Today was very frustrating, one of those days when everything seems more difficult than it should be. I had a hospital appointment this afternoon, I'd been looking forward to it and dreading it at the same time. I badly needed some answers but I wasn't sure that I was going to like what I heard, so I felt very anxious.
Robbie came with me and since parking at the hospital is challenging at the best of times, I decided to park in a nearby car park and walk the short distance to the hospital. We still have snow but as the hospital is very close to the town centre I was fairly sure that the pavements would be gritted - they weren't! We slipped and slid towards the hospital very slowly indeed, but we made it without any serious problems. The road and pavement leading to the hospital main entrance were treacherous, it beggars belief that the local authority take no responsibility for making sure that roads and paths leading to hospitals, schools and the like are cleared and made safe. Having negotiated the icy pavements I had to pass a huddle of smokers who blocked the pavement just outside the hospital grounds. I was on my way to the chest clinic and the last thing that I needed was their second hand smoke!
I didn't really get the answers I wanted, just lots more questions, more medication. To be fair he did take my problem seriously and he understood how debilitating this cough is, it makes every aspect of my life so much more difficult. He requested lots of tests including an MRI scan, blood tests (I think they took a whole arm full of blood!) and various breathing tests. I have to see the consultant again in 2 months, I really hope the increased medication will help because the thought of putting up with this for another two months makes me feel like giving up.
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We had to go to a different part of the hospital to get my blood tests don so we walked back towards town a different way, but the paths were just as bad and our progress was slow. We walked through St Giles churchyard, it is beautiful at any time of year but the snow against the white snow-laden skies made it look magical, for some reason it made me think of Narnia. I have happy memories of walking through the churchyard with my aunt when I was a child and it looked so beautiful today that I asked Robbie to take some photos for me with his new phone.
Robbie took me to the Cordwainer for something to eat because I had been too anxious to eat much at lunchtime. He likes Wetherspoons food but it didn't really 'float my boat' and it was so dark in there, I like to see what I am eating. It is scary, but I have to admit that I sound more like my grandma every day!
I expect people will be wondering why there have been no blog posts for a couple of weeks. I have been ill and I just haven't had the stamina to do much more than deal with the daily essentials. The killer cough has continued with no sign of improvement and then about ten days ago the nagging pain under my right arm in the side and back of my chest got a lot worse and I decided that it was time to take myself back to the doctor, because I just couldn't cope. So on the Friday morning I found myself sitting in the waiting room trying my hardest not to cough and hoping that the doctor would understand just how bad I was feeling.
After about five minutes a woman (aged about 70) came into the waiting room and parked herself next to me, we exchanged smiles, I wasn't really in the mood for small talk but the woman had other ideas. She was the sort of person that my mum would describe as 'vaccinated with a gramophone needle' she lacked an 'off button' and she chatted happily without stopping for breath. Within minutes I she had told me about he career as a nurse, her (now ex) husband's insatiable sexual appetite, his misbehaviour with an implausibly large number of women and his even more implausible excuses. She paused for breath and I was just wondering how I could possibly respond without encouraging further conversation when she turned to me and asked if I was ready to meet my maker. I opened my mouth to respond but she didn't give me a chance, she went on to warn me about the evils of America and the signs that suggest to her that the end of the world and the second coming will happen sooner than people expect. She said that she goes to church every day to make sure that she will be ready when the time comes and she warned me to ensure that I didn't not spend eternity in a cold grave. This was my chance to get a word in, I said that I intend to be cremated when the times comes, so I don't anticipate any problems with feeling cold! I knew instantly that I should have stayed quiet, the woman took a huge breath and opened her mouth to respond, but at that moment the doctor opened her door and called my name so I was able to escape.
The doctor said that my chest was clear but because I'd been struggling with the cough for 9 weeks she put me on steroids and a course of antibiotics and sent me for a chest x-ray. So after queueing at the chemist I took myself to the hospital to have an x-ray. Thankfully the other people in the waiting room were not very talkative and after sitting quietly for five minutes I was called in for my x-ray. It was all over very quickly and I could head home and curl up in the chair for a little while.
