Sunday and I am whiling my time away keeping still and reducing the pain till my appointment time rolls round. I watch half a snooker match, half a football match and half a rugby game. Somewhere in there my youngest daughter arrived. At last its time to go to the emergency walk in clinic. My partner drives me there but cannot come in with me. I check in and expect to wait a long time especially as I am early. I have may back pack with me stuffed with distraction and cancer data. To my surprise I am called in straight away and bizarrely I recognise the para medic as the same one that diagnosed my DVT over two years ago. He is very business like and askes me all the usual questions. He cannot access my latest bloods but I of course have them with me. The outcome is good, its torn or strained muscles, its all soft tissue damage. Voltarol, pain killers and sensible gentle exercise for the upper body is the way forward.
My partner drives me home and we get on with our evening. It ends with me taking more pain killers and going to bed for what turns out to be a trying night as I discover that it is more painful to lay down than to sit up or walk around.
Monday, bank holiday and I wake up quite late propped up. There is a coffee waiting and I sip it as I assess how I am. I get up and check my emails as usual and find my partner and youngest having breakfast. I do toast and coffee and set about getting my washing done along with some other chores. In no time at all its time to go to the pub where I booked a table for lunch. We arrive slightly early and have to loiter till the doors are opened. Once in we hunker down and order our meals and talk about the family and what we all need to do over the coming weeks. Its a good meal and a good conversation. We return home and we wrestle with the obstinacy of a laptop to hook up with an external monitor, usually adn easy peasey job but impossible on this occasion. My youngest daughter leaves to return home and I set about feeding the hedgehog, filling the bird feeders and bringing in my washing. I’m about done for the day and out of energy, my back is not sharp but aching and its a bit draining. I get back to the sofa and watch TV while drafting the blog. Tonight will be an early night as I intend to drive to a meeting tomorrow and stay overnight so I will need all the energy I can muster. So the last 72 hours feel like they have been a bit of a roller coaster with blood test that tell me I am still in the fight and then back pain that re-stimulates all my fears about kidney failure and cancer growth, finally the relief that my pain is soft tissue. So now its about pace and continuing to move in a manageable way.
