A far more relaxed Monday morning. Carol is now at home, so none of that walking along that interminable hospital corridor on my way to Ward 20.
I was sitting on my own with Alfie on my lap, giving him some attention early this morning. He's been quite confused over the nearly three weeks with Carol in hospital. He usually sleeps on our bed, but with Carol sometimes finding it far more comfortable on the sofa downstairs, the poor little dog has had divided loyalties, spending half the night upstairs but then trotting off downstairs sometime in the wee small hours. But even more confused with her not being here at all. He's been following me around the house when I've been here on my own, almost being like a shadow, even when I got to the toilet or have a bath. The other day he was looking really depressed, laying on our bed, in the place where Carol would have been, and downstairs on the sofa, laying in the corner of the sofa where she would have been. It's been quite sad really.
Anyway, returning to what I had intended to write on here. As I looked out of the window towards the garden (which isn't a fair description if it as it's just grass and more grass with a few trees over-hanging the fence and a tatty shed covered in bamboo screening because it looked so awful. You can get into it as the door is hanging off and it's full of some previous tenant's ancient and mouldy mattress which you could see through the cobwebby windows, enough to put anyone off, so totally useless for us as a place to store anything, such as a bicycle.) As I sat in the lounge I saw a squirrel on the top of the shed. It was twitching it's tale, which I believe means a threat. I think it was aware that Alfie was nearby. Perhaps it could see us through the window. Alfie wasn't aware of it and was looking the wrong way. Then the squirrel ran along the left-hand fence, down the fence and onto the grass and then up the central pole of the bird feeding station. Quite amazing that it could climb this metal pole. It than began to climb onto the cross-pieces and eat from the nut-feeder. At one point it hung upside down from the top-most branches, a bit like someone out of a movie like 'Mission Impossible.' Even then Alfie didn't notice what was going on. It was certainly quite entertaining. Then it climbed back down the central pole and shot across the grass, up onto the fence and away into the trees behind the fence. I could see it leaping about in the branches of the tree. It came back a couple of times and then flew across the back fence and off.
When Carol was discharge from Ward 20 last Friday she was told that she would need to have a blood test and that she would need to go to the Maple Centre at the hospital to have one done. I still can't see why they couldn't do it on the ward, as the phlebotomist was always coming to her room to take blood. Not exactly a job for me because needles and blood for me don't go together. Well, of course, they do in order to take blood from a patient, by my propensity to pass out when I give blood.
We drove back to the hospital, fortunately living only a short distance, it's not far. We parked in the ground-level carpark and I managed to park virtually opposite The Maple Centre, so it wasn't far to walk. On arriving at the reception desk, we asked the receptionist about having to come in for a blood test to be told that the blood centre wasn't open on a Monday. So you can imagine our annoyance at being told to come in when we left Ward 20, but were soon told we had to go to another part of the centre, the Emergency something-or-other department. We waited in the obligatory waiting room, with other people. I have to talk everyone I meet, wherever possible, and I spoke to this lady who was there with her daughter. Pity I had to open my mouth, as she had to tell me absolutely every detail of her daughter's illness. Some rare disorder, part of which was being managed by the hospital we'd been to on Friday, The John Radcliffe. Some people seem to make a full-time career of their illnesses and relish telling anyone who will listen the ins and outs of their illness, the therapies they have to use, even their medications, operations, all the details that, frankly, you don't want to hear. I couldn't get a word in sideways, and it was just as well they left for their appointment, otherwise I think I would have gone slightly doo-lalley.
Then Carol was called in to have her blood test. She was gone about ten minutes and when she came back she said that the results would be known in about an hour. We could stay in he unit to then get the results but we decided to go home, as it's only a short car journey away. So we decided to go home and await a telephone call with the results. We had to go through the ticket-machine routine once more. One machine wasn't working, and the other one had a queue of people using it. Fortunately we didn't have to wait long and managed to get home quickly.
We did some house work, changing the bedding (duvet-changing is my least enjoyable task. Putting a duvet cover on is difficult enough, but a king size one is perhaps even more difficult, and we couldn't find all the matching sheets and pillow cases, but we eventually found them and the job was done.
Almost on cue the phone rang. My mobile. But, on running downstairs and almost breaking my neck in the process and finding my mobile in the lonuge I wasn't too pleased to find out it wasn't the hospital, but someone attempting to sell electricity and gas or something. I have to say I gave the man on the other end of the line a piece of my mind, wasting our time and effort.
But then the call did come from the hospital. They wanted us to go back as the doctors wanted to see Carol and have a word with her.
We drove back, I dropped Carol outside the Maple Centre and a parked the car and then I walked back into the unit. There were several more people in the waiting room, but one man, who was there earlier, was still waiting. I have to say I was somewhat sad for him, having to wait patiently to be seen.
It was excessively hot. It's the old thing again, which I couldn't but help but notice on Ward 20. The heating was turned up far too high. It might be November, by why run the heating at full blast? In the ward we had to have a fan on full-time and the window open, to reduce the heat. But in the Maple Unit I was beginning to get really hot and beginning to wilt like a lettuce. More like the temperature you've expect in a hot-house, ideal for growing tomatoes or the more exotic fruit such as pineapples or oranges. Surely the N.H.S. can ill afford such profligacy and it might solve a lot of their financial problems if they cut the temperature in such places.
