You might call this a transitionary blog, if you were so minded. Read on and make your own judgement – are there signs of improvement of getting back to normal? A couple of things relevant to my continuing health issues since I posted my last blog. Both of them broadly good news but it’s, I’ve discovered, never wise to become too optimistic in these matters. But here I go being dangerously positive.
First I now have a definite date (assuming no hidden complications) for my TURP operation (that’s for my prostate in case you’ve forgotten) at Harrogate hospital. This is the 6th of October. Some way off but after this last experience of surgery I’m not in such a hurry as I was to (literally) put my body on the line. A bit sooner is the pre-op on September 13th.
I have a lot of questions about this operation and I need to write them down to make sure I don’t forget anything important. The only problem being that this conversation won’t be with the surgeon and the person I’ll be speaking to probably won’t know the answers to my questions. For example, how does this operation compare in terms of seriousness to the colon version? How long is it, can I go home the same day? Can it be done under a local anaesthetic? Will it rid me of the blasted catheter for ever? You know that sort of thing.
Anyway at least I have the dates for stage 2 of the operating cycle. The other small bit of good news is that I’ve, at the time of writing, had the valve for two weeks which is a big improvement on last time (that was two days I think). The valve still rates in the weird and not very wonderful category of human experience but it’s a marginal improvement on the dreaded leg bag.
So approximately two weeks later I’ve opened up my laptop in an effort to live up to my earlier ambitions i.e. transition. Last Friday for example I went back to my old jazz guitar tutor and had a lesson. It wasn’t really a lesson as such, more a way of gently getting music back into my post op life. I asked that we should make the lesson around the keyboard (I’ll explain why in a moment and why I’m choosing jazz rather than folk fiddle).
To take the last piece of the jigsaw first, the folk fiddle, I have a relatively accessible next step for this aspect of my music. This in the form of Thursday night practice and maybe next Saturday, a gig in Otley. Pretty much the last one I played last year. I think the gig itself might be too big a step but the rehearsal on Thursday might be possible. We will see but you may have to wait to see if I achieve this.
Back to the jazz. There are no sessions for this until after the holidays so getting back to this bit of normality will be more challenging. Hence the lesson should be a sensible way forward. And playing jazz keyboard would always be my musical activity of choice. Hence the focus on the keyboard. If I could get this part of my retirement up and running I would know normality really was happening. But that’s a way off dear reader.
In the meantime I’ll share a few minor green shoots of normality. Like going up to the barn / vineyard / visiting local pubs. And, even an evening visit to one of our restaurants (a first since the op). I have now driven the van, the Land Rover and the Kia without any obvious problems. I’ve managed to turn out a variety of blogs although none of the SEO stuff or any pictures but the writing is there and so is second place on Google. So as I say some green shoots of recovery and the recovery part has been far more difficult than I anticipated but I think it’s happening now.