There was no blog yesterday, the day before that, or even the day before that! I have a very good excuse. As I type today’s post, I cast my mind back to Sunday evening, some 72 hours earlier…

Guess what? I am back in hospital again! I had been experiencing leg pain for a few days. I told myself that I would call Orthopaedic Outpatients on Monday, to request an appointment for this (at the time) somewhat minor issue. My left leg had totally different ideas. It didn’t want to wait until Monday…

As I entered the bathroom, I heard a sickening noise, impossible to describe, coming from my leg. I then lost all balance, having to hold onto a stool, in order to avoid hitting the floor. Then came the pain..

I have had more than my fair share of health issues, during my 36 years on this planet. I’ve endured operations, gruelling treatments, as well as symptoms which I pretty much have to just put up with, on a daily basis.

While I had to deal with some horrific situations, nothing would come close on the pain scale I felt on Sunday.

Things must have been bad, because at that point, I had decided I wanted to go to hospital “RIGHT NOW!”.

The parametrics arrived. Luckily, I had managed to get some clothes on and therefore protect my modesty.

I then had to get from the bedroom, to the hospital. While this is only a short journey, geographically, given the stress and events involved, I felt as if I was in my own 1980’s roadtrip movie, alongside Steve Martin and John Candy.

The journey went as follows…

• Move from my chair onto their chair. Complete with screaming.
• Get tied into their chair. This is apparently not to prevent the screaming banshee, the paramedics had just captured, from escaping. The ties were to prevent me from falling out as…
•  … the chair was carried down the stairs, with me in it. Reassuringly, I get told by paramedic, not to close my eyes for this manoeuvre, as I need to be on the lookout, to ensure my head doesn’t get bashed.
• Arrive at and get loaded onto ambulance. I feel like a flat-packed wardrobe on an Argos delivery lorry. I recall how Argos use Yodel as a courier. I also recall Yodel throwing a parcel over my garden gate. I am now terrified.
• Notice the curtains in a house opposite the ambulance are twitching. Get ready to wave at nosey neighbour and show them that they’ve been busted, while being friendly at the same time. Then remember my hands are tied – literally!
• Arrive at A&E. Never have I been more relieved – every turn and corner the ambulance took on the windy roads, felt as if my leg was being torn off.

I was delivered to A&E Majors (it would have been such a disappointment to end in Minors – it doesn’t sound nearly as serious), where I was placed in a bed and told to hold out in anticipation for the doctor. I was about to play The Waiting Game…

When I woke up, I nearly fell out of bed, due to shock. The surprise was caused by a familiar face staring into mine. It appeared to be John – one of the two best men at my wedding!

I quickly gathered my thoughts and realised, unsurprisingly, that it wasn’t John at all. The face staring into my sleepy eyes, belonged to the nurse on duty; who, coincidentally, shared many features with my best man.

One trait the nurse has, which John does not, is that he was extremely helpful (John – in the unlikely event that you’re reading this… I’m sorry!).

The very helpful nurse was disappointed to learn that I had no known bed sores. “Shame”, he exclaimed. “I was looking forward to seeing your bum”.

A doctor came to see me. I was told to provide a pain score, from 1 to 10 (10 being the worse). I always struggle with providing a suitable number. As my bone was shattered, my leg was naturally going to sting, a little.

If I was to provide a score of 9 – pretty excruciating – the example I would think of would be to cut open that bit of skin between your genitals and bum (apparently, the “perineum”), before spraying it with Lynx Africa.

A score of 10, can only be one possibility… Leg cramp. Luckily, I’ve never had this myself, but those Premier League footballers make that look unbearable. Especially when their team just happens to be winning 2-1 and want the game to end as quickly as possible.

To calm my pain, I was given morphine – straight into the veins. I was promised, sorry, “warned”, that this might make me feel a little odd. It helped ease the pain, but it was nothing like they made it out to be in Transpotting. You certainly wouldn’t catch me crawling into a disgusting Scottish public toilet for the stuff!

Having become more settled in bed and with the pain easing, thanks to the morphine, I started to notice how long that I was waiting to go anywhere. I did get to watch a man win the award for Rudest Person 2019 (despite it only being January). Kudos to the idiot in the bed opposite mine, who was acting seriously drunk and nasty to staff. He moaned how he had work in the morning and if A&E were not going to let him leave right away, the staff would have to pay his wages. That’s unbelievable… this man actually has a job?

I eventually arrived at the ward, where I was Nil By Mouth. I had not eaten an evening meal at that point. Lucky for me, that I had eaten that huge Sunday roast earlier… that huge Sunday roast, consisting of a cheese and onion crisp sandwich.

I remained “NBM” on Monday, due to the continued possibility of an operation being carried out that day. Contray to speculation, this was not a means of torture, by the hospital trying to get me to reveal national secrets, like a Guantanamo Bay prisoner.

The fact I was not allowed to eat, kept being rubbed in my face – staff would shout out the day’s menu, so patient’s could pick their choice of meal… “Quiche? Chicken pasta? Braised quail eggs, served with a succulent mandarin and cranberry dew?”. That was the menu, as I remember it two days later. I may not have recalled it entirety correctly.

Fast-forward to Wednesday. I’m still here. Remember the heatwave we had in the summer? I was in hospital for that, too. Want to hear something funny? The ward temperature feels just as hot today, as it did in July. This is despite it being winter and snow forecast, over the course of next week. The reason for this bizarre climate, is the ward’s heating system. This evening, they seem to have cranked the heating up to the maximum setting. Either that, or they’re trying to sweat secrets from out of me, with those Guantanamo tactics.

Earlier in the week, nurses kept having to encourage me to drink, and would quiz me on how much I had drank. Today, I’ve been drinking so much, becauae of the temperature, they’ve given up – I take far too long reading off the huge list of beverages to have passed my lips. A fellow patient appeared to get confused when asked to state everything he had drank – “Do I have to pay for these drinks?”.

As for me, we will see what Thursday brings. One thing’s for sure, I won’t be going home tomorrow. If you’re lucky, I might blog for you.