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| Margate beach with gulls |
During the first week, The union persisted
in ringing several times a day, which I tried to ignore. I lost my temper when they rang early Tuesday
morning, after a crap night’s sleep. I shouted
“fuck off, it’s only 9 o’clock!” and pushed the bedroom door shut. My partner laughed and said 9 wasn’t
early. I got annoyed: I had been trying
to stay calm since he woke me earlier but I blew up at that and we had some
cross words. Then we managed to laugh at
Hull childhoods – I said he should write a book about it.
By mid-week as the weather turned
towards actual summer, I got really fed up being stuck in bed. Over the weekend I tried to ignore my symptoms
and got up to do stuff, only to become debilitated again.
Sunday morning I told my partner about
my dream wherein he found a valuable painting in his parent’s house. He laughed and said no such thing was going
to happen. I agreed it was merely
wishful thinking. He also scored ‘photo of the day’ on LuxLit – he apologised
for gloating and I said he was right to be pleased with himself.
 | |
| Wob hairstyle |
He cut my hair into a new style –
a 'wob', copied off a pic I found
in Boots mag.
I cleaned the living room
which had not been done for three weeks before sitting out in the sun - I
really needed some rays. I did some lazy
weeding while my partner took photos of ‘street Buddha’ and flowers.
He still suffered from a painful ankle and
whinged about not being able to go for a walk.
I sympathised but said I had been unable to do what I wanted for almost
three years now.
The temperature dropped in the
evening. I dyed a pair of my partner’s jeans and my scruffy blue skirt in the machine
with ‘jeans blue’ dye. They came out great!
I had an early night and did some
thinking.
I decided the illness lark had
to stop – whether by mind over matter or medical intervention. I’d had enough of not being able to get on
with life fully. We planned to go on
holiday in only two weeks and I wanted to feel up to it.
Monday I rang the surgery and when
I eventually spoke to the duty doctor, he made me an appointment for that afternoon. I took it easy the rest of the day to
conserve energy. I saw the African
doctor that I had a bad time with back in November. I stayed calm, accepting he could only deal
with one thing at a time and let him do his stuff. He said it probably was sinusitis,
prescribed antibiotics and referred me to ENT (I made the appointment online although
this was not to be until 27th July!)
At the chemist I embarrassed
myself by asking a supermarket worker to help me find something – well, she had
a shop uniform on and I was ill. I also
saw my aromatherapist who had caught nits off the owner of the beauty therapy place
where she works– nice!
Knackered when I got home,
I went back to bed. I took two antibiotics
as instructed and started to feel a bit better after an hour but that might
have been a coincidence. I continued to
improve slowly over the coming days but still had relapses and remained
extremely fatigued. I spent some time
writing, including ‘Common Bank’ for CP and got 5 likes on WP. I also sat out in the intermittent sun
(although I had to wear long sleeves and sun block as the leaflet accompanying
the antibiotics said not to expose skin to direct sunlight).
On the Wednesday, I called into
the bead shop to ask for advice. Some
guy was showing her brochures of an indeterminate nature - wallpaper or
art? One picture showed a wall covered
in mussels. He said they had to remove
it after six months to which we both said we weren’t surprised as it probably
whiffed a bit. I then went for some
groceries and had a funny conversation in the supermarket which I wrote about in
‘tales from the coop’ i.
The aromatherapist used a
different blend which she said would clear my sinuses and give me more
energy. She gave me a sample to take
home. When I got home, I did not feel
tired at all! I sat in the sun then did
some housework. I knew my aromatherapist
would have told me off but I felt I had to do something.
In the evening I rang Mum. She sounded okay but went on about my
nephew’s mum possibly moving to the Philippines and she was worried about leaving
him with no parents. I tried to tell her
it was nothing to do with us and there was no point fretting if it might not happen.
She kept saying ‘I know’ but she
couldn’t help it. Later in the month I
found out there was a bit more to the situation.
Thursday evening at drawing class
I had been missed which was nice. The
tutor got us to draw the pot pig and stuffed crow again. This time with a pencil tied to the end of a
stick so we were sketching at arm’s length.
My efforts were terrible but we had a laugh as someone compared the pig to
Eric Pickles. I said that was unkind to
the pig.
 |
| Geese family |
Friday morning I had a walk to
the station to collect train tickets from the machine. I took
photos of a geese family on the canal and an old stone ‘window’ in the wall
next to the river that I had never noticed before.
On the way back I did the weekly shop. There were no deliveries again so I tried to
keep to what I could carry but of course I overdid it.
