Post 18: The Overnight Bag.
Vital statistics:
Temp: 36.4 
BP: 128/77/52
Weight: too many treats
Hair: who cares
Anything else? I want to go home?
⸻
Lately, I wasn’t thinking about an overnight bag unless it was for the, now cancelled, planned trip to Ireland. But I’m lying beside one that My Darling filled for me yesterday evening with immense care and love.
It’s actually our neighbour’s bag, due to My darling not being able to find our own bags because of my recent efforts in tidying and weeding out things.
Going back a bit, I mentioned before that we had secured a couple of holidaymakers for their Italian adventure instead of us, which has lifted my spirits. It probably sounds daft, but it’s such a relief not to have wasted that trip. I’m looking forward to our two friends coming back at the end of May with happy faces and nice stories.
Back to that large white overnight bag — it arrived after My Darling returned from a short trip home for a break yesterday evening. A break I sent her on with a big smile, asking her to bring back some goodies for me (yes, I’m still very selfish) and to sit, eat something, and rest a while at home.
She looked even more exhausted when she returned and told me that the Japanese TV dinner she’d bought herself (others are available! 
) she would eat later when she got back home for the second and final time.
Even though she looked like she’d fall asleep on the spot, she had a big tired grin and started pulling things out of the bag like Mary Poppins: clothes, slippers, 100-year celebratory chocolate biscuits (others are available, but inferior), socks, pants, grapes, T-shirts, charging leads, and “date me” dates. Bless her.
I was rightly pleased and grateful for her industry and choice of treats.
She handed out other treats from that bag, too — but they weren’t for me; the A&E nursing staff who looked after us all day got those.
As I’ve said before, she’s a good egg.
Soon enough (after My Darling left me for home, tearfully) I was shifted to a different ward, from Majors to AMU. Bloody acronyms. Who thought having two wards named with the same three letters would be a good idea? AMU, MAU — for goodness’ sake!
I have my faculties, and I’m confused.
Anyway, I was pushed on my wheeled bed along corridors and through doors and ended up in a curtained corner of a five-bed bay.
Initially, I told My Darling and family I had been transferred to MAU; later, I corrected my accidental lie.
——————
I’ll be brief and upbeat but truthful about how it went in AMU…
Positives:
• There was security personnel on site.
• Although it was late, personal hygiene was paramount, and I was told to clean my teeth.
• I was in a corner parking space and curtained off.
Negatives:
• My fellow mixed-sex comrades mostly had coughs or COPD, it seemed.
• Between midnight and 4 a.m., four patients were switched out and four new ones brought in — over ten bed movements in total, each new patient verbally assessed, which was disturbing.
• But not as disturbing as the reason for the security guard… a patient with a potty mouth and only one volume: maximum!
For me, the first night’s experience was heartbreaking.
My Darling and I had told all the family to go hike — a COVID seclusion zone would be in force for at least the eighteen weeks of chemo around ME.
You could visit but stay outside — and bring your own he- or she-wee! — all to prevent me getting possible harmful infections; slowing the process and derailing the (already long) schedule.
Work had also accepted my disappearance, and the sick-note during chemo, initially for the first month to see how I’m doing, but possibly longer if things aren’t so good, also for infection control.
So what the hell am I doing in here?
I’m sorry to be so selfish again, but I only got short naps between hacking coughs, patient movements, and patient interviews.
I felt so ashamed about the situation I’ve put My Darling and my family in — distancing and isolating — when here I was, in a room with all the things I’ve chosen and been advised to avoid.
Being treated and breathing in this possibly toxic AMU environment — an airplane seems like a fresh breeze (pardon the pun).
I’m not at all relaxed.
I’m anxious.
It’s 3 a.m.
What can I do?
Me being me, I’m thinking: I’ll tell My Darling not to come to see me here. She doesn’t need to see any of this right now.
A big decision yes — but if she sees half of what I’ve seen and heard, she’ll go nuts!
But then she’ll worry.
I can’t do that.
Ok, maybe I can find a contact email for the cancer ward down the corridor to ask for help?
Better still, ask My Darling to call them (in private) and explain I need help for my obvious anxiousness.
No — that means burdening her with it. That’s not fair either.
What can I do?
I could write a note — show it to the night nurse and ask for her help.
I can’t talk to her in the darkness with who-knows-how-many coughers awake and listening. That would be rude.
So I did — and the note went like this:
“(Please read this text as I feel it rude to speak up if any of the other patients are awake.)
I’ve noticed there are quite a few people coughing in here, and since I’m on chemo and my immune system’s probably down, I’m feeling a bit anxious about being exposed to infections. Can you let me know if it’s safe for me to be in this kind of setting, or if there’s anything we can do to reduce the risk?
I really don’t feel comfortable because I’m isolating from work and all my family and friends — and here I’m in the very environment I’m trying to avoid.”
The night nurse immediately asked if I wanted some face masks, which I accepted, and then said she would convey my fears to the ward head.
I do feel better wearing a mask.
It’s made it even more awkward to snooze now — but I’m not so anxious.
———————
Later on…
The day staff have arrived; all the lights are on.
I’m still wide awake and anxious about what to tell My Darling.
The new nurse asks if she can open the curtains.
I say, “No, no, no — please can you read this?” and show her the same note as before about my anxieties.
She reads it and responds, “If any patients are infectious, they will be put in the side rooms.”
“Can I open the curtains?” she asks again.
I ask her to understand that at home, I’m isolating from work and family, and I’m very anxious right now.
She leaves, leaving the curtains drawn behind her.
Phew!
I’m safe for now.
I’d rather go home.
I’m not that happy.
I feel that everything I’ve told my family, friends, and workplace is a lie.
Apparently, I can mix with small groups of very ill people and not be affected: apparently.
I’m later told my bloods prove I’m not neutropenic.
That doesn’t help much. It should — but it just doesn’t.
The only checks I’m having are for temperature and blood pressure — but I suppose I can’t check the bloods at home, can I? I’m being silly.
But I could do the rest at home.
Bad patient?
I guess I am.
It’s not logical or reasonable to be here in my mind.
If I were in pain or had other symptoms, I wouldn’t feel like home was better place than this and not moan about it.
But I’ve got these big clots, and I have to stay — or I’ll be putting myself at risk.
At least at home, I’d be with My Darling.
Still Looping , still smiling (mostly) and thank you for rolling along with me. 
