Just over a week since my last update so quite quick in my vaguely intended schedule terms. It’s not as if much has happened in the interim. I do have a telephone conversation with Newcastle hospital presumably about some aspect of my prostate operation but truth be told I have no idea until it happens. I think I can safely say it won’t be about a date for this operation given that the last time we spoke the surgeon said it would be a year (and that was February). But I’ll get back to you after Friday.
In the meantime I’m in the wilderness as far as the post op for the colon cancer goes. It’s hard to come up with definite criteria for improvement and without any definite yardsticks it’s quite hard to find reasons to be cheerful as Ian Drury once sang.
I can’t say that I’m in a lot of pain but I can say I’m tired. I try to keep increasing how long I walk for each day (the dogs that is) but it’s a struggle and when I’ve done it all I want to do is fall asleep. There’s a lot of that – sleep – in my daily schedule. You’ve had a major operation everybody says. OK, that’ll be the reason then. I’ll stop now I need a snooze and hopefully all being well I’ll get back to you my readers after Friday (it’s even possible we might go down to Derbyshire for the weekend as we did to the vineyard last weekend although Derbyshire is a longer journey of course. Enough already,
We did go down to Derbyshire this last weekend and the good news is that nothing happened. By that I mean I didn’t end up in Derby A&E. But whereas nothing happened there a lot happened here in Leeds. I am reminded of what they say about buses. You know you wait for ages, no bus then two come along at once.
The hospital version of this was, after no word suddenly it all kicked off – the phone call from Newcastle collecting information they already have about my medication and that sort of thing. Then all on one day letters offering an appointment to see the colon surgeon on Tuesday; then on Thursday a meeting to renew (I doubt they will remove it altogether) my catheter and then, a week later, an appointment to change my blood thinner from an injection to tablets. As if all that wasn’t enough then I also got a phone call from Harrogate hospital (the previous letters were from Leeds) about a date in September for my TURP prostate operation.
Yep it’s all happening and as usual this leads to mixed feelings – gratitude and panic in roughly equal measures. I will finish this blog off later this week after my meetings with the surgeon and the catheter team. I’m not sure what to expect from either so once again, watch this space.
So it’s now Friday of the same week and both meetings have taken place. The review meeting with the surgeon was slightly weird but generally positive. He did resort to explaining the operation, which he said revealed a T2 tumour (they’d got it all and the FTR wouldn’t have worked*) in terms of carpets and underlays. Probably seeing my blank look and decided to put everything in terms an idiot (me) could understand. He went on…
My tumour had gone through the carpet and the underlay and just started on the floorboards but no, not to the room below. Hence the surgery to remove the section of colon had been the correct choice – his but not mine. I thanked him and we got up to leave. He said unfortunately he would not see me again in 6 months time as the process from now on was handled by the nursing staff. A development (on account of cuts, financial not surgical), he regretted.
This was Tuesday and then on Thursday it was back to the same hospital to have my catheter changed or was it to have a TWOK (Trial without catheter) which I’d had before and failed miserably)? I didn’t know and, neither it turned out, did they, so (patient preference)we settled for a catheter change (this after 3 months) but not self-catheterisation.
I won’t bore you with the details but I now have a valve rather than the bag, which is possible progress although I’ve had one of these before and, at the risk of repeating myself, this also had failed miserably. Too soon to make a judgement as I’ve only had it for two days.
So fingers crossed for this side of my condition/s and well done to me and the surgeon for the colon op side of things. Next hospital visit, next week to look at changing blood thinners from injection to tablets. This would be welcomed both by myself who receives the injection and Mrs Summerhouse who does the actual injecting. I’ll keep you informed.
*FTR Full Thickness Redaction – less invasive than surgery, the malignant polyp being sucked out from within the colon without any cutting or removal of a piece of the colon. This was my choice as it’s less invasive but I was over-ruled. Rightly it seems.