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Part 2....Chapter 23....

30/4/2017

OK, it’s early morning, I’ve had a great sound sleep with no noisy outbursts from cackling night nurses. Very few buzzers were activated throughout the night, and there was no blasting radio to wake up to this morning. This is the quietest hospital I’ve been in. But I wait in expectation, as it won’t be long before whoever is on tea and laundry duty starts their shift. Then and only then, will I know if I’m right with my first impressions on staff training, patient understanding and friendliness. Even the orderlies, surely, must have had patient awareness training. Fuk, I’m boring myself here. My own mind is shouting at me to stop writing such dribble. No-one gives a fuk anyway, lol….

My surgeon has been in to see me. I’m going to call him Mr Dapper Darcy. All suited up even with the waist coat and pocket watch attached. I’m sure there was one, unless I imagined the watch dangling there as it would have looked the part. Chiefly fitting the look with his dicky bow tie. He has dark hair and eyes to match, a very handsome man with a sexy voice to boot. It’s hard to tell his age, he looks young maybe in his mid-fifties.

Ooo la-la, such eye candy. I couldn’t stop staring at him while he was explaining what the procedure was going to be, the length of time it should take, the recovery and so on, so on.
I remember the last thing him saying was something about meningitis…. Anyway, in a few days I’ll be going backdown to theatre where my back reconstruction with more metal shall commence. My body will be, once again, screwed up lol this time I hope it stays in place….

My partner has been to visit. My daughter came alone with her dad and his girlfriend, so all are up to date with what is going to happen to me in the next couple of days. You’d think it was one of them waiting for the operation, you could cut the atmospheric feel of anticipation in the room. They are all more nervous than me. Silly fukers.

I can’t believe how much more approachable and good looking the hospital staff are down here in my home town of Cardiff.

So many of them pass my room, and pop their heads in to say hello. I think it maybe because of the music I’m playing or the incense burning. One member of staff who doesn’t work with me and is from the physio department, I think, always pops in for a chat.
She is always asking what it is I am writing. I just answer, ‘This and that and everything inbetween thrown in with it, including you’.

She is so sweet, comfortable to be around and talk with. It feels like we’ve know each other for some time. She is totally dedicated to her work, I can see that from the sparkle in her blue eyes, well I think they are blue. It’s hard to see through squinty eyes what colour they are. She talks about giving the best care and outcome of all her patients, all people in general really. She asks lots of questions out of curiosity which I find quite funny. If anyone else asked me the same questions I’d tell them to fuk off and stop being so bloody noisy lol….

It’s surgery day tomorrow. I’m not nervous or anything. I just want to sit up in my chair and get back to Rookwood, to finish the wheelchair skills class. There is still so much to learn about using and being in a wheelchair. Pulling a wheelie is one thing but rolling down a flight of steps is another, that I can’t wait to try….

Ok, today’s the day. I know I wrote saying I wasn’t nervous yesturday but Lucifer crept into my subconscious dream world whilst I slept, and planted the anxious seed. Only slightly but still, it’s been planted. I think it’s because this time I’m aware of the surgery about to take place compared to the first time when the accident happened.

It’s early, just past 6am with the morning darkness still upon us. I’m imagining most people yawning in their cars, stuck at the traffic lights rushing to get to work…. People sitting on the bus staring into dreamland more than daydreaming because it’s still dark.

God, life out in the real world. I’m almost forgetting what that is as I lay still, waiting for the clock to strike the hour, minute and the second before my name is called to surgery.

The ward lights are still on dim and everything seems stock-still, except for my pen speeding along the page like there’s no tomorrow.

I had a will drawn up while I was waiting at Morriston to come here. I have some expensive assets and just felt the need to put things in order should anything happen. Like I’ve said before, in a blink of an eye anything thing can change and never be put back to be the same.

I know I’m not going to die but at this moment in time after whats happened already it just makes sense. I asked Mr ‘Bad to the Bone’, at Morriston Hospital, another senior doctor, and the head nurse to sign it.

