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Life Is A Roller Coaster, Just got To Ride It
Well-known blond, Irish warbler Ronan Keating famously sang in his big pop tune of May 2000 that life is indeed a roller coaster, and you...
Austin Birks
Oct 21, 20244 min read
79 views
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Would You Rather Have Cancer Or Apply For An Electronic Signature?
Now I do not know about you, my dear reader chum, but I am finding that as I get older, it is the small things in life that cause the...
Austin Birks
Jul 8, 20244 min read
126 views
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Trouble and strife with the strawberry tart
In my adolescent years, I had a mate of mine called Eamonn Martin. One of the things that we used to do was make up our own version of...
Austin Birks
Mar 19, 20244 min read
176 views
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Head, Heart Beat, Knees, and Toes
I was talking to a friend of mine today, and he asked me how I was. I had not seen him since before Christmas, so when he asked me, I...
Austin Birks
Jan 29, 20245 min read
104 views
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Treatment Number 100 Of Chemotherapy
The Bard himself famously said that life is but a stage, and we are all but players on the stage. Well, the older that I get, the more...
Austin Birks
Dec 20, 20233 min read
99 views
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Bag for Life This Year So Far
Well, as I meander closer to my 99th dose of chemo the week after next and then the big one on December 20th, where I hit the big...
Austin Birks
Dec 19, 20235 min read
106 views
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Two Fat Ladies Click Click Click, Dose 88 of Chemotherapy
I used to enjoy playing Bingo once upon a time in this strange and wonderful world that I have lived in for 63 years. It was a different...
Austin Birks
Jun 10, 20233 min read
53 views
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The Dark Side Of Chemotherapy
Over the course of my 4 years and 6 months of living with cancer, a lot of kind people have said to me: “So, if you don't mind me asking,...
Austin Birks
Mar 13, 20236 min read
209 views
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Review of 2022 - In Short: No, Thank You… Things Can Only Get Better
One of the benefits of being a rather sad, old, English gentleman like myself, is the fact that even though technology allows us to have...
Austin Birks
Jan 7, 20236 min read
159 views
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Cancer And The Snakes And Ladders Conundrum, Or Shake Rattle And Roll!
When I first started writing these blogs back in late 2018, I had absolutely what was going to happen, or indeed what I was going to...
Austin Birks
Nov 10, 20227 min read
128 views
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Blood Clot MAAANNN......Rastafari
When I was a young punk, living in Birmingham in 1977, I would regularly go to gigs in the city centre. Watching the likes of The Clash...
Austin Birks
Sep 13, 20225 min read
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From The Top Of My Head To The Tips Of My Toes…Who Knows Where The Cancer Grows… Part 2
Following on from the first part of my journey exploring what the side effects of chemotherapy are and what they are actually like. I...
Austin Birks
Jul 30, 20226 min read
113 views
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First Blog of 2022
Well, my dear chums, here we are and today was my first day back at chemo, having missed my last one and a half chemo sessions, which is...
Austin Birks
Jan 19, 20223 min read
145 views
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Once More Into The Breach Dear Friends (Back to Chemo After a 2-week Break)
It was good while it lasted, I have to say, but it did not last long. My wonderful oncologist, Doctor Peter, had agreed to give me a...
Austin Birks
Oct 21, 20213 min read
67 views
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The Long And Winding Road: A Journey With Cancer
So, here I am, my dear friends. It is 02.45 on Thursday July 22. The daily temperatures have been record-breaking for 5 days solid and...
Austin Birks
Jul 25, 20213 min read
153 views
1 comment


Cycling 300 miles in 30 days - whilst on chemotherapy - to raise awareness for cancer research
At the beginning of February 2021, I found out that my level 4a bowel cancer had returned for a third time. This was a tough blow, but as...
Austin Birks
Mar 4, 20211 min read
67 views
1 comment


Starting chemotherapy... again
2 weeks ago I was diagnosed with bowel cancer for the third time. This week, I started back on the chemotherapy and medication regime.
Austin Birks
Feb 21, 20211 min read
38 views
2 comments


Waiting for CT Scan Results
I finished my last course of chemotherapy 3 months ago and last week I had a CT scan. Next week I will find out if the bowel cancer has...
Austin Birks
Nov 1, 20201 min read
21 views
0 comments

The Finishing Line With Cancer, Or Is It The Beginning Again?
So, here I am again. It is 2AM in the early morning of Thursday, 22nd October 2020. I am just tying to decide, do I watch the MSL...
Austin Birks
Oct 29, 20205 min read
134 views
1 comment

The Strange World Of The (Cancer) Inbetweeners
Hello my dear chums, You might be justifiably baffled at the rather strange nod of the head to the classic teenage comedy series, the...
Austin Birks
Aug 24, 20204 min read
164 views
1 comment
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