After some considerable length of time Carol was called in to see the doctors. Not just one, but several, together with a nurse. One was sitting working on a computer and I wasn't entirely sure whether she was part of the consultation. One was doing all the talking (a doctor) whilst another was standing at a sort of metal stand writing notes on yellow paper. It would appear, from the blood test, that Carol's kidneys weren't functioning properly. No surprise considering all the medication she has to take. They wanted her to come back into the hospital, but we weren't happy about this, considering she'd only been discharged on Friday. For me, the thought of having to keep coming in, walking all that way to the ward, would have been too much, but they said it would be O.K. for her to go home so long as she drank plenty and she came back tomorrow (Tuesday) for another blood test so they could keep an eye on her kidney function. So that is what we agreed.
Thankfully we could go home and on the way we went to the Coop in Netherfield, just over the road from the hospital, to buy some few items for lunch and our evening meal.
So, Carol has to drink plenty of fluids for the next 24 hours. Then we have to return to the Maple Centre tomorrow morning and they're going to do yet another blood test to find out if her kidney function has improved. I just hope so as I don't want her back in hospital. I know they have to get on top of all these things before the chemotherapy begins, but that place is a nightmare.
We drove back to the hospital, fortunately living only a short distance, it's not far. We parked in the ground-level carpark and I managed to park virtually opposite The Maple Centre, so it wasn't far to walk. On arriving at the reception desk, we asked the receptionist about having to come in for a blood test to be told that the blood centre wasn't open on a Monday. So you can imagine our annoyance at being told to come in when we left Ward 20, but were soon told we had to go to another part of the centre, the Emergency something-or-other department. We waited in the obligatory waiting room, with other people. I have to talk everyone I meet, wherever possible, and I spoke to this lady who was there with her daughter. Pity I had to open my mouth, as she had to tell me absolutely every detail of her daughter's illness. Some rare disorder, part of which was being managed by the hospital we'd been to on Friday, The John Radcliffe. Some people seem to make a full-time career of their illnesses and relish telling anyone who will listen the ins and outs of their illness, the therapies they have to use, even their medications, operations, all the details that, frankly, you don't want to hear. I couldn't get a word in sideways, and it was just as well they left for their appointment, otherwise I think I would have gone slightly doo-lalley.
Then Carol was called in to have her blood test. She was gone about ten minutes and when she came back she said that the results would be known in about an hour. We could stay in he unit to then get the results but we decided to go home, as it's only a short car journey away. So we decided to go home and await a telephone call with the results. We had to go through the ticket-machine routine once more. One machine wasn't working, and the other one had a queue of people using it. Fortunately we didn't have to wait long and managed to get home quickly.
We did some house work, changing the bedding (duvet-changing is my least enjoyable task. Putting a duvet cover on is difficult enough, but a king size one is perhaps even more difficult, and we couldn't find all the matching sheets and pillow cases, but we eventually found them and the job was done.
Almost on cue the phone rang. My mobile. But, on running downstairs and almost breaking my neck in the process and finding my mobile in the lonuge I wasn't too pleased to find out it wasn't the hospital, but someone attempting to sell electricity and gas or something. I have to say I gave the man on the other end of the line a piece of my mind, wasting our time and effort.
But then the call did come from the hospital. They wanted us to go back as the doctors wanted to see Carol and have a word with her.
We drove back, I dropped Carol outside the Maple Centre and a parked the car and then I walked back into the unit. There were several more people in the waiting room, but one man, who was there earlier, was still waiting. I have to say I was somewhat sad for him, having to wait patiently to be seen.
It was excessively hot. It's the old thing again, which I couldn't but help but notice on Ward 20. The heating was turned up far too high. It might be November, by why run the heating at full blast? In the ward we had to have a fan on full-time and the window open, to reduce the heat. But in the Maple Unit I was beginning to get really hot and beginning to wilt like a lettuce. More like the temperature you've expect in a hot-house, ideal for growing tomatoes or the more exotic fruit such as pineapples or oranges. Surely the N.H.S. can ill afford such profligacy and it might solve a lot of their financial problems if they cut the temperature in such places.
After some considerable length of time Carol was called in to see the doctors. Not just one, but several, together with a nurse. One was sitting working on a computer and I wasn't entirely sure whether she was part of the consultation. One was doing all the talking (a doctor) whilst another was standing at a sort of metal stand writing notes on yellow paper. It would appear, from the blood test, that Carol's kidneys weren't functioning properly. No surprise considering all the medication she has to take. They wanted her to come back into the hospital, but we weren't happy about this, considering she'd only been discharged on Friday. For me, the thought of having to keep coming in, walking all that way to the ward, would have been too much, but they said it would be O.K. for her to go home so long as she drank plenty and she came back tomorrow (Tuesday) for another blood test so they could keep an eye on her kidney function. So that is what we agreed.
Thankfully we could go home and on the way we went to the Coop in Netherfield, just over the road from the hospital, to buy some few items for lunch and our evening meal.
So, Carol has to drink plenty of fluids for the next 24 hours. Then we have to return to the Maple Centre tomorrow morning and they're going to do yet another blood test to find out if her kidney function has improved. I just hope so as I don't want her back in hospital. I know they have to get on top of all these things before the chemotherapy begins, but that place is a nightmare.
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