After talking to my surgeon Mr Dapper Darcy and the nurse who refreshed my memory after the conversation. It is a big operation and they won’t know exactly what to do until I’m cut open and the damage is seen. It maybe just a few titanium rods and screws needed or it could be the full works of scaffolding, which will limit my mobility even more.

Let’s wait and see Amanda. I tell myself. Your calling has arrived. The boys have come to take you to theatre. It’s time to go to the place of rescue, under the trusted hands of my Surgeon Mr Dapper Darcy. The stage is set and the spotlight is on…. Let the show begin….

I wish my self well and I bid you fare well my trusted pen and paper…. Until we meet again I put you safely under lock and key xxx.

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Part 2.... Chapter 22....

30/4/2017

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Llandough Hospital, Cardiff

Ok, it’s 6.30am on Monday the 19th November. I’m still here in Morriston, being joined by the most miserable weather. It is freezing outside. The window was left open allowing the sharp cold breeze to say hello uninvited.
Nurses are whizzing back and forth my room window a hundred miles an hour.
I pressed the buzzer at 6.40am. I just need someone to come in and close the god dam window.

I’ve been shivering my tits off for too long and my legs are like ice…. AAARRRGGGHHHH !!!

I’ve stretched over and grabbed my green thick woolly cardigan. Slipped it under the thin hospital blankets, popped my arms in and wrapped my body like a mummy…. Only my head and hands are exposed to the chilly air. Both hands poke through, one holds pen the other pinch holds the note book.

Each breath exhaled looks like a personification of Jack Frost, it’s that cold. Think I’ll write later, my hands are almost blue….

Finally. The nurse came in to stop the buzzer. Upon entering she directed a question to me, whilst rubbing her hands up and down her arms. ‘Ooo, it’s nippy in ‘ere. Aren’t you cold’?...

‘Can’t you tell?’. Was my reply as I pointed to my cardigan.

I asked her if there had been any news from Llandough to confirm admittance today, but the answer was no. I’m gonna try and snooze now. Latterzzzz.

Woop! Woop! The snooze and laterzzz didn’t last long. The ward chieftain swung open the door and loudly announced next to my bed, ‘Amanda, time to get up now. Your leaving this morning’. The chieftains voice sounds more like an officer in the army than the head nurse of a ward. I jumped out of my bloody skin when she barged in. ‘Really? I said. Thank Fuk I’m getting outta here’.

Happy fuking Dayzzz. The day has arrived to re-pack my belongings and move on. I must be at Llandough by 12 noon so it’s time to put pen and paper away…. Laterzzzzz ????….
Ok, everything is packed, and I’m dressed ready to go. It’s now 10.15am and I’m waiting for the ambulance men to walk in. I’m excited, apprehensive, and body numb.
It’s 11.45am the boys have arrived. I’m strapped in and it’s time to move. It’s latterzzzz, again.

A lovely atmosphere greeted me when I arrived at Llandough Hospital lots of smiles and a room awaited. I was so relieved to have a room and happy to be here within 5 minutes. Thank the Gods.

It was the usual checking in format and the ‘Would you like a hot drink and sandwich’. The nurse unpacked all my things. Showed me wear everything is and on leaving said don’t hesitate in ringing the buzzer. She said the surgeon would be in to see me in the morning to explain what will be happening.

As she left I started to feel relaxed and comfortable. Until I looked out through the door way and saw they have left me alone to settle in right opposite the tea making and laundry room. So once again I am right in the middle of noise… Fuking great.

Two other nurses came in to see me and take a swab from my nose, throat and groin areas and the little infected area on the top end of the scar from my first surgery. Blood pressure and temperature were taken and all is dandy. This hospital out plays Morriston on every level. It’s very organised, staff are better trained and friendlier, it’s cleaner and even the yogurt gets the thumbs up…. Nothing is ever going to change on the pain front for me, so again it's. 'Deal with it Bitch' mode ????