The 7 day course of steroids and antibiotics helped a little bit, but the symptoms got worse again as soon as I stopped taking the tablets. The pain under my arm on the right side of my chest has been steadily getting worse too so I when I went back to the doctor I was desperate for some answers. My x-ray had revealed a rather confusing picture, there was a shadow or something hard to identify on my right lung and something is pushing or pulling my diaphragm up which in turn is restricting the capacity of my right lung. So I am now awaiting an appointment with a consultant to try to work out what is going on and it looks as if I am going to have to put up with this cough for a few more weeks at least.
Robbie and I were rather anxious when we went to the hospital to see his consultant yesterday. We were surprised to find that we didn't have to wait very long until Robbie was called into the consulting room. The consultant explained that the MRI scan had been worthwhile because they were able to get some good pictures of Robbies spine and the pictures had been reviewed by a specialist at Oxford. As expected there was clear evidence of the damage caused by his spina bifida and they could see that his spinal cord was significantly longer than normal with less smaller branches coming from it. The good new was that there is nothing on the scan pictures to suggest that there is any tethering of the cord at the moment. There were words of caution too, Robbie should never have a lumbar puncture or any procedure on his lower back because it could cause serious damage. So the messsage was to keep walking, to accept the falling over and the pain as just part of him and to take great care of his lower back because if anything goes wrong with it they will not be able to put it right. It sounds a bit grim and it would have been nice if we could have found a way to stop the falls and to deal with the pain, but we didn't really expect that. I think we just have to be grateful that the news was as good as we could have hoped for. So now he just has to learn to bounce when he falls over and hopefully he will try not to fall in front of a car or a train!
I went to hospital today. My GP had referred me 'just to be sure' or so she said. That was weeks ago, in fact the symptoms first started to bother me in early December. I'm not good at waiting, and finding myself in limbo land waiting and wondering wasn't helping at all. My appointment came through for late April and it seemed like such a long time to wait, but on Friday they rang to offer me a cancellation. So this morning found me worrying quite unnecessarily about what I should wear for my appointment. I am constantly amazed by my ability to obsess about trivia. It really didn't matter what I wore because I was obliged to swap my own clothes for a distinctly unflattering cape type gown. The embarrassment of meeting the consultant only bruised my dignity, next on the agenda was a mammogram and the bruises from that were much more tangible. I'm sure they could have found an easier way to deal with such things by now. If men had to have their most sensitive parts clamped in a vice like grip between two plates while standing in a contorted position in order to achieve a diagnosis, I think they would soon apply their minds to a better way of doing things. I wonder why we just put up with the pain, maybe for the same reason that we meekly queue up to use public toilets - we just get used to it.
When they had exhausted all possibilities in terms of indignity I was sent off to wait in the waiting room while the consultant reviewed the images. I read the ancient copy of Woman's Own from beginning to end and I was just about to embark on a detailed examination of the notice board when I was called back into the consulting room. I didn't like the sound of this and for a fleeting moment I considered making a run for it. The consultant wasn't happy with the pictures and had asked for them to be done again - such joy! They had come up with some variations on the original torture treatment, this time I had to stand on one leg with one breast cramped so tightly that it made my eyes water while the other breast was flung over my shoulder - well, it felt like that anyway! Back in the waiting room I aged visibly as waited for the consultant to review the new pictures, it really was starting to bother me. Eventually I was informed that they were happy and there was nothing to worry about and with a grateful sigh I headed home.
Robbie went for his hospital appointment yesterday, to find out why he keeps falling over. The consultant wanted to do an MRI scan to find out what was going on, but Robbie suddenly announced that he suffers from claustrophobia and could not possibly cope with an MRI scan. Instead he has to have a CT scan and some other tests.
I was surprised to hear of his claustrophobia, he has never mentioned it since we have been together and I felt that if he had coped without it for this long, he should be able to cope for a little longer in order to have an MRI scan. He has showed no sign of claustrophobia when travelling on the sleeper train, in fact he is very keen to repeat the experience! When I challenged him about his new found phobia he was insistent that it had bothered him in the past. He claimed that once years ago when he shared a tent with the Wild Woman from Walsall he felt claustrophobic. Silly man, that is not a phobia, it is a perfectly natural reaction, I feel claustrophobic if she is in the same county!!
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