Put this in the scrapbook.

A couple of weeks ago I asked our lovely club captain if she had a copy on file somewhere of the flyer that came through my mailbox back in 2010 that started all this madness.

I really wanted a copy of it to add to my scrapbook story of this Fairway to Fifty project(Volume 1 of which has just been completed) .
With some trouble Alisoun was able to find this and gave it to me yesterday.

 So here is a little plug for a tremendous and welcoming golf club,that has managed to survive several bouts of major liquefaction on the fairways and greens after both the February and June earthquakes of 2011 here in Christchurch.

Fortuitous Flyer

Perfect timing!
And a great adventure begun without me even realizing.

I remember I attended that very first lesson with great trepidation as I was still very shy about going out in public with my big (and to me terribly noticeable)facial scars post surgery and having lost so much confidence physically I doubted my body would even be able to manage to swing a club with all the tight stiffness and lack of movement in my neck and shoulder.
I could not believe how heavy those clubs felt and how impossible it seemed to even hit the ball.
I came home with an injury-but not one I expected. Somehow I managed to slash my thumb open with the fingernail of my opposing thumb as I attempted what seemed an incredibly awkward way to hold a club.


Having played a lot of hockey in my youth to provincial level I thought I would have no problems actually hitting the ball!


Wrong.
But I was back the next week.


Giving Golf a Go.


 

Sharkey's Day again.

Not sure if the sun came up "like a big bald head" yesterday  or not but it sure was another day for Sharkey!

A lucky day!

Check out the photo and spot the difference:

And then there were Two.

Indeed,now there are two Lady Shark balls to put into the commodious pocket of the new 
Blue Shark. 

I won the Stableford Competition this week with an impressive 24 Stableford points.

What? I hear the uninitiated query.

The ways of golf are many and varied.

In a Stableford competition you are allowed to take a certain number of shots on each hole based on your current Handicap. If you play to your handicap and finish each hole in the allowable number of shots you score 2 points per hole and you would finish with a total of 18 if playing a nine hole game as I do.

For example: I am currently on a Handicap of 20.2 so in general on a Par 3 hole I am allowed 5 shots to complete the hole. If I hole out in 5 I score 2 points;if I hole out in 4 I get 3 points;do it in 3 and 4 points are mine.Conversely if I take 6 shots I receive only 1 point and none if I take 7 shots.

With a score of 24 I was playing below my handicap!

In fact on Thursday I did my best ever stroke score(total strokes played over the whole 9 holes) of 51-my all time low!

Of course what happens next is that my handicap will come down lower and then I will be  allowed less shots on each hole so it becomes harder for me to score Stableford points.    

Confused?

Bemused?

Well let me just introduce another bit of golf talk-I also got  a Ferret!

Yep!

I tell you,it is a weird and mysterious game.

A ferret is when you hole the ball from off the green. 

A lovely chip shot from off the green that bounced nicely and then disappeared! Yes it bounced neatly into the hole much to my amazement.Good luck rather than good management I have to admit.

Should be called a Fluket not a Ferret.

 

 

Addiction?

The week before last we were in the midst of a glorious Indian Summer and after having found myself on the golf course every afternoon making the most of the last of the Golden Weather I had to ask myself some difficult questions.

Is this golf thing becoming an obsession?

 Am I becoming addicted to the ping of my driver as I tee off?

Do I need to find a local branch of Golfers' Anonymous ?

Do I need to get a sponsor?

No No No
All  I need is a great golf buddy who is as keen as I am to go out as often as possible for a round.
And luckily for me I have just such a friend.
We both started playing golf at the same time back in April 2010 in response to a little flyer that came 
through my mailbox urging:

 "Ladies Give it a Go-3 Free Golf Lessons at Avondale Golf Club"

And give it a go  we did .

And we saw that it was good.

At the time I was needing something to get me out of the house and re-engaging in the world.

Gentle exercise and fresh air, but something new I had never done before so I would not be comparing my body

and its ability to perform with my pre-treatment self.

Something that helped me focus on the present moment and distracted me from the constant pain in my jaw and face.

After our three free lessons the Club Captain offered us a temporary three month membership at a very reasonable rate so we could see if we enjoyed golf enough to warrant joining.

 

Very canny plan! 

Well as we played a few rounds amongst the big trees and delighted in the monarch butterflies that festooned some of the trees on the fairways and occasionally alighted on our balls( the ones we did not loose!)we slowly became hooked.
At the end of the three months we signed up for a half years membership with the Nine Hole Ladies Club.
 And a steep learning curve began!

