Friday 12 October 2012

Lucky Bugger!


Wow, what a blooming week!!
 On Monday, we went off for Ady’s bone scan. This isn’t a quick trip to the hospital at all. We had to get there at 10am for the nuclear injection and then go away for three hours and come back at 1pm for the scan which would take about half an hour.
This give all the nuclear waste time to travel around his body and  settle on all the dodgy bits of bone and then when you go though the scanning machine, all the dodgy bits light up or turn into ‘hot spots’.
We were wondering if Ady was going to light up like a Christmas tree.

While I was waiting for Ady in the scanner, and elderly couple…well in about their 70s I spose, came and sat to wait for the husbands scan. They told me that he had prostate cancer about 5 years ago and had it removed. Everything had been fine and they got on with their lives and pretty much forgot about it…then they had a call from the GP to say his PSA was on the rise and he needed a bone scan. Bloody hell, his starting PSA was only 7 with a gleason score of 6.
I thought to myself ‘ Feck me, we’re doomed’

So, the scan was done and off we went home. We were told it would take 7 to 10 days for the results.
 So there we were, on that bloody waiting game again. I hate that game because the rules are, that you have to plan the funeral and wonder what sandwiches everyone will like, then you have to plan about what to do if the scan is clear, then you have to go back to planning funerals and what music to play, and then you have to go back to wondering what the problem is if it is clear, and then back to how to tell the children, cos he must surely have mets, and then back to thinking that it is clear cos there is no psa rise.
You have to do this ALL week, in between getting on with thinking about what to cook for dinner, what to wear tomorrow and all other normal things that normal people think about.
Thank God I’m a mentalist.

I got Ady to take his co codamol and ibuprofen religiously to try and keep the pain at bay. He was a good boy and did as he was told, pretty much.
When people asked how he was, his answer was “Oh, well, I’m still alive” FFS.
Last Thursday, I took the girls to school and popped in on my man I look after. I got home to find Ady in the kitchen leaning on the side with his hands.
I said “Are you OK?”
He said “No I am not, my feet are killing me, I have never ever felt pain like this, ever”
I have to admit, he didn’t look too good either.
“Have you taken you tablets?” I asked
“Yes , Christ this is agony” and off he went to lay down on the settee.
I thought to myself, ‘Hmm, what should I do…I know, when in a moment of panic, stop and assess the situation calmly, so I did for a minute, and then decided, nah, feck it, lets ring the doctors.
I rang the doctors and spoke to the lovely receptionist and asked for a telephone appointment. Of course he didn’t have any left, so she offered to take a message and our GP would  ring me anyway.
I asked her to write in his book that Emma and Ady say his tablets are crap.

Later that day, Dr K phoned and I had a good chat with him. Ady was asleep, as usual, but earlier, I had questioned him heavily about his pain and on a scale of one to ten, how bad was it and all that.

I told Dr K that in the morning, his pain was a good 10, and it has only gone down to a five or six mid tablet session, and his pain only ever goes down to a five or six but he just deals with it.
I asked Ady what I would be like on his 5 or 6 pain number, and he said that I would want to be in hospital on a drip, so I think he must have been in the most hugest amount of pain ever if that’s the case !!
Anyway, back to Dr K. I asked if he can have spread without a psa rise, and he said it is possible and also, with Ady’s history of multiple cancers, he didn’t really trust the blood tests.
He was chasing up the hospital for the scan results and had asked for them to fax it urgently. He would ring me in the morning and wanted to see us in the afternoon. He booked us an appointment there and then.
He said that Ady should not be in this amount of pain at all, and we need to get some sort of pain management thing going.

So, this morning, I popped out to look after my elderly man, and when I got back, Ady said to me, “You have better hold off the sandwiches cos Dr K has just rung and the bone scan is clear”
“Clear?” I said “Well what else did he say?”
“Oh I cant remember, he said something about there being nothing untoward on the scan except a few bits, but that main thing is that it is clear”
 “What do you mean you can’t remember? You must have only just got off the phone to him…have you got dementia too…?”
“Well” he said “ I knew he would ring while you were out, he should be speaking to you and then we would know what is going on!”

‘I wonder what the ‘few bits’ mean, I thought to myself.
We sent general texts to people to let them know the scan was clear and everyone was very pleased, however,  of my friends replied that if the pain was in Ady’s arse, he had a good idea as to what was causing it, and another friend replied with “That’s great news, do they know what is causing the pain|? Do you think it might be you Emma?
I would have told them both to feck orf, but then I would have no friends left.

This afternoon, we went to the doctors and spent a good half an hour with him.
He said that on the scan, it showed degenerative bone disease in his right knee, both feet and right lower back. They didn’t look at the top bit I don’t think, cos they were in a hurry to get the results back.
He offered Ady a steroid injection which he really doesn’t want cos it lulls him into a false sense of security for six weeks and then all the pain comes back with a vengeance and he has to suffer until he can have another one. He didn’t want to add anymore arthritis medication cos he feels the methothexate and sulphasalazine is toxic enough, so at the moment, we have gone for staying on the co codamol  and ibuprofen and to take them regularly to keep the pain at bay and then when he gets what they call breakthrough pain, then he can have a swig of morphine from the bottle, because his pain is very up and down and not constant.

So there we have it, the bone scan is clear but he has lots of arthritis causing him lots of pain, so we have cancelled the hearse and vicar, and cracked open the morphine!!







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