Energy issues

This whole lack of energy thing is beginning to get me down.

The first half of nearly every day is a struggle to stay awake, never mind doing something constructive. Most mornings I will have a very good idea of how the day will go.  Often the first half of the day is something akin to driving a car with the handbrake on.  At midday the handbrake is gradually released and the day starts to gain a little more momentum.

The most active time of the day, for some reason, happens between 6 pm and 9 pm. It’s better than nothing at all but it’s a short time frame to cover the things I’d like to achieve some days. And it’s that time when the end of the day is nigh.  And it’s dark. I prefer to work around the Trash Palace in the daylight. All the better to see the trash, you know.

I was warned about one of the effects of drug hormone therapy, which is fatigue. I nodded in understanding when given this information but I had no idea it would be like it is most days.

I recently attempted to winkle some information out of the hospital pharmacist about how the drug works but the answer was not particularly helpful and veered off into that morass known as the half-life of drugs.

Perhaps I should talk to my local pharmacists, one has been in the business for years and has a lot of practical experience and understanding of prescribed medications. I’m sure he could explain the half life of drugs, even to someone as slow-witted as I am.

Another thing to be taken into consideration is the hot weather we have experienced lately; I’m sure it does nothing to improve the situation.

Eucalypt trunk detail                         circa December 2005

Alphabetical re-arrangement

Here it is.  2019 – another year.  Happy days!

And with it the big decision whether to carry on with the jigsaw/memoir blog or whether to abandon it entirely. 

A few thoughts gather like spectres at the edge of this decision. The USB meltdown at the end of last year is the big one.  Whether to try and recover the lost data (at huge expense) or just to abandon everything that went before and act as though this is the point where my blogging starts.

Hmmm. January 1 is the point where the blog, if it has fallen by the wayside, usually starts up again; I’ll stop feathering around and make a decision.

Pauses to think.

OK. Let’s do the usual thing.  Start off the year and wait and see how long it is before the blog loses steam and falls into an abandoned heap – again.

This means of course re-arranging the alphabet continuity. Not re- jigging the letters of the generally accepted English alphabet into any sort of new and haphazard order. I could try that but it’s not likely to be a popular concept.  While I’m considering all this twaddle I have been thinking about how the English alphabet was arrived at and how, unlike the continually evolving English language, the alphabet is not very often tinkered with by people who think they know best and anything goes.

I might pick up this train of thought at a later date. At a date when I’m really short of ideas. Ah, I’ve already decided on the title!

Back to the present.

 My blog, when it is actually happening and going somewhere, is run on an alphabetical basis. Starting off in January and then making my way through the year, month by month, A to Z each month without repeating the first word of each title letter, over twelve months.  Stop grumbling and muttering that you don’t understand and it’s all gobbledygook rubbish.  You don’t have to – I’m running this blog, not you. Get it?

 Stopped reading by now?  I’m not surprised.  I’m a bit bamboozled myself but one of the problems associated with the USB meltdown was losing all my title words for the previous six months.  There goes my continuity.  Nothing to do but to start over.

Right the big decision has been made.  Let’s get on with it.

Building detail, Carlton
circa January 2007

Tuesday afternoon at Andy’s

I walked in the door to Andy’s café this afternoon and it seemed like a second home-coming.

It’s a fine thing in this world of constant change, where the newest, most socially desirable  of cafes often  have queues of people waiting to get inside the door, to stroll up the street, walk in the door and be able to sit down, confident  all your food and beverage expectations will be met without fuss or attitude.

At  Andy’s it also means being greeted within a few seconds of walking in; this attention to customers, old and new, has its downside; if you were considering nipping in the door to run off with today’s Epicure lift-out, a free drink from the cold cabinet or some other small, easily concealed item, you would be making a big mistake.  Andy would be right onto any sneaky behaviour.

Today was a late lunch day for me and as my appetite is nowhere near back to normal, I am not yet back to eating everything in sight.  I ask Andy to split the serve and  eat half at the café and take the rest home for a meal tomorrow.

All is well with my new life today.

Familiar Territory

Each day since my arrival at New Street I have taken a walk beyond the front gate, the distance walked increasing each day. In my confined world of the last two weeks, I have kept to the streets in close proximity to my temporary accommodation.

Today I extended the distance dramatically. 

I had a plan, of course.  The plan was to go to the only café open on Sunday, to sit down and have a coffee.  And maybe a cake?  The day, as you might expect in winter, was cool, with weak sunshine.  This was a special occasion, not walking for the sake of taking some exercise but walking with a social purpose in mind.

My venture was not without an element of risk.  The traffic lights change at the intersection and the far side of the road seems an impossible distance away.  I set out at the fastest pace I can muster; I feel like some old crone hobbling along at a snail’s pace. I am greatly relieved and greatly surprised to make it to the pavement without being bowled over by a speeding car.

