I somehow managed to delete my Health Update post from last November, so here it is again, for anyone wondering why I'm an artist who hasn't created anything for 6 months or more...
Unfortunately, the health problems I've been suffering from this year have turned out to be far more serious than anyone realised. Rather than being the flare-up of my Ulcerative Colitis I'd been assuming, it was actually an aggressive bowel tumour forming. On October 11th I had to go into A&E and was then rushed into emergency surgery where they saved my life from the bowel perforation that had occurred as a result of the cancerous growth. There followed a couple of days in Intensive Care and ten days on a ward where the help, nursing and care I received from several different departments was quite simply brilliant - the people who work in our hospitals are frankly some of the best people you will meet in any walk of life; they're professional, hard-working, compassionate and self-sacrificing and in a nutshell, restore your faith in society.
I've since been recuperating at home for a few weeks, recovering from the operation. Like many others, I now have to face an ongoing battle against the cancer to fight it back as it has spread beyond the original site. As such my artwork is going on an indefinite hiatus I'm afraid, at least until my energy levels are back up to concentrating sufficiently long enough and deeply enough to produce anything decent. Chemotherapy isn't renowned for making you feel good, so it could take a while!
As a taoist, I am genuinely open to all outcomes so the following isn't meant to be a Big, Melodramatic Goodbye, but just on the offchance that things get a bit tricky a bit quickly, I'd like to say a big thankyou to everyone who's bought, commissioned, supported, encouraged and appreciated my art over the years. It adds an extra level of gratification to doing what I love and it's been great to get to know so many really nice people in so many different countries as a result (never let anyone tell you the internet is A Bad Thing!). I'll probably be back to bore you with some more work at some point, and I'll still be sharing random memes on Facebook occasionally I expect. In the meantime, be cool, and if you're British, please treasure the NHS for the true gem it remains, despite the incredible pressures it has to operate under.
