Week 6 – Home, the Cat, Devon and Edinbugh

I have lost track of how many days, and I know it is 7 weeks since my operation on Saturday and three weeks since I have been at home on Sunday. My recovery is happening, when I came out of hospital I found it really hard to walk down stairs, my legs were all shaky and now they are not. Also for the first week I slept all the time, and had two nights of 10 hours – I can honestly not remember when I last did that – my 20’s! Now I am back to normal sleeping patterns of 6 hours or there abouts and not sleeping during the day. What has greatly improved is my concentration, I can now read a book and catch up on all those box sets. It feels very self indulgent to read such a lot, my teenage self’s perfect day.

However, it is frustrating as I am not really getting better and back to anywhere near normal. I was told 6 months and it is easy to believe that so, that makes August! It will be a few more weeks before I am back to doing jewellery I think. I feel I can get back but it is the utter fatigue I have that stops me. For example I get up in the morning, have a wash/shower and then dressed and that tires me so I have to rest for 30 minutes before getting on with anything else. Over the last few days I have decided to make an effort to get a bit fitter so with baby steps I am going for a walk, 5 minutes out and 5 minutes back this week and I will extend it next week. The really lovely thing about being home is resting on my bed with my lovely cat, she is very happy and is curled up next to me as a write. It is also so much better for Mark as he does not have to come to the hospital every day. His work is very busy at the moment so he is back to long hours and comes home late.

My wound is still open and I have been having it dressed by district nurses and they are weaning me off their services so I have been told to go to my surgery to have it dressed, I think they want me to do it myself now … I do like the reassurance but that does not seem to count for much. So I have resigned myself it is my care now.

Eating is still my biggest problem. I have been steadily loosing weight and now seem to be stabilising. I manage to eat a little, three tablespoons of soup for example. I am beginning to add a few fruit and veg to my diet. It is eating solid food and swallowing more than about 5 mouthfuls, that is the problem. That is my diagnosis today but I find that what works today is not necessarily the answer tomorrow. I made macaroni cheese and that was easy and delicious to eat, and then last night it was awful. The secret is to snack on a few meals throughout the day, but as it is painful and makes me feel unwell I do not really feel like eating much at all. I seem to be able to eat some chocolate and sweet things and so a few mouthfuls of this makes me feel a bit better. Easter should be fun. We are off to Devon for Easter and holiday next week. Driving down to Devon via a night with my mother in Warminster on Friday.

Mr. Lamah has finally referred me to The Marsden, however I have yet to hear from them, it all seems to take a long time.

Thank you to everyone who has sent books, messages, cards, walked dogs, cooked food, flowers, lovely scented gifts and come to visit me. Please feel free to continue to come as I am still very house bound and cannot walk the dogs yet. We are away for a week and it would be lovely to see more friends, old and new the week after next. Rowena is en route to Edinburgh for an open day, she has decided to accept their offer and will be going there in September, depending upon A levels but the offer is within her reach. We are so proud of her to be going to such a wonderful university.

28/3/18