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Part 2.... Chapter 21

21/4/2017

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Good day thoughts. I’d love to say I’ve been up early washed my hair, got dressed, took off for a walk down Caswell Woods with my dog, had a takeaway breaky on the prom etc, etc, etc.
But alas no, not today. Not for any foreseeable future day in factual terms. Today I’ve been down to x-ray and scan. Sometime this week I’ll be popped back into the nosey MRI scan capsule, probably for about 20 minutes.
I’ve been back here at Morriston for a week now, and after closer inspection with MRI the damage done is in great need of scaffolding engineering. Not the news I wanted to hear but its news. News with a catch. The surgery can only be done at Llandough Hospital back in Cardiff.
A stone’s throw away from Rookwood. If I had chosen to stay in Cardiff for surgery, it would have been done by now and I’d be back at Rookwood carrying on with my physio. I tut loudly with eyes rolling. I’m just waiting for a date to leave here and go there....
I haven’t written anything for a while. It has seemed pointless really. Everyday has been another ground hog day for me, but not for the ward.
I did eventually get a room. It’s nearly three weeks and I’ve been stuck here on my back waiting for a date from Llandough Hospital. Everytime I’ve asked my surgeon, the consultant and head nurse. The answer is always given as, ‘We’ll know tomorrow’. I have raised my voice over this matter of waiting and the reason I’m waiting is because the Surgeon at Cardiff is on holiday. It’s taken three weeks for that information to come through. It’s like living in the fuking dark ages with 21st century communication breakdown.

I’ve been under a dark, heavy cloud for a while. I can’t say it’s been following me around, but it’s been relentless and I suppose inevitable. It’s right above me. Pushing down its weight of not so fluffy clouds inexorably.
This place has taken me back to the beginning. The first time being told I wouldn’t walk again. Now I’m back here I feel so low with so much never ending pain. I’m finding it hard to bring out my fight.
All my life when the balance has been rocked an action was needed. The fight-or-flight response in me has always been the fight. Of late it’s the opposite, it’s flight. I feel weak. I don’t want to be here. It was supposed to be my death on the 16th July 2007. That was my fate. Only medical intervention kept me alive. All life has done since that date is build me up to knock me down again and again. It’s the story of my whole bloody life.
I’ve even taken myself and my little witch doll Molly to the hospital chapel. Well, we were pushed down and into the chapel while on the bed and took up much of the room. I just lay there listening.
A close friend called in to see me. Telling me that her mam and dad were praying for me and our Irish friend now back in Ireland had even more people praying for my health and fast recovery. I tell her and only her, that for the first time I’m not feeling strong enough anymore mentally, and physically it's not worth putting into a sentence. I don’t want to carry on…. She sharply tells me to pull myself together…. I love her even more for that. I needed reminding of who I am.

Good and reassuring energy found its way back to my aura and was restored into me on 31st October, New Year’s Eve, Samhain (pronounced 'sow'in').
My daughter and partner had gone to Caswell Woods to pick some fresh vines to bring in so we could do our traditional New Year’s ritual. With all the other bits and bobs to join my crystals. Good memories, honouring those who have passed. Autumn has arrived and so has the time for reflection, renewal and spiritual self-balance….

November 15th is todays date and tomorrow being the 16th will mean I’ve been here lying flat and super still for the past four fuking weeks.
On Tuesday 13th I was told that it would be either Wednesday or Thursday that I ‘Could’ be transferred to Llandough. It was good to finally have some news on my next move. After all, I came back to Morriston on the 26th October and although a possible date is close, I have a feeling I won’t be going on the dates given.
Wednesday and Thursday sailed by with no news on leaving Morriston. Thursday afternoon Mr ‘Bad to the Bone’ came to see me and said it ‘Should’ be today or tomorrow to Llandough. He wished me well and that I deserved it. With that he was gone in a flash, leaving a puff of smoke behind him. As usual, he had no time to listen to what I had to say. Just as well lol.
It’s Thursday evening now and I’m still here. As I lay in bed I’m hoping it’s going to be good news in the morning, and I’ll be leaving this pit of hell. To be taken from the realms of its ‘We can offer you nothing’ and taken to a place of hope and renewed back surgery. A hope, this time not in disguise hopefully ????.

