Ady's Test.

Tonight, I am babysitting for my niece’s two boys. They are very cute indeed! They are about one and three I think.

The one year old has gone to bed and has been asleep since. The three year old has been a bit restless and tearful cos mummy and granny have gone out dancing (sorry Andy, he didn’t mention granddad) and he wanted to put a skirt on and go with them.

My niece told me that he mustn’t come out of his room and that if he wakes, then I must do a firm ‘goodnight’ and shut the door.

Well, we only had a little drink and a cuddle together downstairs until his favourite rabbit was tired. We did that a few times and I think he is asleep now...Oh dear, I hope that hasn’t fecked up his sleeping pattern....never mind, eh ;)

Anyway, I am having a lovely evening, in peace and quiet to get on with my blog. So much happens so quickly, that before I know it, I am all behind!!

I am going to go back a couple of months and work forward. If I repeat myself, then just pretend I have dementia or something cos I can’t remember what I have written half the time anyway!

Right, lets crack on to around the time that Ady was wanting to get back to work, but his arthritis was stopping him.

When he had the bone scan and it came back that he had bone degeneration and no cancer, now this is quite difficult to explain, but he thought, ‘Is that all it is?, just a bit of arthritis?..why am I in so much pain then?’

He sort of felt that it would have been easier if he had cancer in his bones, not that he wished it upon himself you understand,but because other people would understand the pain and fatigue he was feeling, but arthritis? People have said to him before now “Oh everyone gets arthritis”

For years and years, Ady has just got on with his arthritis, he has never let it get the better of him, but this time, it is literally flooring him!

Ady would have this battle going on in his head that he doesn’t have cancer now and all it is, is arthritis. The fatigue must be because he is used to not working and so therefore he must be being a lazy bugger, sleeping the day away. One day, he asked me to phone our GP to ask if his thyroid tablet dosage was correct, because he felt as if someone had pulled a plug on all his energy and it had all drained away, and walking was like wading through thick treacle.

When the GP said his thyroid medication was correct, he decided that it must be because he is being a layabout and a benefit scrounger, which reminds me that I must remember to tell you about the haircut and make over my sister and niece organised to stop me from looking like a benefit scrounging chav hag, which I have to say, with hindsight, I was starting to look like one!

Anyway, Ady decided that as his thyroid was OK and he was in remission with both cancers, then all he has is his usual arthritis which he has had for years, then if he takes his co-codamol and ibuprofen with a swig of morphine, he can crack on and get back to work and the fatigue will wear off once he gets going *sigh* He really believed that his fatigue was just laziness.

He was getting up in the morning, taking his tablets and having breakfast and then going back to sleep for a couple of hours. He would then get up and potter around, sometimes he would take morphine first thing in the morning and sometimes when he had woken from his morning sleep. He would find he had just nodded off in the afternoon, usually during Dickensons Real Deal, well, frankly, that shit is enough to make anyone nod off, and the next minute it would be tea time. Then he would also sleep pretty much most of the night, apart from getting up on average three times for a wee.

I told him that there is no way that that amount of sleeping is from laziness. If I was sitting around not doing very much, there is no way that I could physically sleep that much..ever. There must be a medical reason for his fatigue. Ady, on the other hand is quite convinced that he is just being lazy and that he should get back to work.

He also said that he doesn’t really feel that enthusiastic about work. The very thought of work makes him feel knackered. I tried to explain that if he was feeling well, then he would be chomping at the bit to get to work...it is in his blood, but at the moment, he is clearly not well, not to mention the pain he is in!

This whole dilemma went on for quite a few weeks, well, since August actually and he just couldn’t understand why all of a sudden, his arthritis has flared so much...it has never flared this much before. He has had times when, say his finger has been in excruciating pain for a few weeks and it has gone hot and swollen, then suddenly, it has gone ‘pop’ in the joint and the pain goes for a while, but this pain is different...much more painful.

I told Ady that there is no way on this planet that he can work full time at the moment and provide for us...not in a million years. Ady insisted that he could.

So, to prove my point that it was not laziness causing his fatigue and he wasn’t being a scrounging bum, I told him that starting for the Monday, he was to get up, take the girls to school at 7.45, come home, stay awake and I would give him a list of jobs to do around the house. He could have a tea break, just like he would at work, and he could have a lunch break, where he could have a light nap if he wanted to. He could finish ‘work’ at 4.45.

Ady decided that it was a silly idea, but agreed to it. He thought it was quite an easy test and he could prove to me that he was fit for work. I knew full well that he wouldn’t last to the end of the week and wondered what excuses he was going to make for it not working.

Monday arrived, and he set his alarm. He was actually going out with his friend for the day that day, so I didn’t prepare any jobs for him. He wasn’t going to have many jobs anyway, just getting bits of shopping from the village and emptying the dishwasher, that type of thing really...maybe clean the windows...nothing strenuous.

He took the girls to school that morning. They were pleased they didn’t have to catch the bus and Ady told them ‘Your mother thinks I should take you to school in the mornings and do jobs around the house...she thinks I cant cope.....I should be getting back to work instead of mucking around with this’

The girls looked at me and rolled their eyes!

Ady came home from dropping them off. He muttered something about having a sleep to which I gave him one of my told you so looks so he stayed awake.

By 10 o’clock, he looked absolutely shocking. His friend turned up to take him out. He looked at Ady and said “Bloody hell, are you feeling OK? You don’t look very well..we dont have to go out if you dont want to”

Ady replied “No, I am fine...the wife thinks I am being a lazy bugger with all this sleeping...she thinks I should stay awake so I can get back to work”

I chuckled to myself at the way he was turning it all around to blame me for when it all went wrong. I have to say, I didn’t think I would be proving it three hours into the first day!

The boys went out for the day and as soon as Ady got home, he was reaching for the morphine bottle.

Tuesday came and he took the girls to school again. He did admit to me that on the way home he felt ‘ever so funny and peculiar’ and had to pull over for a bit. He decided that perhaps it was because he was taking his tablets earlier in the morning or something. “Rightyho” I said

He did sleep on the Tuesday, quite a bit actually and as he felt peculiar that morning, I let him. I thought I had proved my point and now perhaps he will realise that he is unwell and not lazy. Well, no, Ady moved the goal posts slightly and said that we had agreed that he was just taking the girls to school and he was allowed to sleep a little bit and he would take them on Wednesday.

Wednesday came and he admitted defeat. The poor bloke was on his knees in absolute agony and severe fatigue and feeling pretty fed up about it all. He hates it cos I always win!

At least now, when he feels guilty that he is not working, and he listens to all the benefit bashers and hears all the stuff in the media and from the government about people scrounging from the welfare system, he can be rest assured that he isn’t one of them. And when he is having a not so painful day and he starts on about ‘getting on and getting back to work’, I can remind him of the week he just had to take to kids to school, how does he think he is going to work full time.

I do completely understand his frustration, but for goodness sake, has he forgotten what he has been through that last few years?