Diary > Thursday 4th February

[Roobarb]

It finally stopped raining this afternoon, although it was a wet morning and there's more forecast tomorrow. It was good to be able to get out in proper daylight without getting soaked. I'd had another restless night and only about four hours sleep by the time I nodded off.

Saw in the news that volunteers are being asked for, to trial whether a mix of vaccines will be more effective than two of the same one. It's good to know that all of this work is going on and more is continually found out about the virus.  As time passes the scientists will get a better idea of how long the vaccine protects us, all very comforting to know that these marvellous people are looking after us. I was horrified to see the video that some idiot (who turned out to be a schoolboy) had made of himself shouting Liar, liar! at the unflappable Chris Whitty as he stood in a queue to buy a sandwich. The boy's mother was furious and said she would take his PlayStation off him. That'll teach him. 

My grocery delivery turned up half an hour early, I wasn't prepared so it rather threw me. After wiping the items for the fridge and cupboards I put the non perishables in quarantine in the garage. I'm wondering whether I'll continue to do all this once I've had my jab.

My extra art class Zoom was scheduled four till five, the teacher had very kindly added this free of charge as we were all struggling with this project and she'll be be doing a demo of the new project tomorrow. She advised a couple of minor changes to my painting and pronounced it finished.
Got ready and went to meet my friend J for our weekly walk, it was far too wet to go on Tuesday. It was still quite light at 5.30.  Walked around the local area, it wasn't as cold as last week although not exactly warm. Back home for spag bol and a glass of wine.

Watched the Chasers Road Trip on TV, this week they were in Japan being tested against robots. They were actually checked into their hotel by human looking robots and met some people who created them. One of them was created in the image of its maker, it was so realistic, it gave me the creeps and even more so when they talked about future development of robots. The programme has also provided a good insight into Anne Hegerty's autism and how it affects her on a day to day basis.

Art class is tomorrow morning then back to afternoons, thank goodness.

[Gone]

Had a rude awakening this morning at 5am, the OH needed the bathroom urgently, I'd only been in bed for a couple of hours.
30 minutes! What on earth took her 30 minutes? Anyway, by the time I got back into bed it was closer to 45.
So I was a grumpy bear this morning but up at the usual time, feed the dog, one eats later because she's a late riser, feed the birds, then myself. Finally the OH.
It's the usual routine, wake her up, remove the oxygen cannula, fill the nebuliser and put the first meds next to her drink, then wake her up again. Toast and jam cut into 3 strips, I'm sure black lab has one of them, then get her into the bathroom.
Her dressing over the removed peg was a mess again, it's still an open wound after 10 days and quite an unpleasant smell.
So, once she was back on the bed, I cleaned it up, put an inadine patch on, then a big, absorbant pad, followed by 2 dressings which together were about 10 inches square. Then cleaned, flushed and dressed the suprapubic catheter. Clean nightie and piled the cushions up behind her so she's sat up a bit.
It was nearly lunch time by then and I thought I'd do a machine load of washing. Her old nightie was soaked from the leaking wound, so that had a hand wash first.
Lunch over and I had a little nap, still exhausted by the disturbed night and busy morning.
It's recycling day today, putting it out for early collection tomorrow.
I'm a keen recycle these days.
Giving the OH her 6 o'clock pancake, I noticed the dressing was leaking again, I'm getting a bit fed up with it, considering she was told it would start healing 24 hours after the procedure, and it's 9, running into the 10th day now.
Community matron is due again tomorrow so I'll have to have a serious chat with her.
The evening was taken up with updating records, reading through a few letters from relations, cooking dinner... M&S haddock pieces in batter, parmentier potatoes, garlic mushrooms and parsley sauce, then a little later, my jelly with broken meringues, squirty cream and topped with hundreds and thousands. That's about it for my day.

Snowdrops and raindrops tonight.

[Mowsehowse]

Nice your art teacher is giving you an extra session Roobarb, and that your latest piece is deemed almost finished. Well done.
Griff, you must be exhausted. I am not surprised you are "a bit fed up" with the wound which won't heal, and I hope the district nurse, oops, Community Matron, can sort something out.
I have had to turn off the notifications about all the people getting their vaccinations. I feel so demoralised that the only area in Devon to have rising cases is Torbay, and I am hearing nothing about group 4 getting any closer to being vaccinated in Torbay. In fact, I have been told volunteers have been stood down here as no supplies of vaccine are coming this far south.
Now we learn that numbers of children are being hospitalised from some complication after contracting Covid, which is really scary.
Nothing at all to report.  It rains continually, so I can't sleep, and I can't get out.

[Annette7]

Poured with rain all day - forecast 'slight drizzle in the evening'!!   Had stuff to go in the recycling bin which is at the rear of the car park but no way was I getting drenched just to do that.

Sunny today (Friday) which is lovely to see but I'm concerned that the forecast states Saturday rain all day then snow for Sunday and Monday.   Have a long overdue dental checkup on Tuesday and wondering what the roads will be like.   Watch this space.......

No change in my usual daytime activities which pale into insignificance with what some are having to deal with on a daily basis.  My admiration has no bounds!

