This column will be dif­fer­en­t from my pre­vi­ous ones. I’ve been struggling to find the right words.

I can’t pretend: I am frustrated. In fact, I’m very frustrated about the current situation. I imagine I’m not the only one, so I decided to share my thoughts here.

It seems as if, at the moment, nor­mal life is on hold. Every day brings more terrible news about the spread of the latest coronavirus dis­ease, or COVID-19, across the globe. Cases in­crease and deaths follow. It’s totally grim.

Right now I feel sad for …

Life is risky!

I know that is true and I also know that being diag­nosed with multiple myeloma has altered my concept of risk.

Right from the start of my life with multiple myeloma, I became aware of taking new risks.

There was the risks asso­ci­ated with having a stem cell trans­plant. The doctors and nurses highlighted them to me. It seemed a risk worth taking, but it did make me think much more deeply about the de­ci­sions we make and the way we have to deal with the con­se­quences.

Then there …

About four and a half years ago, prior to my multiple myeloma diag­nosis, I started to have lots of health issues that were pre­vi­ously unknown to me.

The ones that initially affected me most severely were back and rib pain and breathlessness when I exercised. I had slipped when hill walking, and I thought I might have pulled a muscle or even broken a rib. I couldn’t find any reason for the breathlessness, but I thought I might have damaged an intercostal muscle.

Yet none of this really made much …

Someone said to me once that, in life, you can get used to any­thing. I am not sure that I agree with that state­ment. I would rather think that you can try to get used to most things.

When my body started falling apart due to multiple myeloma, I did try to adapt, but it was a struggle. I don’t think I am used to the new cir­cum­stances, even now four years post diag­nosis, but I certainly feel that I have tried to adapt and make the best of the life I …

I think that when you are diag­nosed with a serious con­di­tion such as multiple myeloma, it’s probably quite natural to wonder why this has hap­pened.

The medical and popular media are con­stantly suggesting that we follow particular regi­mens in order to keep ourselves healthy and avoid getting cancer. Lots of 'un­healthy' behaviors are thought to in­crease our risk of getting a range of lifestyle-related cancers. But there is no evi­dence that multiple myeloma is a 'preventable' cancer. Nothing that we know of that we “did” caused us to get multiple myeloma or …

Neuropathy has been a feature of my myeloma “experiences” for many years. Even long before I was diag­nosed, I had neu­rop­athy. It mostly affected my hands and feet, but it could affect other areas of my body as well.

It drove me crazy, and from time to time I tried to find out what was causing it. I had no success at all in my quest. I even once went as far as insisting that I see a neurologist. He did some tests to rule out certain con­di­tions, but he didn’t give …

There are a few things about having multiple myeloma that I don’t think I will ever get used to.

One of them is the way people react when they find out that, despite treat­ment, multiple myeloma is a cancer that comes back. It is an un­com­fort­able situation for many people (including me and all the Myeloma Beacon readership!), and I have found that it is often very dif­fi­cult for some people to accept.

When I was first diag­nosed and began treat­ment, I didn’t know this fact myself. I just gradually …