I spent the afternoon sitting outside,
reading and listening to music. I then
went indoors for a siesta and when I came round, the weather had turned
cloudy.
 |
| Old stone window |
It rained overnight and Saturday
was mainly dull. We spent time on
holiday planning and out in the garden. I
developed a sore throat again in the evening and really should not have stayed
up so late watching films. The next day
I got up but mainly dossed in front of the telly feeling sorry for myself. I did make moves to go out but realised I was
not up to it. In the evening I went to
bed early but had an odd night waking sometimes
with hot flushes and sweating, and other times feeling cold which was
unusual.
Monday morning I got up as
normal. However, I realised the sinusitis had not gone so I rang the doctors
again. They asked if I had different symptoms – I
hesitated but said it seemed to be more in my throat and they told me to go in
again later to be checked out. The Doctor
gave me different antibiotics and told me to keep inhaling.
The next day my physical symptoms
had eased again but I still felt very fuzzy and fatigued. I spent most of the day in bed and did
nothing at all. Very late in the evening,
my partner tried to show me some of his art and I said he should do a slide
show so I could look at them when I felt like it. We decided this was not a bad idea anyway.
After a rubbish night, it took me
ages to come round the next morning. Following a couple of intermittently sunny
days It rained all day, so I felt less pissed off being stuck indoors but sick
of feeling unwell and extremely fatigued. I began to wonder if it would ever end!
We had a chat about how we both
felt. My partner also had trouble
sleeping and said his painful ankle did not help. He tried a new thing of eating just under 130
calories before going to sleep and got us both a piece of bread. I didn’t know if that is why but I did have a
slightly better night.
 |
| Weird ladybird |
The next morning I heard the
recyclers and got half dressed to put some mouldy bread out. As I was going downstairs there was a knock
at the door. Someone tried to sell me
loft insulation.
I told him I was ill so he
left me a leaflet and said he would come back next week (to which I made no
reply as I would not be home).
Out at the bins, I noticed a weird ladybird.
Later, I
realised I’d made a mistake with the antibiotics – I had been taking two doses
a day instead of four! I felt very
stupid but reasoned it didn’t matter much as I was pretty sure the infection had
gone (again) and it was just the fatigue to contend with (again).
In the evening I was about to play a game on my phone when it
told me there was an update. I thought
I might as well install it. This took two
hours so I couldn’t use my phone at all.
We stayed up late watching daft Thursday politics stuff.
I tried a different relaxation
technique which made my limbs feel very heavy (a trick I learned from a new
free ipad app) and had a good two hours’ kip.
But then I woke up and heard my partner coughing very loudly and shouted
at him to shut up. It was getting light
outside and I only managed bits of sleep after that and felt terrible the
subsequent morning. I didn’t speak for
ages until my partner asked if I wanted a bath.
I said I didn’t know and explained why I felt rubbish. His only comment was to say he didn’t know
where the coughing had come from.
I got really depressed about the fatigue
and worried that I would not be able to go on holiday the following Monday. I talked to my partner and he said he would
carry all the bags and get me a wheelchair (sic). I.e., not going was not an option!
I took it easy most of the day
but did manage some cleaning and packing.
I started to feel a bit better later and on Saturday morning I improved for
a while but started to feel crap again in the afternoon. I ignored it at first, then my sore throat returned
and I felt woozy. On the shortest night
of the year, it was only about half an hour before daylight when I eventually
dropped off. Inevitably, I did not sleep
much.
Midsummers’ day was grey and dull
and I still felt rubbish. I soldiered on
but went to bed early. I took a pill and
had a reasonable night.
 |
| Canterbury High Street |
I set the alarm
for 8 o’clock Monday morning and managed to rally enough to get ready and walk
to the train station in the drizzle.
Despite my ailments and my partner’s ankle we had a good time in Kent
and London.
We stayed four nights in
Canterbury and visited different places on the coast each day including Margate and Dover.
We then spent a weekend
with my sister in London.
This included a
fantastic trip to the Globe Theatre, a tour of historical sites in South east London and time with two of my nephews. (entries coming
soon on ‘Wordpress’.
 |
| London skyline from Severndroog Castle |
The train back from London the
following Monday arrived late into Leeds and I realised there was no way I
could run with all the bags to catch the connecting train. I went outside for a smoke and tried to help my
partner locate his mislaid travel card.
He went to work while I took charge of the large bag and returned home. I ordered a taxi to pick me up at our home
station - much easier than struggling with bags and only £3!
In the evening, I sent a message
to my younger nephew who was experiencing some issues that were similar to the young
people that I used to work with. I knew
he was getting some help and support from his brother and my late brother’s
partner but I wanted to know that I was here if he needed me.
The next day I rose early and tried
to get back into my normal routine. Of
course I was tired, but I felt relatively healthy; for the time being at least!
i http://maryc1000.blogspot.co.uk/2012/12/tales-from-co-op.html
i http://maryc1000.blogspot.co.uk/2012/12/tales-from-co-op.html