Cancelled our usual 'girls' chat in the evening - M had her covid jab a couple of days ago and wasn't feeling too good and didn't feel up to chatting.   I know some people have had some reaction but first person I actually know who has.   All I had was a sore arm, just like with the flu jab.

Take care and continue to stay safe.

Annette

 

[guest141721]

First of all many thanks to you all for your comments and kind wishes. A little bit about OH. I guess you've all realised by now that she’s disabled, uses a wheelchair and has other health issues. She’s an amputee as a result of a disastrous accident in 1979 not long after our oldest daughter was born. Both legs through the hip, right arm at the shoulder and half of her left hand including the thumb and first two fingers. Then later on Ileostomy and urostomy surgery and retinitis pigmentosa combined with glaucoma.

Thursday was a heavy day for us as you can all imagine. It started earlier than usual with being woken by the alarm clock. Since retiring we’ve normally only used it when we’ve had to get to the airport for an early flight for one of our many trips abroad. So on with my normal routine of helping OH out of bed and into her chair, emptying her night bags and making sure the ostomy day bags were OK, helping her get showered, dressed and ready for the day. Got breakfast ready while she was outside and once that was eaten and cleared away then out both of us out again, me to clear the night’s snowfall from the driveway and OH for more of her ”fresh air”. Drove to the eye clinic which is located at the regional university hospital about an hour away. Allowed extra time in case the roads were bad after the night’s snow but no problems and we arrived in good time for our ten am apppointment. I’d expected the appointment to take a couple of hours as it usually does but as it turned out we were there all day. As I mentioned yesterday, her eyesight is much worse than she’d let on. Her ”bad” left eye is completely blind and the vision in her ”good” right eye is down to a tiny blurred pinprick in the centre and they told us that the remaining sight will be completely gone in all probability within the next six months or so. On a scale from one to ten she put her pain level at  between eight or nine in both eyes even with pain meds. She’s been a heavy smoker since she was thirteen and that obviously hasn’t helped either. I was amazed as I had no idea how bad her eyesight had become and how she’d managed to disguise it but it did explain one or two odd things like her recently ordering ten instead of one kilogram of potatoes. To cut a long story short after all the examinations, tests and discussions we finally accepted the decision that as her sight loss is total, permanent and irreparable and to relieve the constant pain and need for pain meds that she has surgery to enucleate both eyes and replace them with prosthetic eyes. She’ll be totally blind which was inevitable anyway but the loss of pain will certainly improve her quality of life. So now we’re just waiting for the hospital to call and tell us when they’ve scheduled surgery.

By the time we got home we were exhausted and had an early night but it took a long time before we could get some sleep. Sorry to have rambled on and if this seems a bit disjointed but I hope you all understand that it’s good to be able to get this off my chest.

[Gone]

Nice your art teacher is giving you an extra session Roobarb, and that your latest piece is deemed almost finished. Well done.
Griff, you must be exhausted. I am not surprised you are "a bit fed up" with the wound which won't heal, and I hope the district nurse, oops, Community Matron, can sort something out.
I have had to turn off the notifications about all the people getting their vaccinations. I feel so demoralised that the only area in Devon to have rising cases is Torbay, and I am hearing nothing about group 4 getting any closer to being vaccinated in Torbay. In fact, I have been told volunteers have been stood down here as no supplies of vaccine are coming this far south.
Now we learn that numbers of children are being hospitalised from some complication after contracting Covid, which is really scary.
Nothing at all to report.  It rains continually, so I can't sleep, and I can't get out.

Mowsehowse good morning, I feel for you.
The system in Devon seems a little hit & miss.
I was quite shocked to get mine done when I did, and before the OH who is high risk.
Then she had a phone call a few days after she had it, inviting her for her first jab. Madness!
But I'm hearing so many cases of elderly people not having theirs yet in the local area.
It's certainly not working like we keep being told by the government.

As for the leakage problem with the OH, the com matron has been already but gone off to find some better dressings after speaking to an "expert" the one that told the OH it would start healing in 24 hours is now saying it could take a month. 😕 👈 My exasperated face

[Gone]

Glyn, that's horrific for you both on top of everything else that's happened, I feel for you both and even with the hardships myself and the OH face, can't imagine how it must be for the both of you.
As far as I'm concerned, you can ramble on as much as you like, we need to get things off our chest.
If I didn't write a little on here, I'd go mad tbh.
And thank you for telling us so we can understand too.
You certainly have my full admiration.

[louisa maud]

Griff, can you  not ask for more help, you need to get help so that you can also get just a short time to rest and your body  recharged

LM
Just to add, there  is  help  out  there for you  and  Glyn but it seems  it  has  to be asked  for,  even for a short time.

[Gone]

Griff, can you  not ask for more help, you need to get help so that you can also get just a short time to rest and your body  recharged

LM
Just to add, there  is  help  out  there for you  and  Glyn but it seems  it  has  to be asked  for,  even for a short time.

It's a very tricky situation tbh.
When someone is totally dependant, they can become very possesive. And I understand that.
While some help is good, not all of it is.
As far as care goes, I had to make a complaint about one person who was becoming a little too familiar with the OH and she was scared about telling me, so it can be a good thing but not always.
Medically, the community matron that looks after the OH's needs is one in a million. She's really put herself out today to try and stop this continual leaking from the wound.
Griff