Hello dear readers!
Yup, I blipped again.
You’re not imagining things. Last weeks blog post was indeed absent, something that has occurred more than once of late. I might have a little re-think and move to fortnightly post but, If I’m honest I’m not sure that that would solve the issue.
Anyone who has read this blog within the last seven months will know about the diagnosis of Multiple Sclerosis I received last July.
Sometimes it feels as if I’m becoming a bit of a one trick pony as, if you read back (and please do), you may just find that the majority of posts mention MS in some form. I hope this isn’t becoming too samey for you, my dearest readers but, possibly understandably, Multiple Sclerosis has become something that exists at the forefront of my mind the majority of the time.
Last week this was especially true.
Shop Til You Stop
As I’ve mentioned, it has been seven months since my diagnosis, and in that time things have reached, if not an even keel, then most certainly a more steady course through life’s choppy waters. The hull might be leaking, the rigging a little shot, and the captain busy in his quarters reading navigating for dummies, but the journey continues (and on that note I will stop stretching the analogy before I break the blog).
Last weekend, however things changed. It began in the middle of a supermarket shop I was braving along with my sainted wife, Tina. We’d got the bulk of the shop done without loss of life, patience, or the will to live (a minor miracle) and were just rounding the tinned veg when I started feeling… wrong.
I can’t really put it much more specifically than that. I felt off and I must have looked a little off too, as Tina asked me if I was ok. I said I was alright (as you do)but she persisted and I admitted to not being at my best. At this point some of the visual problems I had suffered in July seemed to be cropping back up. No double vision or things appearing where they weren’t but a subtle yet growing sense of vertigo. A strange sensation of movement, or more specifically of movement that had just stopped (Think getting off the waltzers at the theme park).
At Tina’s insistence I left the supermarket and went and sat in the car while she finished off the shopping(in record time, and well within budget!). From there it was straight home and, a couple of hours later, a phone call to 111.
Inhospitable
Sometimes it feels as if I’m becoming a bit of a one trick pony as, if you read back (and please do), you may just find that the majority of posts mention MS in some form. I hope this isn’t becoming too samey for you, my dearest readers but, possibly understandably, Multiple Sclerosis has become something that exists at the forefront of my mind the majority of the time.
Last week this was especially true.
Shop Til You Stop
As I’ve mentioned, it has been seven months since my diagnosis, and in that time things have reached, if not an even keel, then most certainly a more steady course through life’s choppy waters. The hull might be leaking, the rigging a little shot, and the captain busy in his quarters reading navigating for dummies, but the journey continues (and on that note I will stop stretching the analogy before I break the blog).
Last weekend, however things changed. It began in the middle of a supermarket shop I was braving along with my sainted wife, Tina. We’d got the bulk of the shop done without loss of life, patience, or the will to live (a minor miracle) and were just rounding the tinned veg when I started feeling… wrong.
I can’t really put it much more specifically than that. I felt off and I must have looked a little off too, as Tina asked me if I was ok. I said I was alright (as you do)but she persisted and I admitted to not being at my best. At this point some of the visual problems I had suffered in July seemed to be cropping back up. No double vision or things appearing where they weren’t but a subtle yet growing sense of vertigo. A strange sensation of movement, or more specifically of movement that had just stopped (Think getting off the waltzers at the theme park).
At Tina’s insistence I left the supermarket and went and sat in the car while she finished off the shopping(in record time, and well within budget!). From there it was straight home and, a couple of hours later, a phone call to 111.
Inhospitable
The lady Tina spoke to was not messing around and while we were still on the phone she organised an ambulance. This arrived with the customary alacrity and, after an examination, a few questions, and a couple of phone calls to locate the best place to take me, I was driven to Dewsbury Hospital’s A&E department. I stayed there for the next few hours.
To cut a long and not very exciting story a little shorter, I was discharged from A&E and told to report to Ambulatory Care at Pinderfields hospital the next day. I think if the NHS wasn’t under the strain of being woefully (and perhaps deliberately) underfunded and understaffed, then I might have been kept in over night. The truth of the matter, is that they had no idea what to do with me.
