D day, or should I say C Day

24-09

07:45, Time to impact: 12 hours 30 minutes: I was driving Victoria to school as normal, and noticed that she was staring into space out of the passenger window. I tried to give her a bit of a pep talk, you know the kind of thing, the "I'm not your slave" kind of rant. She struggled to be positive and tell me what she thought I wanted to hear, and the journey carried on. With the benefit of hindsight, I really hate myself for that rant now!

08:15, Time to impact: 12:00: I pulled over at Sarah's house as usual. However instead of getting out the car, and waving goodbye, she just burst into tears. She told me how she was fed up of feeling ill, and how the headaches were getting worse and on top of her. I comforted her, and said that she didn't have to go to school if she wasn't well, and that I'd take her to see the doctor. After 15 minutes of this, she decided however, she would be OK to go to school, and off she went, and off I went to work.

08:45, Time to impact: 11:30: Just as I am driving around the work car park in the vain hope of finding somewhere to leave the car, I get a phone call from the school. Victoria had been taken to the school nurse as she had nearly fainted, and was looking as white as a sheet. I immediately abandoned my pointless parking space quest and headed for the school, and rang the doctor's surgery.

11:30, Time to impact: 8:45: The duty doctor examined her and said he thought that she had anemia, and that I had to get her to the hospital (Northampton General, co-incidentally where I work) immediately for an emergency blood test, and if confirmed emergency treatment. I spoke to Tracey on the phone, and my mum, and anemia did run in the family on both sides so this seemed a logical conclusion to make.

12:00, Time to impact: 08:15: Unsurprisingly arrived at the hospital and was unable to find any staff parking, and was forced to park in the public car park, which of course meant that I had to pay! This always riles me as I work at the bloody place! Victoria looked weak, pale, and appears to have lost interest in just about everything around her.

12:45, Time to impact: 07:30: The first doctor arrives and starts asking a string of questions followed by a physical examination. I can see Victoria is frightened, and seems reluctant to answer. I encourage her to answer as best she can. We wait. They arrange for blood to be taken. Victoria is traumatised when they ask for a urine sample, and starts to get upset.

14:45, Time to impact: 05:30: Different doctor, more questions, more poking and prodding and the questions are mostly the same questions again, and Victoria starts to get frustrated with this. By this time Tracey has arrived and they still haven't actually taken her blood for testing! What were they waiting for. Frustration, boredom, anger and fear all bubble under the surface of us all.

16:00, Time to impact: 04:15: Finally, they take the blood tests. Now all we have to do is wait.

18:00, Time to impact: 02:15: "He waits, that's what he does. Tick follows tock follows tick follows tock..." Another doctor comes to talk to us all. Again, same questions, although this time one new one arose. The doctor turned to us and asked almost casually, so as not to cause alarm "any family history of cancer..." Funny what sticks in your mind as I write this a few days afterwards.

19:15, Time to impact: 01:00: The Consultant Paediatrician returns (I feel I can call him that now, as I'm sure none of the kids are still reading) and assures us that the results should be back very soon and we should know what we are dealing with. At this point, no decision had been made on whether Victoria would be admitted or coming home. The wait was agonising. We were all feeling the tension, but toughing it out. Each tick of the clock seemed to take minutes. OK, deep breath...

20:14, Time to impact: 01:00: Tracey and I are called in to a room, where we are sat down with the Consultant and two other members of staff. Clearly this was not good. I could see the cracks in the ground start to open up before my feet. My heart was pounding, and was the loudest noise in the room. Each tick now felt like hours. Life had entered a period of slow motion. I felt like I was in an episode of the Six Million Dollar man, you know the bits where they rather bizarrely would slow down the 'bionic' scenes to give the impression of speed. (Once again, only the adults will get this reference, but once again the kids have long stopped reading!)

20:15, Impact confirmed, detonation positive: Fortunately for us, the Consultant was a straight talking, shoot from the hip kind of guy, and he didn't pull any punches. "The analysis of the blood cells is consistent with Leukemia", this was followed by a number of words that could have been in any language in any order because my brain had temporarily shut down all sensory functions whilst I processed this information. After a 360 power cycle (once an IT technician, always an IT technician, reboot to the rest of us) and I started listening again he asked me "Do you know what Leukemia is?". "Yes", I replied, "it's blood cancer isn't it?". Now the ticks had stopped completely. My eyes were welling up, and Tracey and I turned to each other and embraced, and let it all out.