked what that was for I was told. “All the machines we will be using are there, we don’t want you to see how many there are.”

I laid on my back and was told that I would soon be drifting off to sleep and seconds later I was asleep.