I find it hard to describe as an illness but it isn’t something that will ever go away and will probably get worse, but after knee surgery about 12 years ago, which wasn’t particularly successful I now have permanent Chrondromalacia in both knees which varies daily between a minor nuisance and virtually crawling up the stairs and trying not to show to others just how ghastly stairs are in my facial expressions!

Another was having a large thymoma removed just over 2 years ago, which was borderline cancerous, fortunately fully removed but due to my age, there is no guarantee it won’t come back. Its taken a long time to ‘accept’ my situation but I know I just have to live with it as there is not much I can do other than have regular check up’s for the rest of my life. It wasn’t really symptomatic until it was caused me to end up in A&E unable to breathe, which slightly terrifies me it could happen again and I might not be so lucky.

I also suffer with irritable bowel which varies in its severity but am thankful for now is mostly behaving itself!