"Great Golf is a Matter of Club Selection"

proclaims an advertisement in the Golf Gazette.
And I found most of my clubs at The Super shed (-the recycling shop at the dump) for $2 .
Although putters were harder to come by and cost $10.
My golf bag was procured for $1 on special one lucky Thursday.

My assumption that golf was a snobby and expensive game was getting turned on  its head.

Lovely $1 Golf Bag

 Attached though I was to my Tartan Golf Bag(so fitting for the Royal and Ancient Game originating in the Kingdom of Fife,Scotland) this week I bought a new bag with birthday money.

Last week I played in the semi-finals of a Handicap Match Play game at Avondale.I was up against one of the best players in our club but because it was Handicap Match play my opponent had to give me 8 shots i.e. if she scored 50 and I scored 58 we would be even.
This is one of the great things about the Handicapping system in golf-all players can start from an equal footing no matter their skill level.
I told myself that if I won the game I would spend my money on the new bag I had been eyeing up at my favourite golf shop.


So I got lucky- I played a good round and with the 8 shot advantage I am through to the final.The new bag was purchased on Tuesday.

The Old and the New

 

 

A Hole for each Club

 Oh beautiful blue Shark bag 
with 14 separate compartments,
one for each club. 

This, as I discovered today, makes it so very much easier getting the clubs in and out of the bag and eliminates a lot of the clanging together of the clubs as you trundle around the course uphill and down through patches of liquefaction(yes I live in earthquake city!)


On a Roll....
My winning streak continued today when I scored the lowest round at club day.

-a 35 with the help of my handicap(which is now 20.2)

And my prize?
A golf ball of course.

But not just any old golf ball.
Very auspicious for the first day out with the NEW BLUE SHARK   

I win a Lady Shark ball.

It's Sharkeys day today

 

Inspiration

Yes! Breathing in and out,in and out,in and out.
 Go on-do some breathing with me now - you know you want to.

In the days following surgery when I was breathing through a trachy and almost drowning in my own saliva,
I had a gem of a charge nurse over-seeing my care.
A Charge Nurse in charge indeed!.
Gayle was a rather formidable, super capable, no nonsense ,'stop your carrying on' Australian woman of whom initially we were all a bit afraid.
Of course despite her brusque manner she turned out to have a heart of gold.
When I was struggling with pain and choking and gasping for air she would stand over me with a hand on my shoulder, gently but firmly and say:
"Your only job is to take another breath.That is all you have to do.You are alright, just breathe in and out."
Fantastic advice to anyone in a difficult situation,panicking.
And jeez she wasn't even a rebirther charging me an arm and a leg.(The surgeon had already got his dibs on those.)

And really all any of us have to do is take that next breath and calm the mind.
Wonderful Air.

Remember it is air that creates the bubbles in your champagne.

So often and in many different situations(even standing on the tee box) I hear Gayle's voice reminding me to
just breathe.

As for inspiration for this golfing adventure.....

Check out this young woman- http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/6213390/Flight-a-rite-of-passage-for-new-pilot

Early in January of this year whilst I was thinking how I might like to celebrate
 actually making it to 50
I read about Chloe and her "Flight of Passage" to mark her 21st.
Hmm I said to myself -what momentous and significant adventure could I create for myself to mark the half century?

Birth of a Great Adventure

And then it came to me:

 Having that very day thoroughly enjoyed playing  nine holes at the Kawatiri Golf Links in Westport
 I knew my adventure......

  would have to involve  Golf .

Playing Tiger at Kawatiri Links,Westport.

I wanted to have a party with all my beloveds but  it would be hard to get them all together in the same place,and if I did I would not really get to spend significant time with them in a party situation.

Perhaps a Road Trip would be in order so I can visit friends all around the country.

And so the idea was born.... 
I will play fifty golf courses around New Zealand and combine it with catching up with all my dear friends (and no doubt meeting new ones too).

And I will write a book about my journey.
That journey being the past five years of my life. 
The golf will provide a way into the story that needs to be told about my particular
 cancer rite of passage and shamanic journey.

The working title of this book will be:  A Fairway to Fifty.

As brother Hamish commented "this idea has wings" and it will fly. 
It will fly like a ball struck squarely and firmly with my 7 Wood from 80 metres out, all the way to the green.

