Well now that Christmas is well behind us, I feel I can tell you about the awful time I had during the holiday.
It started on Christmas Day when I found myself suffering from a really bad chest infection together with other flu like symptoms even though I had my flu jab in October. Of course it was a bad time and my appetite had disappeared too so thinking I might feel better in 24 hrs, the tradional dinner was cancelled as was most everything else. When Boxing Day arrived I felt worse so decided to try and find a doctor to pay me a visit as I was bedridden and feeling seriously unwell. This meant a call to an ‘out of hours’ doctor ( who don’t exist anymore ) and I was eventually directed to 111 where after a 25 min wait on the phone for a person to answer, I listened to a series of messages which proclaimed just how important my call was and not to hang up as someone would be with me as ‘soon as an agent’ was free.
Eventually a young lady answered and being tied to her script wouldn’t allow me to describe my symptoms and I just had to answer a series of questions that were ‘designed to ensure I received the right level of care’, and it was after the ‘interview had finished I was assured someone would get back to me within the hour. After about an hour a doctor rang me and we went through another list of questions again which afterwards I was assured someone would be out to see me within 6 hours.
After about 4 hours I got a phone call from a nurse who told me a Doctor was on his way and would arrive within the hour. Which he duly did and the poor chap, looking run off his feet, examined me and offered me the chance of being transferred to a hospital. After considering this and imagining what it would have been like, being Christmas I decided to decline preferring the warmth and comfort of my own bed. He therefore prescribed me a course of antibiotics along with some steroids, which thankfully he had enough in his bag to last me until my own GP opened up again after the holidays.
Again Festive dinner and wine was cancelled and I was bedridden for a further 4 days, until I eventually started to get some strength back. I watched some TV again and saw what kind of Christmas many other folk had and after watching the devastation caused by too much rain in some parts of the country I couldn’t help but feel sorry for all those unfortunates who were flooded out in some parts of the country, so I suppose I didn’t do too badly after all. Anyway a week or so later my own GP rang me and prescribed a further dose of the same and after about 2 weeks the damn bug or whatever it was finally disappeared leaving me washed out and struggling to regain some strength.
Then would you believe it, a side effect of so many antibiotics was a mouth full of ulcers which required treatment and this again prevented me from eating solid food, but like anything this too passed over, and just when I was getting back to normal, I pulled a muscle near my spine which incapacitated me from any serious movement. and that’s where I am at present with the offending ailment slowly getting easier and I am hoping that will be the last of any problems for a while, otherwise I might as well not bother writing about further misfortune and just enter ‘ditto’!
(This entry covers the dates 26/12/15 to 18/1/16)
