London in October

For the first time ever I bought a ticket for London without getting input from Rob. It felt odd. I have friends from home coming to visit and I didn't have any margin for time so I just went ahead and got the ticket. I made the trip as long as I could and I left some details specifically vague.

It'll be in October again, not my favourite season to see the UK, but it will do. 

I mentioned it to Rob, after the fact. I think I was hoping for him to ask me if I'd be coming to see him but he didn't say anything. For some reason I got the impression that he didn't want to see me. With the fact that we often communicate through messages it's hard to gauge enthusiasm or facial expressions when you can't see them. 

I don't know if things will work out or not, I only have a couple free days, I don't know whether he will be free those specific dates either. It all needs sorting. It's all very iffy this time round but he did sort of say he would be disappointed if he didn't see me, so that was nice to hear. 

It doesn't seem like that long ago that we met up, it was last year, last October... It's weird, this year flew by. 

I really do hope we can wing it. I love spending time with him, the talks, the walks, the sex.... Sleeping with him. It's all like cotton candy, sweet and soft and melt in your mouth good, but oh so ethereal, so momentary. 

Catch 22

Thanks for all the lovely comments, concern and advice. It definitely feels nice to hear such positive and heartfelt things from readers.

Unfortunately I have not had much progress in this whole thing. I've made many more calls and got somewhat frustrating answers.

Most of the doctors I have talked to told me I need histology reports on either my mother or my uncle or both to be able to get anywhere with an oncologist.
 
I made a few calls and there is N.American red tape around my mother's medical records. I can't access them unless I'm being treated by a national hospital or institute, in which case, even then it would be complicated. This is what the national health system told me, they also told me I might have a better chance if I talked to my mother's GP, especially if she is still practising. She is, except when I talked to her assistant it turns out my mother's records, from 10 years ago, are not in the 'system'. They are paper records and are therefore in storage somewhere, they have to be dug out. Her old GP will be in today and hopefully I'll have an answer on whether or not that will be possible.

I don't want to have to ask my uncle, who isn't mentally stable, to authorize to send his medical records to me.

As per medical care here, I found an institute a fair ways away which is specialized in this type of thing, but I'm pretty sure there are alternatives here. My doctor doesn't seem to want to look into what testing I need to do or whether it's possible to get it done here. It looks like I may have to do a long trip to get the information I want.

I'm still worried. I haven't been bursting into tears at random times though so that's good. I'm just getting more and more frustrated.
I was expecting the bf to be more supportive, he's been on edge and easily annoyed instead. Maybe it's my complaining about the system here and how things are so bureaucratically bad here. He picks fights with me, we had two arguments in two days because of it. I feel like I have to constantly defend myself for complaining about how frustrating this whole thing is.
I can't see a horizon, I can't see this being simple. It seems like it should be simple but it's really not.

Even on the Oncology institute site here the outline of tests seems rather straightforward, but to be able to do them I need a doctor to prescribe them and none of the doctors will prescribe them if I don't have my mother's medical records.
UGH

It's a Catch 22.

Cancer

I have been procrastinating on this a fair amount. I had some indication of what tests to do but I wasn't sure it was possible to do them here. My doctor doesn't have much of a clue so I had to do my own research. 

I ended up, after many calls, talking to a radiologist who explained the procedure she thought was best. I'm thinking that every doctor I talk to will give me a different set of tests. 

Maybe the best thing is to talk to an oncologist. 

I don't think this type of cancer shows up on blood tests or X-rays, which is the procedure the radiologist suggested. I'm guessing that the LDCT (low dose cat scan) is the best option, but they generally only suggest it for people over the age of 50/55. 

I'm scared. I have respiratory problems. I have since I moved here from N.America. I developed a form of asthma. it has, over the past year, gotten a little worse. When I lie down sometimes I feel like I need to cough. If I do cough, I have a hard time breathing in after. I can't catch my breath. It's a horrible sensation. I know it's not related but it scares me none the less. 

I'm afraid of calling my uncle. He's odd and it's already difficult for me to talk to him, now with this it's even harder. I have no idea what to say to him. 

I feel like I have no one left in my family, there's my father and my sister but that's it. 

I've had anxious thoughts about who to leave things too if I died, I don't have a will but I feel like I should. I could leave things to my sister or to my father but if they don't outlive me? I would probably leave things to the bf or to his nieces and nephew. 

I have property in North America I don't feel like I can leave property to some kids who live in Europe. 

I'm scared. 

Drinks

So we went for drinks, me and my annoying neighbour's girlfriend. We always have a good time, I like her. She's funny. 

On our walk back home I asked her how she'd met her boyfriend and she said a little shyly, "it's a long story", without me pressing she continued, she said that she was with this guy, who happened to be friends with her current bf and there was some other social network at the time, he friended her on there, they started chatting and they started seeing each other. So this is his M.O.. 

I also asked if he was with someone else at the time too and she said that he was single. 

Just random details that help me put a profile together.... 

Decisions

So I have made a decision about the neighbour. I will unfollow his posts without unfriending him at the moment. This will make ignoring him easier. I will ignore him completely, including private messages which are rare from him in any case. 

This evening I'm going out for a drink with his gf and may initiate some conversation about how they met etc. but I won't tell her what's going on. I don't want to ruin their relationship without really knowing this guy. If things get worse or persist after we have a group dinner then I will talk to him. I'll tell him it's not appropriate and I'm not interested, if that doesn't deter I'll talk to her. 

This afternoon I dreamt he took my profile picture and zoomed into the background and sent me the closeup of my bedroom. It was creepy because in the dream it looked like he'd taken the picture through a hole in the wall and only after I realized that it was taken from the mirror in my profile pic. 

When I woke up I had to check fb to make sure it was a dream. 

This thing sucks. I hate having to worry about my neighbour. 

I also put a pic of the bf up with hearts around him. Maybe he'll get the hint. 

I don't normally post pics of the bf since he's not on fb. when I showed the bf he seemed flattered though. He usually doesn't want his picture on fb. 

Ugh Neighbour... Again!

He's at it again. It's disconcerting. This time it was extremely clear the posts were for me. The main post was another poem, a poem about a blond woman in the sun who carries your heart away. It's no coincidence I sat out in the the sun in the back yard to work the day before.

The posts were not public and they appear at the top of my feed just like all the others. I happened to 'like' one of his photographs earlier in the week (before the poem) and he sent me a private message on fb saying in English that I was his number one fan. After I didn't respond for a day he added that it wasn't a criticism. 

I ignored everything. It wasn't just one post either there were a bunch, things like asking suggestions for what to eat for dinner, mentioning being tired but not sleeping, one about going bird watching (wtf?!?)... The list goes on.  All weird things that make me just slightly uncomfortable. 

It frustrates me that just because I liked one of his photographs he has gone on this tangent. 

I talked to a couple of people about it. One suggested I ignore him completely. The other suggested I kindly tell him that I'd only like to interact publicly. I do kind of feel like I should say something... But my automatic response wouldn't be to politely mention public communication only. I'm not sure why though. Maybe it's a language thing. Maybe I feel like it could be interpreted in a few ways considering his posts are open on a feed but they are set for only me. 

Maybe I should set a private post just for him telling him to stop and that it's not appropriate. 

I was hoping we could organize a dinner with a group of our friends so that he could meet the bf and get a hint. Maybe he'd quit on his own. He just seems really stubborn and insistent.