The same was true of Ambulatory Care, and after four hours spent there I was still no wiser and no closer to any treatment. Again I was told to come back, this time on the Monday when MS specialists would be around. Upon ringing to enquire about transport on that Monday morn I was told it would be there within the next four hours, and then rung back ten minutes later to inform me that my presence was no longer needed and that a nurse would call to my home to take bloods.
I panicked.
Scare Tactics
Since diagnosis, I think I’ve handled things pretty well. Yes, there has been he odd blip. Yes there has been the odd spike of emotion. On the whole though I’d like to think I’ve remained relatively calm and collected (cool goes without saying). Experiencing very similar symptoms to the ones that drove me into hospital just a few months ago, and then being told contradictory stories only days apart by the same department of the same hospital felt like I was being fobbed off and, quite frankly, left in the lurch. I felt abandoned and more than a little bit scared at that point, probably more scared than I had been since my diagnosis relapse.
Luckily, I have a lot of support. Family, including my parents who, as we speak are sunning it up in Lanzarote., have all been there, eager to know what’s going on, eager to help. Tina has of course been my absolute rock. The other person who has made a huge difference is the MS nurse, Diane, who within one phone call assured us that there was nothing to worry about, That the fact I was suffering the same symptoms meant it was not a fresh relapse but most probably an infection (Yup, UTI) triggering a flare up of existing damage, and that there was no such thing as a Multiple Sclerosis emergency. ( My wife on the other hand has a different opinion )
Keep Calm & Carry On
That last point feels counter-intuitive but she’s right. Nothing much can be done to stop a relapse should one occur. Nothing much can be done to prevent infections from causing a flare up, and nothing much can be done to repair damage (the body does a reasonable job of that on it’s own, clever thing it is). It doesn’t stop it being scary and she fully understood that. My reaction was not one that is uncommon. I guess the take-away from all this is that I need to not panic, to not let fear rule me. I also possibly need to drink more water... but that’s a different story.
Until next time...
To cut a long and not very exciting story a little shorter, I was discharged from A&E and told to report to Ambulatory Care at Pinderfields hospital the next day. I think if the NHS wasn’t under the strain of being woefully (and perhaps deliberately) underfunded and understaffed, then I might have been kept in over night. The truth of the matter, is that they had no idea what to do with me.
The same was true of Ambulatory Care, and after four hours spent there I was still no wiser and no closer to any treatment. Again I was told to come back, this time on the Monday when MS specialists would be around. Upon ringing to enquire about transport on that Monday morn I was told it would be there within the next four hours, and then rung back ten minutes later to inform me that my presence was no longer needed and that a nurse would call to my home to take bloods.
I panicked.
Scare Tactics
Since diagnosis, I think I’ve handled things pretty well. Yes, there has been he odd blip. Yes there has been the odd spike of emotion. On the whole though I’d like to think I’ve remained relatively calm and collected (cool goes without saying). Experiencing very similar symptoms to the ones that drove me into hospital just a few months ago, and then being told contradictory stories only days apart by the same department of the same hospital felt like I was being fobbed off and, quite frankly, left in the lurch. I felt abandoned and more than a little bit scared at that point, probably more scared than I had been since my diagnosis relapse.
Luckily, I have a lot of support. Family, including my parents who, as we speak are sunning it up in Lanzarote., have all been there, eager to know what’s going on, eager to help. Tina has of course been my absolute rock. The other person who has made a huge difference is the MS nurse, Diane, who within one phone call assured us that there was nothing to worry about, That the fact I was suffering the same symptoms meant it was not a fresh relapse but most probably an infection (Yup, UTI) triggering a flare up of existing damage, and that there was no such thing as a Multiple Sclerosis emergency. ( My wife on the other hand has a different opinion )
Keep Calm & Carry On
That last point feels counter-intuitive but she’s right. Nothing much can be done to stop a relapse should one occur. Nothing much can be done to prevent infections from causing a flare up, and nothing much can be done to repair damage (the body does a reasonable job of that on it’s own, clever thing it is). It doesn’t stop it being scary and she fully understood that. My reaction was not one that is uncommon. I guess the take-away from all this is that I need to not panic, to not let fear rule me. I also possibly need to drink more water... but that’s a different story.
Until next time...
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