Category: Duodenal ulcer

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Today’s ailments in charge, and I believe enjoying giving me pain, the most uncomfortable are: Shaking-Shoulder-Shirley in 2nd-second place, well below my so-painful newly developed one. Going by the name of, currently anyway, Cracked-Rib-Craig. Later in the day, Crack Rib Craig’s pains tripled. Carer Ejaz called ICC & was advised to call 111. Which he did. As a result, an ambulance is on the way. These were the 11 days in 2 hospitals and 5 different wards: utter frustration.
Ejaz could only stay until the paramedics arrived; he had to shoot off when they arrived. I asked him to contact Paul with the details via email, and showed him where the link was in the Excel Contact listing to pass along for me. That was a comfort, stops folks from fretting at my absence. I suppose. 
The ambulance men were also in a rush, and asked me to leave my big coat and not to take any sticks with me as they would only get nicked. I was in no state to argue, but paid the price when I realised I’d left my camera, mobile, card and cash in the greatcoat. Naturally, in all that time, with no pen, pad or contact, the only person who tried to contact me, not surprisingly, was Jenny, My Angel.

We got to the QMC, and I joined an estimated 34 trolleys in the A&E corridors. Someone came shortly to diagnose me, and I was wheeled ahead of the corridors on a trollied patient’s stretcher straight to the cardiac PET team in a side room. I only managed to catch a few readings, but a smidgen concerned, at my blood sugar showing 4.5. After some of the sickly sweet bottles were forced down me, and off the scan, then the X-ray rooms. Then I was moved into a Geriatric Neurology Ward. In the evening, after scrounging a pen and a paper towel, the readings I noted were 169-68, 8. Blood oxygen 92 71. Apart from the blood sugar at 2.6 now, I thought I’d be okay and on my way home soon. 

