HOSPITAL UPDATES W/C 070713 (PART ONE)

Sunday, July 7th, 2013

Well, here we find ourselves at the start of the week in which this entire saga will slip past the six month mark, from the very darkest depths of winter to the heights of summer, and still, it seems, there's no end to it in sight, unless you count the bleakest one which could, of course, still happen.

And so we get a bright, sunshiny day and our plans change and the cinema doesn't get our money because we don't want to sit inside a dark auditorium on such a fine day but, perversely, spend the day indoors watching old documentaries instead because it's simply far, far too hot for outdoors.

In the midst of all this debilitating heat and stickiness, I drag myself out to the hospital via the supermarket and find mum spark out fast asleep. My arrival wakes her but she fails to really come round for the entire duration of my visit, failing to even summon any enthusiasm for the tennis which is going on somewhere even as we speak, although the fresh cut rose from her neighbour's garden does spark some interest. Other than that, however, she remains "dozy" instead, and the depression of thinking that "she might never get home" is returning, so that when she does (briefly) turn on me again, it is with the familiar notion that I "never ask" about what they're planning to do with her, because the proposed endoscopy still hasn't happened, and this time around, they "never talk" about sending her home again. I remain convinced that asking, of course, wouldn't make the slightest difference, because they do what they do despite me, but I may be wrong about that.

I tell mum that I've noticed a "party" going on outside the next ward along, in the sense that they've got the emergency exit open and a number of people are chatting outside. Mum says that they had their fire door open all night, too,  just to help keep the place a little cooler. This is, apparently the "coolest spot in the whole hospital" but I doubt it, and mum constantly exposing her underwear from under her blanket would tend to imply that she's still far too hot. My sister has (apparently) suggested that I ought to get a wheelchair and take her outside, but this is, of course, far more easily said than done and so I decline the offer.

The nurse comes to take her blood pressure and is concerned that it is a little low, perhaps because mum  hasn't been drinking enough in the stifling heat. One of those yoghurty supplement drinks miraculously appears which seems to improve mum's spirits, especially as she'd mentioned that she'd not had any today, although she did have two bowls of porridge for breakfast.

She feels as if she's "not with it", "living in a maze" and "everything's blurry" that she "can't see straight" or "hear properly" but none of these things are new or sudden developments and come mostly from feeling tired and, understandably,  more than a little sorry for herself. Her legs feel very wobbly and it annoys her that she still has to ask for help to walk anywhere, but her legs are likely to be weak as she hasn't really used them all that much for nearly six months now.

Mum is very sleepy and, whilst I am concerned by a sense that her health's deteriorating again, I decide that it's best to let her doze off and I bid my farewells and drift off home again, feeling in need of a bit of a doze myself.

Monday, July 8th, 2013

Whilst I'm not planning on any dealing with the hospital on this hot, sticky Monday, I wake up feeling very gloomy as if I can sense we're approaching, for good or ill, some kind of an "end game". I don't know, perhaps seeing mum looking so frail and ill yesterday has troubled me, even though I know that it was mostly due to fatigue, heat and possible dehydration, and I start to believe once again that we are on a slippery slope towards darker times.

A phone call at just before ten. It's mum saying that the Doctor has just been. She asked him about the biopsy results and was told that the haematologist would discuss the results with her... Mum wonders whether they would ring me if it was anything bad, points out that it's not my day for visiting, and makes some small talk about it being a nice day. I say that I don't really get to see it and have to confess to not really having lunch breaks to speak of, that my sister has disappeared (presumed to be at the beach) so she's left a message, but that's as far as our conversation goes.

Tuesday, July 9th, 2013

A bad night's sleep, lying awake thinking that, one way or another, I really need for this to be over. I had, rather jokingly, said a few weeks ago that if mum was still in hospital by the end of July, I'd most probably have gone mad and yet, here we are, already well into the month and with no signs of her leaving that wretched ward any time soon, and, if you'd told me in January that this would still be going on in July, I really don't think that I would have believed you.

Still, the 2.40PM phone call from mum is encouraging, or at least as encouraging as "I think I'm on my way out" can be. She does, of course, mean that the hospital are now actively seeking out a place for her in intermediate care and not any other meaning that it might have, and no, they haven't rung me...

Meanwhile, the haematologist has said that the biopsy showed no sign of that "cancer thing" returning, although they'll be keeping an eye upon that as an out-patient.

So... Could it be...? Could it really be possible...? Is this endless round of tales from the hospital finally approaching its end...? As a hot, sticky day draws to a tetchy conclusion, and I make a few tactical errors in professional terms because of some late-in-the-day confusion over messages, and with the beloved's mocking imitations of what my evening might have in store (a la "Boycott Bingo" but I really can't bear having to put up with the same criticisms twice in the same evening), I head, once again, hospitalwards, wondering quite how many more times I'm, going to have to...

I wearily arrive as beds are being rearranged to be faced with the question as to whether I've listened to my messages, which is "confused-speak" for the conversation we had this afternoon, because there aren't any. But, in a quantum environment where she both has and has not spoken to my sister, anything is possible.

This leads to the "It would be nice if people (i.e me) showed an interest" conversation which is coupled with the "There was a time when your sister rang every day" aside which all grows out of the fact that the hospital are preparing to discharge her, but there's the tiny matter of our disagreement about how best to handle it. I maintain that they will let me know when they need me to know things whereas mum thinks that I should constantly pester them for more information.

I would say that we agreed to disagree over this, but there was precious little agreement involved in it to be perfectly honest with you.

Still, the breeze coming through the window is pleasant enough, as are the other patients and such visitors as there are. The doctors think that her health is generally okay enough for her to go into intermediate care, even if she herself believes that she is neither better nor ready to go anywhere. Everything, from getting out of bed to eating is "an effort" and her legs are wobbly, but all of these are things that will be helped by intermediate care if she'll only put the effort in.

Meanwhile the doctors were apparently unsympathetic about the fact that mum might need new spectacles despite having pain "over £300" for a pair recently, and they didn't think much of her complaints about feeling "light-headed" either (but then it is damned hot at the moment, so we probably all are...)

Other topics include what day it is, my work problems (not really interested), my friends who are abandoning the country (not interested - except to tell me of her own history with her friends in Canada), and the fact that she did actually read the Stockport Express I bought her before giving it away, but there wasn't much in it. The fact that a nurse is off to Egypt tomorrow is far more interesting, although my tales of the current troubles over there, and more tales of catastrophe and woe from around the big wide world don't seem to be of much interest either.

So much for having things to talk about when I go, eh...?

Anyway, on that jolly note, I make my excuses and drift off into the ether, bidding my farewells to whichever staff want to say "good evening" to me... and head homewards to eat and sleep and sweat, get miserable all over again about "wanting my life back" and fret about what the next chapter in this jolly little saga is going to bring along with it.