Last time I wrote on here, I thanked the doctors and staff at Gloucester Royal Hospital for coming to support me at my play. However, today I want to be really specific in who deserves the biggest thanks of all.
Dr. Dilys O'Neale is without doubt one of the biggest personalities I've come across as a consequence of my diagnosis. She was there on day one on the 10th of October 2012 and on the 31st of October 2014, she retired from her position at Gloucester Royal and without doubt will be incredibly missed. She influenced me hugely in my approach to treatment, always greeting me with a sly dig and a smile. Dilys understood that it was truly rubbish for me to be in hospital, feeling awful due to chemotherapy and so she would make light of it, which for me, was the perfect response I needed to my complaining. She'd always buy strange plasters and give me stickers after treatment and we'd often laugh at the latest Russell Howard's Good News while she pushed the bleak yellow fluid into the back of my hand, but also, to the back of my mind.
Dilys honestly made hospital a better place to be and therefore, made my life a whole lot better in the process. She'd always (admittedly sometimes a few weeks late) produce reams of charts and graphs to placate my worrying mum and I was always happy with my Disney Princess plasters. I feel like I'm maybe not saying "thank you" as seriously as I should, but I feel like that was exactly what Dilys was like as a person so I don't feel too guilty.
However, Dilys, if you are reading this, then please know that you've had a lasting impact on mine, as well as my family's life, we owe you big time, so thank you! I don't want to say it's all been a barrel of laughs because, well, you know, cancer played a pretty major part in our meeting, but through circumstances neither of us could help, you helped make a bearable situation out of a pretty bad one.
Good luck in everything you choose to do next - Whiny Will x
I realise that I have been very lucky to have had such a friendly face around me for two years at hospital, it must be a really tough job to look after grumpy little b*st*rds like me. I think that it can be easy to forget just how much work all the doctors and nurses do for all patients and so it's always good to remind them how appreciated they are.
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