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Part 2.... Chapter 20....

18/4/2017

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Good morning Monday. Although I feel there will be nothing exceptionally good about this Monday. Being as it’s 6am right now and I’m already venting out my frustration on paper.

I am on a loud ward which during the night was joined by a small posse of howling, squawking, fukwit nurses on night duty. Spending more time baffing on about their personal life in comedy central gear, than rushing out to help those who have rang their buzzer for what ever reason. Even just to turn the frigging buzzer off would have made a better night sleep, but it didn’t.
I don’t dislike nurses, I praise them 10,000-fold but not every second of the day/night. After all they are human, well most of them are and we can’t always get on with everyone.

I didn’t bother to ring my buzzer I just shouted down in a loud whisper to all at the reception desk to ‘Turn it down! It’s early hours, us sick are trying to sleep’. One came over to apologise and they turned it down for a while. Then I just shouted out ‘Oi’ ????.

Great, they’ve put the lights on now making it brighter than Blackpool bloody tower. Joined by the noise of clanking metal bin lids being dropped. Phones ringing non-stop on top volume and all the hand overs arriving full of laughter and chatter best kept for their tea breaks.

I’m hating every breath I take here on this ward.

It’s not the best condition to have you know, ’Hypersensitivity’. Being excessively over sensitive to high pitched and loud sounds. My physical sensory response to sound is exaggerated by its transmittance to my senses. It strikes me with, what really is, a mild but sharp electric shock.

Sounds are vibrations which penetrate through everything. I feel pain when sound vibrations pass through me.

If anyone has had a static shock from a lift button or a car door etc, well that’s as close as I can get to explaining what I get with a high and low pitch of sound…. Even someone coughing starts it off….
If I’m warned beforehand it’s going to happen it’s slightly more bearable.

Here she comes, the water jug woman. Banging a jug down onto the table then moving on to the next to execute the same action all the while doing my frigging head in with the sound. It's torture. I’ve called over to her and asked if she could put them down a bit lighter ‘please’. Well, the look she gave me I could have swiped away in one swift slap if she was close enough.

I explained my condition, the facts of and made clear that it was ‘still’ early and some patients were ‘still’ trying to sleep in ‘hospital’. She said nothing. Just carried on banging the jugs down until she became a distant irritation.

God, I’m on one today and it’s now only just pasted 8am. Breakfast is late. The ward is in full swing. It’s bed bath time. Woop! Woop! Arhh the joys of being a nurse lol.

And they can fuk off if they think they are touching me today….

Still waiting for the doctors rounds to start with their entourage – breakfast was shite as usual – miss chatter box to my right seems slightly subdued and the curtain is drawn around miss quiet on my left. The ward has softened the blow of sounds as most staff have moved onto another ward. It won’t be long before lunch is upon us and I got a feeling my surgeon ’Mr Bad to the Bone’ won’t be with me today. He’s not the one for date and time keeping, this I learnt about him only a few moons ago.

I’m going to put my headphones on now and listen to some sounds while I’m thinking, writing and observing my almost normal day to day surroundings. Block out as much of the nurses babble as I possibly can, and wait to see who graces my bedside with their presence. To enlighten me on what’s going to happen to me here.

God, I miss dancing. The escapism. It would release my spirit to acknowledge its freedom. Dancing was the only place I could completely forget about my worries and stresses and just have fun and let it all go.