The buzz in the café is a world removed from the dining room at New Street; I might well be on another planet. I sit and enjoy the experience; there’s nothing like a life-changing event to make one appreciate the small things in life.

I make the reverse journey back to New Street.   I’m well pleased with my first real venture on foot out into the big, wide world.

Enough said

Most likely I’ve said more than enough.

After much careful drafting and re-drafting I finally have the wording for the Thank You cards which satisfies me.  I carefully copy this onto the cards; sitting down and dashing off the appropriate wording, without pausing, is not my style.

In the case of the day surgery staff, they may well reel around in shock, horror and disbelief, or a combination of all three, when they read the card.  I put aside all thoughts of conventional wording and go for a two-part version.

 The left side of the inner card belongs to Sebastien and he builds on the wording on the card front.

‘Congratulations.  You’ve Passed.’

The surgery staff are commended for keeping to the rules laid down before surgery, thus ensuring they passed the Sebastien Test, with flying colours. In an effort to provide some balance to the left side, I revert to a more personal approach on the right hand side, which might smooth any ruffled feathers caused by Sebastien’s forthrightness.

The card wording for the ward staff is along more conventional lines and is accompanied by a box of Belgian chocolates; these in theory will be shared with the day surgery staff.

Cards written and in the bag with the chocolates.  Job done, almost.

Clean clothes and other important chores

New Street does not offer a laundry service to respite residents; this means I have to rely on one of the Support Team to escort me to a nearby laundrette where I can load the clothes into a machine, have the person in charge of the laundrette put the washed clothes through a dryer, fold them and have them waiting for me later in the day.  

La Madeleine came over to New Street to chauffeur me around yesterday and do the heavy haulage; carry the heavy items like the bag of laundry.  We left the laundry tossing around in the wash cycle, crossed the road to Andy’s and had a coffee. Something was seriously wrong with the coffee; it was definitely not up to the standard I am accustomed to drinking at Andy’s.  I did not complain as I have a suspicion the fault lay, not with the coffee, but with me.

Coffee drinking disappointment behind me, we drove to the nearest big shopping centre where I searched for suitable Thank You cards.  I want to deliver these to the hospital before I leave the city for my country convalescence; if I don’t do it now it will never happen.

It was a time consuming exercise; I only needed two cards. I looked at what seems to be every damned card in the shop which might serve as a Thank You card and quite a few that would not serve as Thank You cards but which were wonderfully illustrated and had quirky and amusing captions.

 Eventually I made a decision and away we went, back to the laundry where I made the irritating discovery that the clothes drying had been completely overlooked. 

I was not a happy little Vegemite.  I had to remind myself that worse things have happened at sea and in the larger scheme of things in My New Life, damp clothes are a mere bagatelle.  However it meant going back to collect them today and I was lucky Neighbour Heather came to the rescue.

She was happy to collect the laundry but not enthusiastic when I requested trip to the card shop.  I had considered the cards again last night and changed my mind about one.  It did not reflect accurately enough what I wanted to say.  I stuck to my guns and along the way to the shopping centre discovered NH had played tennis this morning and hadn’t had time for lunch.

We found a café still serving lunch and she ate up and brightened up.

Being on my Support Team can be very demanding.

Weekend events

Saturday morning, after rifling around in the bedside wardrobe for a few minutes to consider my options, I dress for the day.

Visitors, aka The Support Group, expected and unexpected, arrive at various times. 

Chocolate arrives; it is cinnamon flavoured and my stomach churns at the very thought.  The anaesthetists have a lot to answer for; I lay the blame for this aversion squarely at their feet.  Another box of chocolates arrives and although less stomach-churning, they are also placed in the bedside cupboard for later.  

Much later.

I pass up the offer of a move to a bed with a view; I regret this on Sunday. You make decisions and then you have to live with them.

The possibility is investigated of buying some television time; the machine is not accepting credit cards but will accept cash in lieu.  This arrangement is fine; I fossick around in the secret cash cache and find the requisite note.  Twenty four hours of television will be sufficient.

After lunch Wen leaves for home, suitably dressed to keep out the winter chills. I’m left to my own devices; this means pulling a chair up to the window, sitting down and watching the outside world: the car park, the Hospital Next Door, the railway station across the road, the smokers/patients sitting in outside areas puffing away on their cigarettes, the man cooking sausages at a giant barbecue outside the entrance to the HND. 

The evening is filled watching television, more gazing out the windows, walking around the ward corridors and the luxury of having the bed curtains back, the blinds up and not being confined to the small world surrounded by the bed-curtain.

Round 6 am Sunday morning my solitary reign over the room ends with the arrival of Leah, admitted via the Emergency Department.