Let the games begin!

 

Celebration! Why?

Making it to Fifty is no big deal I hear you say. Folk do it all the time!

But trust me when I tell you- for me,it has indeed been a fair way to 50
and in the past 5 years much of the journey has been about trying to negotiate
out of the ROUGH.

And I am not talking about a bit of longish fescue here.

I'm talking serious tussock and thick gorse!


How rough?

In February 2007 I was diagnosed with squamous cell carcinoma in my right tonsil with possible spread into the wall of my throat. After a selective neck dissection (this involves stripping the lymph from tissue in the neck to varying degrees depending on how far they think the cancer is likely to have spread- in my case I had 3 levels out of a possible 5 stripped ) the lymph was found to be clear. However a couple of cancer cells were found in the scoop of tissue taken from the throat wall- a miniscule amount but not in the optimal place according to the radiation oncologist.
His recommendation was to radiate the area. Reading up on the short and long-term effects of radiation made this a very unattractive proposition to me with my background in alternative medicine. I made the decision to do all I could with herbs, diet,meditation,qigong and anything else that suggested itself to me to try and heal myself.

By the beginning of 2008 I was feeling strong and recovering well from the invasive surgery and making plans to travel, even booked the tickets. I was envisioning a year of new adventures and vibrant health. I had started a new teaching job in a private language school as well as working with some individual learners in the evenings. I was feeling quietly optimistic about life. But I had a nagging discomfort in my right ear- not pain exactly but annoyingly present.I thought I better mention it at my next monthly check-up.


And then the ball was lost!

At my appointment on a Thursday in February 2008 I mentioned the ear pain and the registrar, on putting the little camera up my nose and down into my throat for a look immediately called the specialist. The camera goes back up my nose ."It looks as if it is back" says the surgeon....."Cancel everything for next week we will do a biopsy on Monday morning"

And so the story goes. It is a long one........................The cancer was back and had spread into my soft palate.

The treatment for this type of cancer is draconian. In brief it involves:

• making an incision from the bottom lip to the base of the ear
• sawing through the jawbone
• opening up the face so they can get into the throat
• removal of large portion of the throat wall and soft palate and possibly some of the tongue
• plastic surgeon removes a flap of skin from the inner arm along with the artery and plugs this into the hole left behind in the throat.
• Skin from the leg is taken to fill the gap left on the arm.
• I will have a tracheotomy tube to breathe through and a nasal-gastric tube to feed through
• I will not be able to speak at first
• most of my teeth will have to be removed prior to surgery
• 6 weeks after surgery the radiation and chemotherapy will begin
• the operation will take about ten hours

And that is if all goes well!

It didn't.

The flap failed to take due to some medical misadventure and  slowly died in my throat.
The whole procedure had to be repeated .
The newly healed incisions were re-opened.
Another flap of skin was taken from the other arm and more skin from the thigh to fill the gap.
This time I am on the operating table for about twelve hours.
Lots of blood is lost.
I need a blood transfusion but this does not happen for several days.
This is a very difficult  surgery to go through and having done it once does not make it easier to do a second time.
I am the plastic surgeons first failed flap!
Oh special me!
I am lost in a world of pain,drug haze and sheer endurance.
There is nothing left in me for this fight. Without my loving support team I simply would have perished.


Tough though all of this was I will look back on it as the easier part after having gone through the radiation/combined chemotherapy and the suicidal depression that followed.
There was a year of living with a stomach peg through which a foul-smelling liquid food was pumped into me all through the night.
And a three year period to wean myself off all the drugs I was prescribed to cope with my physical, 
mental and emotional issues post-treatment.

Of course this is just a very brief over-view of the past five years of my life.I always meant to write a book about this journey and tried to keep a journal throughout the treatment period .But somehow every time
 I sat down to write something the memories were still too raw and vivid. 

Default setting post radiation  treatment.

                                             









                                         



As one of my excellent brothers observed in his birthday card to me: "Bet there were days a few years ago when you thought you wouldn't make the half century". 

Indeedy! and that is why I say it has been a fair way to 50.

Making light after 3 weeks of radiation.

 

 

 

 

My friend Eroica came over today to help me
 with the technical side of setting up a Blog for my year long adventure.
Fifty golf courses to play in fifty different locations around
 New Zealand to celebrate actually making it to fifty.

Playing Waitoa Park,Oamaru.

                                                       .