Monday morning couldn't guarantee

2 minute read time.

I honestly don't know why I don't just go and live in the Churchill. Well, I do know, it's a bit bleak and my house is much nicer, plus it's a bugger to get a bed. But for all the time I spend there, I might as well move in. I'm already due for chemo on the 15th, and on the 18th I have to go and see Naj (and tell him I think the fluid's back, which I don't imagine will amuse him); then, while I was asleep this afternoon, Judy took a phone call telling me to be there on the 19th for some kidney function tests, which will, apparently, take five hours, wtf!

Got up at the ungodly hour of 7.00 this morning (hah: I used to be at work for 7.30 am when our office was in Oxford; now I barely get out of bed at all) to go and see my GP. I like to drop in on her every now and then as a kind of living memento mori; if she'd been a bit more on the ball (she started out by trying to treat the fluid on my lungs with antibiotics which was, not surprisingly, unsuccessful), I wouldn't now be as ill as I am - or, at least, I'd be further along with my treatment. While the look on her face when she saw the "got cancer" letter from the Churchill was, admittedly, priceless, I would really rather have had an earlier diagnosis. Eh. Shoulda, woulda, coulda. Anyway: today I had to give her my drugs list for re-upping - I've almost finished all those lovely painkillers the hospital gave me although, to my credit, I haven't even touched the morphine - and book a pre-chemo blood test, and also ask her if she could sign my hospital insurance claim. I have a highly amusing hospital insurance policy that I took out years and years ago, which pays me £30 for every full day I spend in hospital. I would have been better off stuffing the money under my mattress (or, better yet, putting it in a dedicated bank account), but it seemed like a good idea at the time and, once again, it's too late now. Anyway: she wasn't sure her signature would be acceptable - the form is hopelessly vague - and neither am I, so I have to phone up the insurers. But I was too tired today. Maybe tomorrow.

I got her to tap me on the back while I was there, on the grounds that she may as well make herself useful. She agreed that it sounds as if there's fluid on the left-hand lung, although she did it in a very cautious and qualified manner. I may have her scared. Do I want a scared doctor? Better than no doctor at all, I suppose, although I can't really complain about that, not when half the medical team at the Churchill seems to want a piece of me.

How nice to be wanted. Or is it?

Anonymous
  • Hey you :)

    I too had a reluctant and rather nonchalant GP whom I had to stamp my feet with so I DID get an urgent referral instead of waiting two months, so I fully empathise with you sweetheart!!

    So yes, do scare your GP, it's good for them to have a rocket up their ar*e sometimes :))

    Keep us posted hun, and huge hugs to you

    xxxx

  • FormerMember
    FormerMember

    How lovely to be wanted.. errr hmmm.

    My Gp was the opposite packed me off to the hospital in a flat panic of days and told me nothing was wrong and it was to reassure me... Wasn't reassured at all by the Oh you've got cancer response... snigger but glad it was that way than sending home with 'stuff'.

    Phew, you are going to be a busy lady. Maybe you could reserve a nice seat somewhere near a window... if you can't book a bed?

    5 hours to check your kidneys? Blimey, what are they doing? Pumping you full of stuff and waiting to see what comes out.

    Morphine... ahhh fond memories. I studiously ignored mine until the nurse said no points for being a martyr and everyone else at your stage of the game has been taking it for ages by now... How could I resist he drug pushing? Was scared stiff that I would get addicted but my aunt is a doctor and she said you don't if you take it for pain... mmmm got me through a hairy few weeks. and it is a very funny sensation being awake and in pain but just not caring... ha ha give it a go sometime....

    Btw, I discovered where it backs up to... didn't get as far as puke you will be glad to hear.. ha ha just  out the sticky bit of the bag that sticks it to you and then out all over your belly and strong pants etc.

    Twice.

    Big hug to you and much as you love it there (not) please don't let them keep you. We will miss you.

    Shame we are not all at the same hospital... I could have a chat with you to while away the hours while you are waiting for your kidneys to do somehting and I am waiting for GC to scrape up the swooning ladies before me....

    Chemo on a Saturday? Are they having a laugh? What's wrong with a good ol weekday like they do here in Wales...

    Little My xxx

     

  • FormerMember
    FormerMember

    Hiya Hilary,

    What a bad time your having right now, like LM says if we were all at the same hossie we could syncronize appointments, it'd make those visits far more fun (can't believe i've just called a hossie appointment FUN b****y h***l). Anyway, Hilary onwards and upwards always.  I take my nintendo and play games.  If you can't excercise at the moment at least you can be excercising your brain haha, i spend hours on that braintrainer one, virtually become zombified.

    Best wishes and hugs to you

    take care all

    Jan

  • FormerMember
    FormerMember

    Cariad - I don't think it was so much that my GP wasn't concerned as that she was wildly out of her depth. Funnily enough, things actually kicked off when I had to see the locum one time; she was even more out of her depth, and panicked enough to send me for an X-ray. And so it began ...

    But I like to keep her on her toes anyway. I have a mean streak about a mile wide, and, some say, an unfortunate sense of humour.

    xx

    LM - given my history with poo, it'd be hilarious if the kidney tests relied on that. It might take a lot longer than five hours, is all I'm saying. Or a lot less, depends how my innards are feeling that day.

    I loved the morphine they gave me in hospital. If we were living in Victorian times, I would so have been hooked on laudanum! (And I could've had a fainting couch, too.)

    Thank you for the information about the bag ... I think!!

    Chemo on Saturdays in the run-up to Christmas, that's what the clinic told Judy. ??? No, it makes no sense to me either.

    It's probably just as well for the hospitals that we're all in different places. The nurses at the Churchill were quite puzzled enough by me ("Ah, glorious, life-giving drugs!"), without throwing in the rest of you lot. I am thinking of no especial person in particular, you understand ...

    *hugs*

    xx

    Janbo - I don't think, reading other people's blogs and updates, that I can really complain too much - not that I let that stop me! I would so much rather be the patient than have to watch someone I love suffer, just to begin with; and I'm not, at present, in any great pain. Very tired, but that's more a nuisance than anything else.

    My brain could do with training, I can tell you. What with chemo and being tired all the time, I don't think there's anything but cotton wool up there any more.

    xxx

  • FormerMember
    FormerMember

    Oh Hilary, I feel awful, have I offended you? I thought my reply was light hearted and funny, was i mistaken?  I never for one minute thought you complained and stuff about patients and loved ones suffering i don't understand or the fact that you are not at present in pain.  I haven't suggested any of the above and feel really upset if you think i have.

    I have re-reead my post and note i only laughed that we could all go to appointments together and the suggestion of playing on the nintendo on brain train was meant to be funny as i actually do do that in waiting rooms.

    When you get it wrong on here you really feel like hiding away and never returning.

    Take care all

    Jan