The first excitement of the day is the arrival of a couple of huge, colourful hot air balloons making their landing in a nearby park; from our windows we have a great view. On Saturday morning, from the day waiting room, I saw hot air balloons, smudged grey shapes in a heavily clouded, grey sky over the distant Yarra Valley. Today’s group were much closer, a short drive to a nearby park.

View from aloft

The day abruptly jumps from excitement to drama, when the focus of the medical emergency announcement shifts from some remote area of the hospital to the other bed in this room!   A handful of nursing staff and the medical emergency doctor, black bag slung over his shoulder and pushing his blue metal equipment trolley, quickly converge on the room.  Thus commences an episode which continues for quite some time, during which Leah is in great pain and I sit in the chair thinking I’m lucky it’s not me in such a state.

In the middle of all the hullaballoo, lunch arrives.  Amanda, one of the nurses, appears and whisks my lunch tray down to the day waiting room.  I follow, walking slowly.  Very slowly. 

It’s quiet and calm here and while I’m chomping through lunch the Surgeon General appears, dressed in his Sunday best.  He is satisfied with my progress; this is the last time I will see him in the ward.

There is another brief amusing conversation, this time about Sebastien’s whereabouts.  I explain he has fainted clear away, all the drama in the other bed has proved too much; the Surgeon General’s solution to this situation was an offer to order Sebastian a whisky. 

Alcohol, the panacea for all ills…..

 The Godchild and Pearlie Shirley arrive in the early afternoon.  I gear up for the big trip to the downstairs café; we find a booth and sit discussing what is happening in the real world and, more importantly, the prospect of Pearlie Shirley driving me to the next part of My New Life tomorrow.  A week at New Street, the first part of the convalescence process.

 The coffee in the downstairs café tastes disappointingly ordinary; a portent of what is to come. The evening meal looks fine, three mouthfuls and I push the plate away. A cup of tea is made, it tastes vile.  Sugar is added, one mouthful taken and the tea is poured down the sink.

A request is made for dry biscuits and lemonade.  The nurse looks askance.  I am saved by the change of shift and the appearance of Su who cared for me on my first night in hospital.  She returns to the bedside with the appropriate medication – instant cure – and several packets of biscuits.

I settle down for my final night in hospital; once again I reign supreme over the room.  Leah has made a miraculous recovery and is allowed to go home.

Tomorrow morning I will negotiate the hospital discharge obstacle course.

Second day

Before first light I decide the plan for today is to lie very, very still, press the pain relief button from time to time and repeat parrot-like my name and date of birth, every time yet another drug needs to be administered.

This is a short-lived plan; it lasts until the food and drink arrive and the realisation dawns that I might need to engage in some other activity apart from pressing the pain control button. I might have to attempt to sit up in the bed.  At this early stage I haven’t yet mastered the mechanics of the raising and lowering of the bed and the bedhead.  I will need to acquire some bed mechanics knowledge, or the art of drinking from a glass of water, with or without a straw, and not pouring it all over the bed, will be but a dream.

The first big surprise of the day is the constant parade of people who appear at my bedside; first is the anaesthetist who interviewed me yesterday.  Yes, the young, dark, handsome one.  He is followed by Assistant Surgeon Jones and her note-taking offsider, the lovely Rangi.

 Next is the pharmacist and hot on her heels, the physiotherapist; the latter attempts to give me handy tips on how to sit up in bed, how to avoid slipping down to the end of the bed and how best to attempt the business of getting out of bed.  There is no cossetting of patients; if you are conscious and reasonably mobile then out of bed you will get.

And get out of bed I do; it is no easy task.  Imagine a very large walrus lying on its back, taking in the sunshine on a sandy beach; for whatever reason it needs to turn over and position itself to make a get-a-way.  This is difficult business for a walrus; a lot of weight has to be manoeuvered about and the walrus will make several slow and very awkward attempts before it achieves its goal. Have a search on You-Tube and it will give you a very clear understanding of what getting out of bed entailed for me.  Not a pretty sight I can assure you.

And that is just the beginning of the exercise; what follows is trailing all the attachments around the bed and finally making it to the chair.  All this entails about twenty steps; by the time I flop unceremoniously into the chair I feel as if I have walked twenty kilometers.

The real purpose of the move from bed to chair, watched over by the attendant nurse, is to get the patient started on the coughing exercises torture; this is important to remove congestion from the lungs and prevent pneumonia.  Deep breathing and coughing will become a regular part of each day.

