Second Surgery and the Bed of Wee

I’ve not wanted to write in my blog and today for the first time I sat down and decided that perhaps I should.  I look back at what I have written in previous posts, how upbeat and positive I was. Maybe I was in denial about it all, not accepting that I had been diagnosed with thyroid cancer. To be honest I think there is this feeling when you get diagnosed, that because I felt so well the diagnosis didn’t really make that much difference. The previous surgery was straightforward, I recovered quickly and cracked on. 

To add to this the Doctors, Consultants and Nurses all made out that it was very straightforward. Surgery – recovery – treatment...done!! Over the past few week’s I’ve realised that it’s not straightforward, things get in the way and there’s nothing like a week long stay in hospital to punch you in the face with reality. The past two weeks have left me feeling broken, exhausted and anxious. I’ve been afraid to write about it but perhaps now I should. I wouldn’t want anyone to go through what I went through.

On surgery day I was OK, I think knowing what is coming helps. The surgery went well and I came round pretty quick and was sat up eating a tuna sandwich with a cuppa just an hour or so later. This time I had a rather disgusting drain hanging out of my neck, which collected the blood and gunk through a tube into a bag. It was a nuisance more than anything, I’d get tangled up in it or worse it would drop and tug on my neck...which would make me jump in the air it was so uncomfortable. I found the solution was to just stuff it in my dressing gown pocket. It was because of the drain that I ended up staying in as there was just a bit too much gunk coming out of it. Thank god I did stay in.

The following evening as I was brushing my teeth I started to feel unwell, my hands were tingling and my mouth and legs and I felt like everything was getting further away. I went hot and my heart started to race with panic as I pressed repeatedly on my buzzer for the nurse. I was crashing...my calcium had hit a low due to my parathyroid's being stunned or damaged during surgery. I knew this could happen but the consultant had been so blasé about it I didn’t think it was such a big deal. But it turns out it is!! 

Mistakes had been made, they’d treated me as a partial thyroidectomy patient and I’d not been monitored or had my bloods taken. I was hooked up to an ECG and had calcium intravenously whilst every hour my bloods were taken. The vein in my arm eventually collapsed and started to bruise due to the constant blood taking. The next day I was moved to a medical ward, placed in a room alone on a 13 hour drip and ECG in a bed stinking of wee! I was exhausted, sore and miserable. 

I now had wires all over my body, a drip coming out of my hand and my drain. Going to the loo was an ordeal. I had to plan ahead and work out how I was going to make the journey. The drip had to be wheeled along with me and I wrapped the drain around the drip so it wouldn’t fall. The first time I went I sat on the loo and accidentally cut off the drip, alarms started sounding and I sat there mid-wee praying nobody would come running in. They didn’t...I learnt that you tend to be left alone on this ward. I called the nurse and we untangled the drip and reset it. The drip continued into the night, it’s lights flashing in the darkness. I wasn’t going to sleep, the nursing team had ordered a huge takeaway and the smell wafted into my room. The rest of the night was spent listening to the loud and annoying voice of a nurse who seemed to love talking about trauma, car crashes and her fellow staff. I could hear her talk about myself at one point causing me to start to panic as the reality of what was happening to me sunk in. I plugged in my ear phones and started to watch the Friends reunion. I don’t think I slept.

The next morning I begged to be moved back to my old ward and cried to the consultant that I couldn’t stay any longer. I spent the morning waiting in my stinking wee bed, being ignored. Only the pharmacy technician chatted to me and tried to reassure me. Then I was told I could go back to my other ward, I was wheeled upstairs, dumped in my own room and left. The ward didn’t even know I’d arrived...they never told them or did a hand over. Luckily I had made friends with a fellow patient who was going through a similar ordeal to me, Laura...she was lovely and so helpful. She appeared in the doorway and I sat and cried to her and then the nurses arrived and held my hand as I calmed down. I was terrified of crashing again, I was exhausted, I looked terrible and felt like I’d been put through the spin cycle of a washing machine. I just wanted to feel normal again, but I couldn’t see how I was ever going to get there.