More than just a bag lady

I'm back at home! 🏡🎉🎉🎉🎉  I was discharged yesterday afternoon and luckily it was Dads day off work so he was able to pick me up. The first thing I did when I got home was to get straight in the shower. I hadn't had one for days and I felt grotty.  Now don't judge me and think I'm a scruffy cow- it's not easy to just jump into the shower when you're connected up to a drip 24 hours a day (instead of just overnight for 12 hours at home) and have those fluids going into a central line in your neck that can't get wet. I must have been in there for about 30 minutes washing my hair, scrubbing my body, shaving my legs and just sitting feeling the water pour down on me.  After that I got dressed and went to my Mum and Dads. The kids were there and they didn't expect me to be; they thought I was still in hospital. They were both upstairs and I shouted them down for dinner.  It was great to see the expression on their faces-first confusion, then surprise and f...

As I've passed through the corridors of the QMC hospital this last week I've noticed that there must have been a project recently to try and smarten the place up. Obviously the beds must  scrape the walls as patients are moved from ward to ward and  over enthusiastic wheelchair pushers have obviously  bashed into them on occasion too.  But I have no idea what Cowboys they've had doing the work... Nice touch up job here! There are just no words...😂 Perhaps there are paint shortages in the NHS or budget constraints mean that they can only touch up the wall rather than paint the whole thing! It reminds me of my blog post 'curtain gate' where the curtain was too small for the window. It also just goes to show that no matter how crap things are you can always  find something to laugh at.  NB x

I'm all ready to settle down and watch the final of Celebrity Big Brother.  I've been down to Costa to get a mango and passionfruit cooler and a packet of revels- my treat for the week. It may not seem terribly exciting to some but as I'm only allowed to drink emix or double strength Dioralyte any other drink is exciting! And I've been really good with eating only plain things that I know won't upset my bowels- most days it's been jacket potato and cheese- so again a bag of chocolates is something totally different. I have been good and only got a small bag instead of a sharing size one so hopefully I can enjoy it without ending up in agony or on the loo all night.  So who will win? I'm team USA all the way. Ricky has been booooring, Marnie did my head in with her showmance with Lewis and Bear- well there's nothing to say about that knob head really is there? At first Frankie drove me mad but he's really grown on me. I like Aubrey- I wish I could con...

Last night I went down to theatre to have a central line put in my neck.  Obviously that's not me- my hair is longer and my tits are bigger 😉 Now this one is me- can you spot the difference? A central line is essentially a big cannula that goes into the jugular vein in the neck and down towards the heart. I'm so difficult to cannulate so when my third cannula tissued yesterday (medical term for stopped working) I asked the doctor if I could have a central line. I know some people will think I'm mad requesting to have a giant needle stuck into my neck but I would rather have one painful procedure done than have repeated cannula attempts done every day or even multiple times a day.  Because it has to be done in theatre by an anesthetist you get called whenever they have a free spot. From past experience this is usually at some ungodly time in the early hours of the morning and you get a nurse coming in to wake you up, flapping about because theatre has called for you and the...

I have just seen the Doctors this morning who have confirmed that I do have a line infection. To be honest I was really shocked- I had convinced myself that it was just a virus and that I would be out by the weekend. So now I'm having to come to terms with the fact that I'm definitely not  going to Germany and will be in hospital for a minimum of 2 weeks. I'm gutted. Absolutely gutted.  The blood cultures show that there is a bug in the line but nobody can explain why I didn't have any temperatures or fevers. I continued to use the line all last weekend and actually felt better when having my feed which is the exact opposite of all the other times I've had line infections. Because of this the blood cultures are going to be repeated today to make absolutely sure that there is an infection and to identify it so the microbiology people can tell the doctors what antibiotics to treat it with.  I am also going to look at other ways I can reduce my chances of getting infec...

So right now Hubby and the kids are flying over Europe on their way to Germany.  There will be an empty seat on the plane where I'm supposed to be sitting but instead I'm in my hospital bed typing this. I thought I was ok with it until I got texts from the kids... As  I read them I struggled to hold back the tears.  The top one is from Hubby replying to me. Then the second is from Big Fella (I've used the pink tash to block out his name as I like to keep the kids anonymous) The third one is from Big Girl.  It's hard knowing that they're going to have a great week away. Of course I want them to have fun- it's just I would rather be there with them. The weather this week in Germany is hot, hot, hot (even hotter than here in the UK) and I had been worrying about dehydrating- well I don't have that to worry about now! People have said to me "you'll be able to go in a few days if you're discharged" and in theory they're right. If I don't...

This summer I rather optimistically planned two holidays- the first a week in Devon with all of Hubby's family and the second a week in Germany visiting friends. I was obviously too greedy because on Monday (just 3 days before I was due fly to Germany) I was admitted to hospital with a suspected infection in my Hickman line. I know I should be grateful that I managed to have the week in Devon but going to Germany was a big thing. It was going to be the first time I had flown since having a Hickman line and it's taken endless emails and hours of telephone calls with the airline and my healthcare team to organise. You see going abroad isn't just a case of taking a bit of extra medication in the suitcase...the feed I have through my Hickman line has to be refrigerated so travelling with it is always problematic.  When we went to Devon I froze a million ice blocks and put them in the cool bags with the feed  and then put the feed in the fridge at the other end straight away. We...