According to informed and reliable sources the following excerpt is the best guide to a successful coughing exercise:

Coughing exercises:

The most comfortable position in which to cough is sitting upright.  Hold a pillow or rolled-up blanket against your stitches or staples.  This may make coughing easier.  When you cough, relax your neck and shoulders. Cough from your belly, not from your throat.  Bending your knees may also make coughing more comfortable.  Cough two or three times, then rest.  Do not be afraid to cough. Your incision is firmly held together by stitches or staples.

In theory I'm sure the above paragraph has some merit, however I can tell you this, pillow or no pillow, it damn well hurts.  The best I could manage today were tiny, kitten-like throat coughs, totally unproductive, painful and exhausting.

I have well and truly failed the coughing exercise test.  I am going to be in big trouble with A/S Jones when she arrives for the next round of lung-listening.

Routine

                                          

Early, very early, on this first day of My New Life, absolutely nothing relates to routine as I had previously known it.

Setting the alarm for 5.15 am?  Unheard of.  Packing the necessities for the hospital stay into a small striped bag, including cramming in a dressing gown which can only be described as antique and bulky?  Never.  Not eating breakfast?  You’re kidding.

This is how the day starts.

It’s a dark, wintry morning; Robyn of Richmond arrives promptly at 6 a.m.  Fifteen minutes later we pull into the hospital car park; after a hug and good wishes, I take the elevator up the ground floor.  The day surgery is in darkness; a handful of patients are seated on couches in the outside waiting area.   I have arrived early; another truly remarkable occurrence.  Chalk that up!

At 6.30 a.m. the day surgery door opens; we file into the waiting area and the hospital routine begins.  This routine follows an order not immediately obvious to the patient awaiting surgery but one fixed feature of the day’s routine is the repetitive question: “What is your full name and date of birth?”   Should I be unlucky enough to be visited at a later stage in my life by dementia, I’m absolutely certain the answer to that question is now forever embedded in my memory bank.

Eventually, decked out in hospital gowns, caps, cute little disposable bootees and white dressing gowns, the ladies listed for surgery today take their place in one of the reclining chairs in the pre-surgery waiting area.   Time passes. One by one the waiting patients disappear in the direction of the operating theatres.

Somewhere nearby, the loud bawling of a prospective sergeant-major announces his arrival in the world to all within earshot.

The one person left in the pre-surgery waiting area is now in complete charge of the television remote and the magazine rack. Immediately the TV channel is changed, from the one where Federal Government’s Leader of the Opposition is making yet another fatuous statement, to the way more interesting indigenous TV channel.

I watch TV for a while; I’m starting to feel hungry.  I close my eyes and doze.

A man, dressed in blue scrubs, enters stage right and greets me; in my semi-awake state I mistake him for the anaesthetist who reprimanded me about not taking my reflux medication on a regular basis prior to the initial investigative surgery.    ‘Don’t you remember me from 1983?’ the man in blue asks in a voice of mock reproof and then he laughs. I certainly can recall that year and the hospital procedure; now it’s my turn to laugh.  Really?  Is he serious?  I have no recollection of seeing this man in 1983 and I say so. I consider fleetingly that this may not be the most diplomatic response.  Ah well, I’ll have to live with that faux pas – it’s out there now.

At this stage of proceedings I am more than happy to have this timely distraction, which has come about because  the man in blue, who is the chief operating surgeon (henceforth to be known as the Surgeon-General), was surprised to find his handwriting when reading the case notes at the very back of my file.  We have another laugh about the long arm of coincidence, a brief chat about 1983 and the doctor I do remember, followed by a short resume on how the S.G's career has travelled in the last thirty years. 

Finally with all the interviews and explanations and other rigmarole behind me I’m ready to pass through the door to the area where My New Life will move on to its next stage.  The anesthetists put the final touches to their preparations, the nurse covers me with a warm blanket and in the blink of an eye I am out like a light.

Much later…….

From a great distance a male voice is calling my name; the voice belongs to Craig, the nurse looking after me in recovery.  He poses a question; on a scale of one to ten how would I rate my pain? I give the answer some consideration.  I'm in serious pain; fifteen seems a reasonable answer from my point of view. It is, however, well above the suggested scale and I opt for eleven.  I have absolutely no further memory of the recovery room.

Later again……..

It is dark outside; I am in a darkened two-bed room, my bed is nearest to both the door to the corridor and the door to the bathroom and even in my heavily sedated state I am pleased about my proximity to the bathroom.  In reality it wouldn’t matter if the bathroom was at the far end of the corridor; I will not be leaving this bed for some time. I am hooked up to all the necessary equipment and mostly everything I need will come to me over the next 24 hours.

A nurse appears in the doorway;  this is Su, who is looking after me tonight.  She has a warm smile and a calm, reassuring manner; the requisite observations are taken, instructions are given in the use of the pain relief button and the call button is placed within easy reach.

I close my eyes and drift off into oblivion one more time.