The 30th of September.
I have a line! Sometimes it pays to know the right people. I was annoyed with nurses this morning as one just waltzed in to go through drugs, then when she realised I was not in awake mode, she just left my door wide open which was frustrating. The doctors came round and when I asked about the line, they sort of hummed and haaed and said it'd moved onto the "appointment" stage, whatever that means. They were basically pretty redundant today. So my mama and I were just sitting around, reading our papers and stuff, and a specialist nurse came in to get some blood from me, but she looked at my veins and bruises and said "Actually, the vascular nurses are outside, I'll just go and have a word". So we sat and waited, then Bryony appeared! We forgot she is a line nurse and she used her magic and influence to get me on the list for today! She's such a star. Plus she's totally happy with teaching my mama to do all this at home. So then we sat and we waited, a man called Iain came to consent me, and they squeezed me in at the end of the day - I was done about half four. We went on a bit of a magical mystery tour of the hospital, but eventually got to angio. It was another one of those procedures that actually, all the setting up and then cleaning down takes more time than the thing itself. They ultrasounded my arms to see the vessels, and typically mine are stupid and run alongside my brachial artery which we didn't really want to puncture, so my line comes out lower than preferred, but nevermind. Then they stuck me with some local, then I felt a lot of shoving as they fed the catheter in. And that was it really! Stick the dressing on, off you go back to the ward! And that is about it, really! Carlos is back tonight - I cannot understand him, between his incredibly thick accent and his retainer. Oh and Darius came to visit me! He asked if we still live next door to "that mad man". But how nice!
The 1st of October. I'm really tired tonight. I think it's to do with being awake for an hour in the night, plus I had no nap this afternoon. A doctor still tried to stab me this morning, failed, and came back when my infusion had finished. Sephie is going to talk to him. I felt a bit light-headed this morning, but I managed to have a shower and wash my hair using the shower chair. That has made me feel slightly more human. My mama came in late because she had to take Grandma to Prof. Clarke but all that went fine so she arrived about lunchtime. She brought me breadbuns and an egg which made for a different lunch. You know your life is dull when the concept of an egg sandwich is exciting. Becky came to visit me this afternoon and she brought me a Boo book which is very cute and it made us smile a lot. She was regaling us with tales of school and church, both equally entertaining in their respective ways. The doctors came back while she was here and once again said nothing...carry on with antibiotics, meeting on Friday etc. Tonight I've been reading the book that the transplant co-ordinator left and it's just reminded me of all the shit I went through the first time. Obviously there will be some differences because my body's in a different state but God...I don't want to do this again. It was so hard the first time. I had a little cry. I'm just really tired.