It’s Friday of quite a big 2 weeks on the road to recovery. Not without its challenges but on the whole a good first week with plenty happening. For example, on Wednesday it was my pre-op meeting at Harrogate hospital. A chance to ask some questions and to receive a ‘you’ll need to ask the urologist that question’ response although she (the nurse) did say, you don’t need to worry about being incontinent after the TURP operation because your prostate is ‘only’ being shaved (lovely word and a whole different meaning in an operation context and which I don’t need to do, they’ll do it if need be, so that’s a comfort) not removed. But any question about the difference between the TURP and the HOLEP (the laser procedure), as I say, you’ll have to ask the urologist.
I still haven’t 100% decided about having the operation at all, what if the drugs (the Finasteride and Tamsulosin) have done their job and shrunk my prostate and therefore I don’t need the operation with all its inherent risk, even if it is small there is still a risk? Ah, you’ll have to ask the urologist about that. But I can arrange a meeting with the clinical team. That’s good. But it might be after your operation date and so you’d have to re-arrange the op. Ah, that’s bad.
You will get to meet the surgeon and the anaesthetist – that’s good. But this will be on the day of the operation and therefore too late to cancel. That’s not so good. But you can choose whether you want a general or local (spinal) anaesthetic. Well that’s good but I wouldn’t have a clue which is best for me, I say. The anaesthetist will advise you. OK, that’s good.
And that’s the way it was, alongside collecting a vast amount of information I’m pretty sure they already have. What medication I’m taking (many different tablets), height, weight, blood pressure, blood tests, you know all the good stuff. I may be staying in overnight, she said, depending on when the operation happened on the day. This is not such a serious operation as the colon one – Good. But it’s still up there – that’s bad.
Hey ho, by the end of the morning I was exhausted, so we went to the pub. This nurse was one of the few medical people that did not comment adversely on my weekly alcohol intake (15 units as you ask). So I liked her for that and, as I say we went to the pub.
And that fits with the week generally. Meeting up with some friends who live in New Zealand and have done for more than thirty years. They were here on a visit to meet with relatives. Fine, but then they amazed us by saying that they were looking to move back to England. Where they lived in NZ was too isolated and had no public transport and they were too old to live where they did. Fair enough but why come back here. We have a fairly low opinion of this country (NHS excepted) and nearly moved to Ireland if we could have got our act together in terms of getting our Irish citizenship. Anyway we’ve always regarded New Zealand as close to paradise and yet here were our friends, about our age, wanting to move back to England (to Devon of all places).
I started this blog on a fairly positive note and just so you’ll believe it really is me writing it not some positive AI substitute, I’ll finish, more than a week after I started, with news of a more negative nature. Last Thursday I had another gout attack. They come and go, always in the night and are, without question, the most painful pain of all my ailments. No painkillers, including any stronger prescription ones, touch the pain.
And lastly but by no means leastly, I’ve been getting stomach aches. Again in the night, maybe to do with the iron tablets I’m taking for my tiredness but why they should start causing problems now I really don’t know. But then there is much about my life, at the moment, that I do not understand so these stomach pains are merely one more item on the list. Sorry to end on such a negative note but the fact is these are still difficult times.