The chest pains got worse, though. The deep breaths they asked me to take on the second visit from the cat team were the most painful to date. 
Overnight, many regular checks were taken, but… the blood sugar did not increase despite the clumps of sweet water it was, and sugary drinks were taken.
The next day, they moved me to the Geriatrics, Blue ward. I had visits from the neurology, Cardiac, and Warfarin-INR checks, which I was sure would be okay, because they have been for weeks now, not NO! The INR returned as 1.2; my target was 3 to 3.5. This prompted them to start giving me Enoxaparin injection in my tummy. The nurse who gave the first one to me left a large blood spot and asked if they are usually this big. I explained that the Enoxaparin was injected in a downward direction and the full length of the needle was not fully in before she injected it. She looked agaog. I did them myself after that one. Here is a snap I took when I finally got home. I’ll explain why later. I got home many days later to take this snap just before midnight, of the original injection. It’s been weeks since I self-injected, but I can remember how they told me to do it. A smug mode sneaked in amongst the frustrations. Haha!
Then, the 24-bed Geriatric Assessment Unit (GAU) was launched in July 2024. (4×6 Beds wards What a nightmare. Little knowing what was to come later. I reassess it as not a very good experience. Hehehe!
But this was my most confusing period. After the 2nd day in there, things were beginning to feel easier, and the blood sugar level was up to 4.8. Don’t laugh, but I cannot recall which department the next Doctor was from. He pointed out the bruises from the blood tests, which two days earlier were bright, were now fading very fast; my pallor was ghostly, and I needed some specialist investigations. Also, that morning, my BP was 187/63, temperature was down to 25.0, and Blood Sugar was back down to 2.6. I think she was a diabetologist. Anyway, I was stuffed with orange juice, more rock-solid lumps of cake, and sickly-sweet boosters. The next day, I was transferred to the City Hospital. By then, Toothache Tiffany had started to kick off, and my urine colour was a 7 for the next three days. Each time I went to the loo, which averaged five or six visits a day, a frame supplied to get there, there was blood on the gown from my external haemorrhoids, every time. Then, whatever it was called up the bum to get samples, photos and cream applied. The outside ones were the more painful. I suppose,  due to all the lying on my backside for so long. The INR slowly rose a smidgen, showing the benefit of the prefilled 9-foot-long hypodermic syringe, inserted in the belly, times a day. Obviously, that was a joke; it wasn’t that long or anywhere near it, just felt like it. I believe, for some unknown reason, I cheered up a little that day and wandered into another of the mini wards, Yellow. And started a chinwag with two of the people in there. I called on the last two days as well.   
Then the night shift ignored every call for help from men needing to use the toilet, empty their catheters, or drink. I found out why: from my bed, I could see the outer door and some of the staff coming in with coats over their uniforms, carrying takeaways. As soon as they’d noshed it, a nurse returned to the bay. He reminded me of Sonny Liston, but didn’t speak as much. This was another bad night because, apparently, as Dave from Yellow Ward told me, the TVs were being repaired, and it was terrible listening to them with the hearing aids in, so I took them out. But forgot to open the battery compartment. They ran flat. Plucking up the courage the next day to ask if they had any, a nurse who had not responded to my attempted forms of wit before, yes, yes, I’ll get you some, and returned minutes later with a pack of eight, for free! The tinny cracking coming from the night watch lady’s desk and the chap in the next bed’s TV. The atmosphere improved when I had a visit from the Cardiac and Warfarin folk, who told me that if all goes well with the next set of checks, they would be able to sign me off! I hoped for the best, and my parole would come through in the morning.
The diabetic tests, well, all four were much improved, and he said he’s signing me out later that day. Oh, the Joy! Getting back to see my Jenny Angel before she goes on her trip to see her Chesterfield relatives with Frank. Great! How hoopefull and stupid I was to think it would happen!
The Neurologist then gave me the all-clear. Bags of new medications to sort out. New painkillers, back on the Morphine again, but by gum, they do work. Others that they may have told me what they were for or not, but you know me. The only certainty is certainly a matter of credence, rather than factuality sometimes. My rare doubtlessness is misunderstood credibility. I think?
Some, well, masses of paperwork to get help with. I won’t bother Jenny or Frank until they get back from their break. That was the plan… Dang dang, fang Dang!
I was due to be parolled at 1030hrs the following day.
I nipped into Yellow Ward to tell the lads, and got back into bed, ready for my vegetable balls in gravy, onions & courgette medley meal.
Dare I say it, I was feeling chirpy! Yee-Ha! But as I was enjoying my meal, a nurse informed me that the Neurologist had not passed for parole! Sob! I may have got the department out of sync here? His results would be known in the morning. If they are good enough, he will sign me off. We felt they would be, and encouragingly, they told me I’d be leaving in the morning, lift arranged for 1330hrs.
Very early in the mornings, a nurse was getting my carrier bag and keys out of the locker, and I just knew it was good news. And, it was! All cleared! But again, a new course of medication to be sorted, and three bags of medications to add to take home with me. So many things to take in at once.
I enjoyed the online. shower of the hospital visits, as I did the earlier one shave they let me have.

