Tim Richardson\u2019s recently-published book, There Should Be Blood, is a humorous and engaging tale of a blood cancer diagnosis that should give hope to other people dealing with \u2018the big C\u2019.<\/p>\n
Tim reveals in this moving and very personal account how he was diagnosed with an unpronounceable disease during the height of Covid.<\/p>\n
Tim Richardson. Picture: Keith Heppell<\/p>\n
\u201c2020 is when it happened, which of course was right in the middle of the pandemic,\u201d remembers the affable author, speaking to the Cambridge Independent from his home in Godmanchester.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd, as you\u2019ll see in the book, I simply had a lump in my neck and snuck into a doctor\u2019s surgery and then had a blood test.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey said, \u2018You\u2019ve got to go in for a blood transfusion immediately\u2019.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey weren\u2019t sure what was going on; basically, my haemoglobin, which is the red blood cells, was down at 70-something \u2013 and they said it should be about 140.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd they said it could be a number of things \u2013 it could be anaemia, it could be a lack of minerals, iron\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n
Tim went to the hospital for further tests, scans and biopsies.<\/p>\n
\u201cMost people would think, \u2018Oh, that\u2019s a bit scary\u2019 \u2013 mine were just very odd,\u201d he says, \u201cand what I put in the book is a lot more humour about it, because that\u2019s the way I deal with things.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut it took about a month or so and then they said, \u2018Well, I think you\u2019ve got this extraordinary disease called Waldenstr\u00f6m macroglobulinemia\u2019.<\/p>\n
\u201cBasically it\u2019s a slow-growing form of non-Hodgkin\u2019s lymphoma. It\u2019s a blood cancer, I\u2019d had it for a long time, I guess\u2026<\/p>\n
\u201cI said to the consultant, \u2018How do you get it?\u2019 and he said, \u2018It\u2019s just pure bad luck. A couple of your blood cells lost the plot and instead of dying off \u2013 which your blood cells do, and replenish \u2013 they went, \u2018No, we\u2019re clinging on\u2019.\u2019<\/p>\n
\u201cSo they just multiplied badly, shall we say.\u201d<\/p>\n
Tim describes a cancer diagnosis as \u201cthe big thing you never want to hear\u201d and explains that following the blood transfusions, the doctors wanted to give him chemotherapy straight away.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut in the middle of a pandemic, when your immune system and mine was really low \u2013 by the way it still is \u2013 they said, \u2018This is not a good thing\u2019,\u201d he recalls.<\/p>\n
\u201c\u2018We don\u2019t really want to keep bringing you in to the hospital every two weeks because there\u2019s a lot of bad things going on in the hospital around Covid\u2019.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd at the time I was lucky; I had been paying into a private insurance for a while and asked if it would make any difference and the consultant said, \u2018Well it would actually, you can benefit from advances in technology and medicine which is around a targeted therapy\u2019.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo I was put on that tablet straight away and the result was pretty quick \u2013 my haemoglobin went back up, inch-by-inch, over the next few months to a good response.\u201d<\/p>\n
Following three or four blood transfusions in the early days following his diagnosis, and then the aforementioned tablet, Tim says he has since been given immunoglobulin infusions.<\/p>\n
\u201cBecause my immune system is pretty rubbish, I occasionally have these infusions that help my immune system, in theory,\u201d he explains.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s not terribly successful, it has to be said, but there we go.\u201d<\/p>\n
How is Tim doing now?<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m doing well actually,\u201d he replies. \u201cThe treatment has been tremendously successful. Apparently, Waldenstr\u00f6m macroglobulinemia is a disease that you die with, not necessarily of\u2026<\/p>\n
\u201cSo it\u2019s a bit like diabetes, or some sort of high blood pressure thing. If it\u2019s not treated, your bone marrow gets infected and then you end up having to have bone marrow transplants and things like that.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo I guess I was fortunate, to a point. My bone marrow was 90 per cent infected, so it\u2019s now hopefully a whole lot less so!<\/p>\n
\u201cYou say, \u2018Is that in remission?\u2019 and they say, \u2018Well, in your case it\u2019s a controlled state\u2019. I\u2019ve asked if it goes away and they say, \u2018We don\u2019t know \u2013 it might, but it might not\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n
Tim adds: \u201cYou don\u2019t live in fear, you just kind of get on with life… I feel fine, and the story is more about a tale of dealing with something that just knocks you for six, in the midst of all the other things that are going on.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd just living with it and being hopeful amongst some of the human reactions \u2013 because there were times when I was very fearful.\u201d<\/p>\n
Tim, who is also a poet, an executive coach and a leadership consultant, has already held a launch for the book at Waterstones in St Neots.<\/p>\n
There will be another event in London in October, at The Old Operating Theatre in Southwark.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy friend, who\u2019s the manager of the Waterstones in St Neots, was reading it and she said, \u2018This has made me laugh so much. It\u2019s great, and yet powerful\u2019,\u201d he notes.<\/p>\n
\u201cPeople say it\u2019s light and yet it\u2019s profound.\u201d<\/p>\n