I could escape from the world around me and enter my own world of imagination. It was the one and only constant in my life since a child. When I danced I felt like I could do absolutely anything with my mind, body and soul because it allowed 'me' to feel beautiful, inside and out with control of every movement. In control of my 'Me, Myself & I' ID....

Now that’s all changed. When I close my eyes, I see me and feel me doing the same in deep though but without the movement and vertical standing lol…. Arhh well….

Lunch has been and gone. Nothing to write about there. Visiting hours are over and the tea lady has vanished. Most of the older patients are taking their late afternoon nap. My bedside buddies have gone off somewhere, and I’m still here lying flat on my back in a stationary position… Life is all but boring in hospital, lol…
Think I’m going slightly mad… Whatever it is it’s passing the time quicker. So there’s something to be grateful for at least….

The Consultants have been and gone. Mr ‘Bad to the Bone’ will see me tomorrow. Nothing was said to lighten my fight.

So I'm back to just existing flat on my back….

It’s always good to be told nothing.... It really does lift ya spirits up.... It's fuking great!!!

They get paid to walk around the wards to tell their patients nothing…. Again, it's fuking great!!!..... NOT!

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Part 2.... Chapter 19

10/4/2017

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On the 26th October I was discharged from Rookwood Spinal Cord Unit and transported via a very bumpy ambulance drive back to Morriston Hospital in Swansea.
I had a choice of either going to Llandough Hospital in Cardiff or go back to Morriston. I chose the latter because it was there my surgery began plus I’d be closer to home.

Photo - The night before going to Morriston Hospital. Let’s ‘av it……

On being admitted back to Morriston the staff were happy to see me, but not for the circumstances. It was like meeting up with old friends that had helped me through the worsted time in my life. It was good to see them too until my bed is being pushed almost into the centre of a ward. They could see from my face before I spoke a word, that I was not pleased with this arrangement.
They say. ‘As soon as there is a room available Amanda it’s yours’. I make the sound of ‘Hmmm’.

It’s Friday night and I’m all settled in. Had introductory chats, with the older crew opposite my bed, which was really quite nice. The girl on my side of the ward to my right, has a few sandwiches’ missing from her basket. She means well but ‘SHUTUP!!!.
I’m not here to be her bestfriend or counsellor. I’m not interested in her anything. God her voice is driving me crazy, its non-stop. I’m not sure she even knows what shes talking about herself. I’m just not in the mood for this right now. I have my own health and future issues to think about.

The lady to my left is quiet and feels the same way as I do about the girl to my right lol, ooh hospital wards, such larks.

I’ve had the curtain pulled around my space and the ‘something’ to the right of me still insists on talking through it at me but not with me. Until I ask her to turn it down and give it a rest. In the nicest way I could muster. She got the message for about 5 minutes.

It’s lights out now. Most are snoring their way to the security and safety of dream land. I wonder what adventures await them and will they remember when they wake in the morning.

Fuk it’s the weekend, which means I ain’t gonna see any surgeon until Monday. Until then all I can do is lay on my back and ‘Try not to move’ they said to a paraplegic, I mean. My answer to that said with a sarcastic smile ‘I’ll try my best doc’.

Although I’ve only just got here, and it seems stupid to feel this, but I’m missing my inmates, my rebels, my pirates. The memory of handing out my eye patches still tickles me. It was so funny to have some role Mutiny play on a disabled ward lol.

On hearing the news about my back the support they all showed me was like nothing I have ever felt from humans lol.
Fag Ash Lil, came over, hugged me, wiped my tears and made me giggle. Biker chic zoomed over to me in her chair and told me to stay strong. They are all amazing women. Strong to the core. Again I will state we are all a superwoman in our own right.

Rookwood said they would keep my bed for when I get back. Which should be this time next week.
I’m tired now, exhausted really, and the noise on this ward is driving me mad. ZZzzzzzzz.

