Post-Operation Recovery Blues

I had my op, and survived, with positive assurances that there is strong evidence in the early days that the bowel cancer was fully removed with relatively little chance of it recurring.  Sadly, that is not as many of you know, the end of things. 

I was kept in hospital for a gruelling eight weeks, taking me right through Xmas and new year. I was hooked up to various drips that even had to go with me on physio walks so various nurses had to follow me pushing the drip rails and keeping me from tangling.  

I got very frustrated when staff showed utter indifference to the buzzers calling for assistance, and when I went through a savage spell of projectile vomiting, one male nurse angered me by wanting to take my blood pressure before cleaning me and my bed up from literally being soaked in puke from head to foot.  Most of the stag=ff were great but a few were monstrous. 

I was released in mid-January, still feeling weak. Stairs were quite a challenge in the first month or so (my flat is on the first floor of a six flat block). I still have the anaemia caused by the cancer and I have so many meds to take it amounts to a breakfast cereal. 

I have a stoma bag now, which amounts to being a cover for a second anus - the primary one being closed down by the operation. I have learned to change the bags myself though they still sometimes pancake or gush. The stoma nurse visits me monthly. 

Worse is the wound hole from the op, which is being very slow to heal, still over4 centimetres deep in late March after a 2nd & 6th of December operation.  This has to be redressed and cleaned and padded daily.  At first, District nurses came to me to do this at home, but now only do that Saturdays and Sundays. In the week I have to go to treatment rooms at the clinics, using patient transport as I don't drive. I'm expected to be ready for my transport 2 hours before my clinic appointments and after dressings it can take 90 minutes for the return cab / ambulance to get me so each day the treatment can swallow virtually the entire day.   I can't go anywhere for overnight stays because of this (not that I can go out at present anyway due to Covid lockdown rules) 

I'm recognized as disabled now which gets me down, I have a key for disabled loos, they put a new smoke alarm in my flat, I got a free eye test, and access to a free will writing service. 

My biggest problem is a neighbour who has crossed a line from helpful to invasive, and outright hostile. He often offered assistance and gave it whether I wanted it or not. During my hospital stay he asked if I wanted my mail bringing to the ward and ignoring my wishes that he left it at home for me, he brought it anyway. I ended up heavily burdened with extra stuff to lug  home.  He later berated me for not appreciating him taking the time to bring my things to me (as if I had insisted on it). His behaviour towards my post got worse once I was home. 

Not too long ago he fetched a letter up to me that had arrived in my downstairs mail box (I lived then as now on the first floor of a six flat building. My neighbour found it amusing to pull the letter away as my fingers got near it until my angry reaction at his six year old child behaviour (he's about 68) was not amusing me.

This neighbour can be helpful, giving me lifts and getting some shopping done for me (I shouldn't go out much in my health condition. However he can also be extremely nosey, and intrusive. He often tells me who my letters are from, having read the envelopes for clues. When I was dropped off in a taxi recently, a service provided free by the clinics, the driver thought I was paying the fair and I had to wait a few minutes until he got a confirmation code on it from the clinic, a mere formality. My neighbour came out of his flat pretending to be examining his hanging flower baskets but looking round to gawp at me and the taxi driver who was quick to notice what a nosey parker he was being too.

Once out of the taxi I was virtually interrogated by the neighbour on why I'd stayed in it so long - when I pointed out that there was confusion over the payment arrangement, my neighbour immediately decided the driver must have thought I was lying if he had to check up on me and refused to listen as I said that wasn't the case.

If I return from shops he often wants to know which shops and what I bought. If I use multiple stores to shop around for the best prices he chastises me for not just stocking up at one shop. I'm very close to really getting angry with his voyeuristic all pervading attitude. He was helpful but now he has crossed a line. 

Matters reached the point of no return when he started really messing around with my mail, feeling parcels so he can tell me what he thinks is in them, holding letters behind his back while he asks me why i'm getting correspondence from Manchester (where I lived for over 50 years).

He keeps trying to tell me off for having too much stuff - Asked him to get me some 1st class stamps and post a letter for me with one - he came back with 2nd class having decided for me that no one gets first class stamps any more - I did not trust him to shop for me again, but started shopping more online and I can get light shopping myself by walking to local stores now as my strength is improving.

I finally blew up at him after the latest holding my post behind his back game - he decided that I lack a sense of humour and therefore he's not my friend any more and five minutes after apologizing profusely for upsetting me he changed his mind and threw me back the spare key to my flat - pretty sure he ignored at least one attempted mail delivery - worrying as some vital medication packs come through the post for me.

Disgusting display of immaturity.

He reminds me of this TV sketch character http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oRivqpinXRM

Monday 22^nd March 2021 – His latest outburst was really nasty and dangerous. I was just returning from my latest clinic treatment room visit in the NHS provided taxi. As I put my key in the front door to the building he snapped the door open sharply, snarling at me that while I might think he was watching for the cab arriving (as he has done) he wasn’t this time. He was holding some sort of tool that looked like a cross between a small paint roller and a musical instrument. He obviously wanted me to feel threatened by it. Can’t see any other reason why he conveniently had it with him when opening the door (he supposedly hadn’t been watching for my arrival) He started cracking it like a hammer against the wall and his own front door, telling me I had no right to criticise him. I tried speaking to ask what he meant, and he responded with loud gorilla like growling. I asked him if he was trying to amuse me or intimidate me and assured him that he was failing either way.  He yelled that he had a lot to say and denied me any right to interrupt. He did the loud primal scream roaring a few more times. I told him he was being pathetic. He ranted that as he had brought my post to me in hospital (after I asked him to leave it at the flat as it wasn’t likely to be urgent), I should let him do what he wants. I pointed out that he had no Covid mask on, (I had mine on) and simply walked round him and up to my flat. He started following me until I pointed out that I’d get the police if he carries on with this attitude.  I locked my door and he stomped off back downstairs.  Ordered a recording devise to capture any future such attempts to bully me on a devise to report him to the authorities.  So far he has stayed off my back. 

Hope you have better neighbours where you are – as I say, most of my current neighbours are great – a few I have yet to meet due to lockdown