6 months ago after several years in a failing relationship I finally took the step of leaving a comfortable but unhappy future to start a new life where I could rediscover being me. Got a full time job and bought a house and told my partner that we should still be friends but that we could no longer live together. He was not happy but accepted things. For the first few weeks he seemed to be accepting things and then he started acting weird. We were concerned he was having a bit of breakdown and I tried different ways to cope with him not managing at home and being very needy. Some friends told me to walk away as I had to make him realise I had left but this was impossible to do as he was seriously in need of care. Doctors were useless and when we could get an appointment they diagnosed a UTI and then a lung infection and then depression. He started to develop a lack of coordination on his left side and lost a stone. Finally we got a friend who is a retired doctor to examine him and he was concerned and write a note to our doctor saying he thought a ct scan was urgently needed. Eventually we ended up at A&E and at 8pm last Wednesday he had a scan. At midnight we were given the results showing a brain tumour and they admitted him to have more tests. After 36 hours in hospital they told us that the MRI had shown no more tumours but that we would have to now wait a week for the consultants to tell us more about the tumour.
I had to move back in and we lived in a confusion of him thinking I was back as his girlfriend, terror about the prognosis and side effects from the strong drugs they prescribed. It was the longest week ever and we had no support or anyone to ask questions to except our retired doctor friend.
The following Thursday we were called to attend a meeting at Derriford - an hour and a half drive away - at 2.30pm. Finally some news. We got there and then had to sit for three hours next to a TV blaring out Raiders of the Lost Ark wondering what the hell was going on. At 5.30 the consultant finally saw us. No apologies for keeping us waiting and then a cold clinical delivery of the fact that the tumour was large and aggressive and they wanted to operate the next day. He then had to have various bloods and paperwork submitted and we had to go home to try and sleep and return leaving at 6am the next day for surgery on Friday.
Another long day and I finally got to see him in recovery at 5.30pm before returning home. The next day I am woken at 6am by him phoning from a nurses phone demanding I go and get him because the ward was so noisy and he'd got no sleep. I asked fir a doctor to phone me back but no joy so off I went. By the time I got to the hospital he had calmed down and they had put him in a side room so I got him sleeping and once again returned home. Next morning the same thing - but this time he is talking about just wanting to come home to kill himself. Obviously he's distressed and getting lots of side effects and he was not the Man I know but trying to speak with the actual ward was so difficult. In between all of this I am trying to juggle my own house, a full time job and four cats.
It's less than 48 hours since he had major brain surgery - he has 30 staples in his head - is on seriously strong drugs and we don't know what the biopsy is going to tell us. How could he possibly come home?
Then I get a call from a nurse saying he is going to be discharged. On Christmas Eve with no back up support to rely on. That completely freaks me out and I demand a doctor to call me but guess what. No call.
So I drive there again and be route another nurse calls me and says he has been talking about suicide all night and she will not let him be discharged. Thank god I think.
I arrive at the ward and he races through reception like an excited schoolboy saying it's all down to me now..
I then get to kid by the consultant that he can go home, the nurses all back him up - and my partner is saying please please please don't make me stay here. What could I do? We go back home to start what will be the worst two days of my life.