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Part 2.... Chapter 18

8/4/2017

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“Morning inmates”. Was the chorus howling from my vocals this morning from behind my curtain. There was no radio blasting today and everybody seemed to be in chatty mode. Mostly saying how cold, wet and dark the mornings were. Well, it is October. Winter is upon us and Samhain (New Year) to me, Halloween to everyone else in here is less than a week away.
I’ve stayed in bed for the last couple of days, with my curtain fully drawn around my bed most of the time. Hearing the comings and goings on the ward. I haven’t been feeling to great since my last physio. I want to be home and I want my life back. But I can’t go home and my life then can never be again.
My pain is mentally hurling me to the Moon. Where I’m bounced up to Jupiter then thrown over to be chewed up by the spinning rings of Saturn. Before being spat back down to Earths reality. Pain has been with me from the moment I woke up from the coma and right here and now I just want to scream.

I’m trying this and that but no pain relief works for me it’s a ‘Deal with it’ reality, that I don’t want to be in. I just can’t explain it. It’s not like any pain felt when able bodied.
My legs feel like they are on fire 24/7. A burning so intense but to touch them they are either ice cold or lukewarm.
Pins and needles in my feet slowly works its way up my legs, causing cramps. An fuk me I remember jumping out of bed years back shaking my leg and trying to massage or hold tight the cramp toe or toes lol.
God, I remember that pain giving me the jump up reflex like it was yesturday. My thoughts seem to be playing jokes on my behalf at this moment of writing, by pretty much saying, ‘Remember how the pain just went away by shaking ya leg. Well you can’t do that now so deal with the pain bitch, ha, ha, ha’. You got to have a sense of humour. To laugh at yourself first is one of life’s greatest tonics, an inner strength to carry you on with a smile.
Meanwhile, with the tendons being pulled causing the muscles around the knees and thighs to tremor. Muscle contractions, twitching movements, pulling, giving the feeling I’m being stretched. The elongating stretch out from my hips and the trust motion from my pelvis is totally mind destroying and frigging freaky but I’m getting used to it.
A severed spinal cord paralysed body, with no mental cognitive consciousness connected to my living brain. Is trying to dance without me knowing. My brain only allows me to visual see my legs move but the conscious feel to this is a mass of pain.
The screams inside my head telling it to fuking stop is enough to section me at the nearby Whitchurch Mental Hospital….
Hell is what it is. Hell is here on Earth with me whenever I feel pain. And pain comes in all forms be it emotional, mental or physical. And right now, for me, it’s all fuking three.

Where are the Gods now? We were thrown into this world expected to love them and pray to them. Well, fuk…. That is all I can say on that one.

To help numb my pain I have been blasting out some tunes to the ladies of the ward. A few of my own choices didn’t go down to well. All the ladies not really into head banging or play air guitar these days lol to Pantera or ACDC. One although not heavy rock also didn’t go down well. For me Comfortably Numb by Pink Floyd is a classic. It’s taken from my childhood. Not my best of memories but it did take my mind off my present pain for a few minutes…. Can’t please everyone….
I also watched the forever famous Pink Floyd The Wall movie. It was a gift to me from a very special girl, an artist with the talent to take her far in this life. She has also painted me an amazing canvas that will take pride on one of my walls when I get home.
My partner came to see me yesturday. I had told him on the phone what had happened over at the gym during physio. When he arrived, I pointed to where I felt the crack sound came from. As I turned, he said the bone was poking out. The vertebrae looked like it had snapped out of its socket.
He took a photo of it and I pressed the buzzer for the doctor.

I couldn’t believe I didn’t feel it. Well, obviously, I wouldn’t. The nurses didn’t notice it either when helping me wash and dress that morning. It was all another knock down for me and again the tears came pouring…. ;-(

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Part 2....Chapter 23....

Part 2.... Chapter 22....

Part 2.... Chapter 21

﻿Part 2.... Chapter 20....

﻿Part 2.... Chapter 19

Part 2.... Chapter 18

Part 2.... Chapter 20....

Part 2.... Chapter 19