Soup

This post follows on directly from the last two part post, describing my recent minor surgery. Part one is here

I have a telescoped memory of the evening of Thursday 12th May. I have memories of waking in the recovery room after the operation. The Anaesthetist was busy sticking a central line into my throat. That morning I was given an epidural for pain management after the operation (not during as some people thought).

One of the problems with an epidural is that it can interfere with blood pressure. There is a fine line between effective pain relief and problems with blood pressure. I arrived in the recovery ward at around 7 pm (after eleven hours in theatre) and eventually left for the High Dependency Unit at 1 am. The Anaesthetist had been on duty since before 8 am - that was when he put the epidural line in. He finally left around 12.30 am - sixteen or so hours later.

Friday, Saturday and Sunday passed in a bit of a blur, gradually becoming clearer as time went by. I didn't get out of bed much during this period. The first time I tried, I was in my chair for about twenty minutes (while they changed the sheets) before my blood pressure went through the floor. I was shunted back into bed as soon as possible!

On Monday I was moved from the HDU to the normal ward (Ward 57). Life started to get better. The epidural was removed and my blood pressure started to return to normal. Gradually all the tubes and lines were removed. Bowel movements returned to normal and I started my lifetime relationship with my baggy.

The time in hospital was fairly straight forward - each day was easier, and I was able to do (a little) more. The highlight was walking to the end of the corridor to the patients day room to watch 'Bargain Hunt' - this was a major achievement (not Bargain Hunt, but getting there).

Eventually I was well enough to escape from the ward. Visitors would hijack a wheelchair and we would escape to the WRVS cafe on the ground floor. Again as the week progressed I tried walking back, rather than using the chair (although it was never far away).

On my second Monday in hospital (day 11 Post Op) I only had one set of tubes left - two very narrow stents coming out of the Stoma. One final test, called a Lupogram, was scheduled for that day. This checks for leakage within the stoma and kidneys. This was the final barrier to being discharged. Fortunately, there were no problems so the stents (thin wire-like tubes) were removed.

The wound looked good and was healing well, my bowel was returning to normal and the urostomy bag and stoma were performing as normal.

The nurses on the ward removed about half the staples in the scar on my stomach. I was told to make an appointment with my practice nurse to get the others removed as soon as possible.

The title of this post is inspired by hospital food. It turns out that hospital food is as bad as it is reputed to be. One of the exceptions to this is soup. The soup which is made every day is excellent. The fact that this was the only food I had for a week is, of course, nothing to do with it!

After all this, if you are still interested, you can continue reading here