Saturday: Full of joy and hope, after the shower, they bunged my things into carriers, cleaned my bed for the next victim, then moved me into the Departure lounge, to await the promised lift home in plenty of time for the 01330hr lift. And, only two escapees to go, me and an old Scottish chap. At 1500hrs, a lady rang to see where the lift was. It’ll be here shortly. 
1600hrs: She rang again. It will be here at 1700hrs.
The poor Scottish man decided to take a taxi, which was not an option for me due to Chloe & Carol’s cartilage in my knees. I did mention that DG supply a larger type of taxi that Jenny Angel uses. But I could not remember the name of it. And she called again. It will be here by 2000hrs.
Not surprisingly, my confidence was low, very low. The room I was left in was so cold. Medical staff kept walking through it in a back room, the smell of poo permeating into the room as they left again. 
There seems to be another call to them, that the City Hospital did not want to give me a lift, cause it was the QMC’s job? So sayeth the computer lady.
All I had on was a hospital gown, and it had not been washed for 12 days. I started sneezing. That brought back the rib pains as I waited. I found a crossword book, but without the reading glasses, I could not even have a go at that. Then, I wonder what I will find when, or if ever, I get back to the flat.
I think it was nearly ten o’clock when the ambulance arrived. The tension was sensed immediately in the two ambulance personnel, stand-offish at first, I thought, but how I felt after an 11-hour wait, mixed with the worries of what I would find. In the ambulance, I used my humour to force them to communicate. By the time we got back to the flat, they asked if I could manage with the walker and bags to get up there. Ahem! As we got into the lift I let my fears pour our and told them that British gas sai9d the metere will stop working unless I supply them with a read,  and it me £26 for the tow failed calls to them to explain we do not know how to read the meter, finally the human we got to0 talk to, spent an hour telling Carer Ejaz how to read the meter, but the coloured buttons where no on the box. He emailed them photos, but eventually she asked me if I wanted an engineer to come and look at it. I replied Yes, please, that would be marvellous! 
No one came, now threats of turning off the power!
They mellowed when we got in the flat, and they saw the great stack of mail delivered while I was in the hospital, 9 letters that need reading and reacting to. The Bank, City Council, and two medical ones were amongst them that I recognised. Then I opened the carriers. As you see, loads of new and old medications.
Paperwork that I cannot read must be baffling to anyone without cataracts. How can I rely on someone to know enough to be confident to sort them for me? I’ve already got boxes, some opened, some not, of Catheter Caroles Contraption, medication all over and under the Carers table, and the prescription medical stuff has spread into another drawer. Recognising the new will be risky with the Morphine and antibiotics. Which am I to keep taking, which am I to stop taking, if any? This could be a dangerous situation. And the poor Carer has to
He keeps to his timetable and does not even get time with the extra time to catch up on anything.
A Social lady said that Age UK can provide help with shopping. That would be grand, but they said that last time I was in the hospital. I’ve heard nothing. I’m all het-up now again. It got worse. I had to throw away all the fresh food in the fridge that was out of date, except the cheese. I lost the plot there, back to couriers at home. They asked me to press the alarm alert, and I did. They told the operator who I was and of my returning home. Then, something I’d been looking forward to so much, a good, strong mug of Glengettie. I got the kettle on and noticed that the slow cooker had been left on for 11 days, with cracks appearing, and it was bone dry.
As if all this was not enough for suicide, the Bank had blocked my account. Great, if anyone does come to help with the shopping now, I can’t afford any. Who can I get to go to the Bank with me, after helping me find the problem and if one, a solution?
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To think, yesterday all I was looking forward to was getting home to see Jenny & Ejaz. I think my mistake was asking the nurses to update my situation. I think this morning at around 0800hrs is the next call.
So, nobody had checked on the flat! ,

I got this update done up to here. It’s now 0620hrs, Sunday morning, and I’m in a worse state than ever.
Which indicates that Ejaz didn’t call once to let Paul know the situation, or do a safety check.

Mind you, he was in a rush when he’d called the ambulance. My fault.

I’m not sure I’ll be able to do a blog for a while, so much to get sorted, and I just don’t know if I’m going to react, medically, over the situation.
I can see things still not getting done, Oh, dearie me.
Now I may lose Grammarly and the internet connection, not to mention the landline and mobile.
British Gas is still telling me the meter is being shut down? Not my fault. Carers have tried their best to help, but the amount of money it costs when they put them onto AIs without the required “why are you ringing” list? Cut you off three times, and you have to pay the connection fee and ridiculous per-minute charges, not to mention the Bank wants to see me.
That’s another thing, who can I get to go with me to the bank meeting? Last time I had to take a Carer with me… the problems are too much.
Thanks for reading this pathetic winning crap.
Away for 11 days… what do I come back to… I’m so sorry. No point in moaning, I know. But I’m getting deeper into a maelstrom of uncontrolled situations. None of my fault, I believe. This makes things worse; I still need of so much help that is not coming.

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I’m turning into a blubbering, worry-wracked
nervous, incompetent, incapable waster.
Just mentioning the obvious.
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Something’s gotta give…
CHEERS
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Yours, Inchie The Defeated.
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