Surgery and Lightning Strikes

The night before T went into hospital for surgery, we had thunderstorms. We watched the heavy dark cloud boil and counted the seconds between the lightning and the thunder. The storm was getting nearer and nearer. Then there was a lightning strike and a huge rumble of thunder overhead. The lights went out and all our appliances went dead. We looked at each other. Was this some sort of omen? Then the power came back on. We checked the house. Everything seemed to be working, apart from the telephone. Slowly, the storm moved on and we went to bed with torches at the bedside. The next day, I took her into hospital.

T was having a planned abdominal operation. While she was waiting to be taken into theatre, we sent each other text messages. Then her messages suddenly stopped. And I had to wait. I paced around the house and tried to do the normal routine. But I was all on my own. It wasn’t reassuring. It only emphasised who was no longer with me.

Before, it had been me getting the operations. I was afraid, of course. Your pulse is sky high when you get onto the operating table. Everyone else is covered up in gowns and masks. They’re waiting to stick knives into you. Then the anaesthetist inserts something at your wrist and you’re out until you come round in the recovery room.

T had gone through the terrible ordeal of waiting three times for me. And all three operations were uncertain of the outcome. I marveled at her mental strength and stoicism. The hours ticked by. After four had elapsed I was almost pulling my hair out. Then a text message. She was alive and well. The operation had been a success. She’d spend two nights in hospital and then she could come home.

Eventually, the BT engineer came. The lightning had blown two master sockets inside the house, the cable at the gable end of the house and at the telegraph pole in the road. He spent an hour replacing the sockets and fixing the cable. With the landline working, I tried our three handsets. None worked. The lightning had blown those as well. But it hadn’t struck either of us. We’d both come through the ordeal. And now we could give thanks.

Long Covid - The TV Guide

Despite testing negative for the virus, I continued to feel unwell. When trying to do things, I was overcome with breathlessness and exhaustion. It was extremely limiting and made me very depressed. For five awful weeks I feared I had Long Covid. Then my breathing began to improve. I found I could do easy walks without needing to use my inhaler. I was even able to try harder walks and also easy cycle rides. I’m not fully back to normal, but I am well on the way. I don’t really know what led to my improvement. But I’m very grateful. Whilst in the thrall of the virus, I spent a lot of time watching TV drama. So here are my highlights.

My favourite TV channel is Talking Pictures TV. It’s on Freeview and Freesat and shows predominantly old films: British, European and American. I was tipped off about it by John Cooper Clarke, the Bard of Salford. Not personally, it was via an interview. He confessed that he hardly watched any other channel since he’d found TPTV. I feel similarly about it. My favourite programme on TPTV is Maigret. Every Tuesday at 21.05 they show a film of one of the novels, made for French TV in the 1990’s. The production values are good, the realization is accurate, the atmosphere is authentic and the lead actor is perfect. His name is Bruno Cremer and I think he’s the best Maigret I’ve seen. Rupert Davies in the 1960’s was quite good, but the production values were poor. Michael Gambon was fairly good too. Then came Rowan Atkinson. He was terrible: hollow, wooden and colourless. Georges Simenon describes the character as imposing and powerfully built. And Cremer fits the bill.

Other than that, I spent plenty of time on DVD’s. My favourite was ‘Pennies From Heaven’, by Dennis Potter, first broadcast in spring 1978 on the BBC (I missed it because I was working in Italy). I was astonished by how fresh, powerful and ambitious the six plays are. Using popular song and dance to explore and ironically comment on the motivations of the characters works so wonderfully well. The use of locations that I know from my childhood in Gloucester and the Forest of Dean is very evocative too. I think this is Dennis Potter's best work. The leads are all terrific: Bob Hoskins, Gemma Craven and Cheryl Campbell. The storyline involves deception, blackmail, rape, murder and prostitution, set amid the poverty of 1930’s Britain. All this darkness presents as a sub-text to the escapism of the popular songs of the time.This tension fuels the conflict (between fantasy and reality, desire and repression, delusion and inarticulacy) that drives the main characters and the narrative. ‘Pennies From Heaven’ gained audiences of 12 million when it was first shown on the BBC. Seeing it for the first time 45 years later, underlines just how safe, predictable and dull TV drama has become on the mainstream channels these days.

Covid Recovery in the UK - You Are On Your Own

It’s been six weeks since I caught the virus, and I’m still not right. I’ve improved from where I was three weeks ago. Now I can do an easy walk for 10 minutes or so before becoming breathless and worn out. But for someone who would normally cycle 100 miles a week, that doesn’t feel like a great step forward. So I’ve joined the many thousands who are having problems recovering from Covid-19. What is also clear is that the medical profession doesn’t really know what to do with us. I’ve seen my GP several times and had a series of tests, but these haven’t identified any specific problems. ‘I expect your symptoms will improve in the weeks and months ahead,’ he suggested. But I wasn’t content with ‘wait and see’, so my GP is now trialling different treatments.

I’ve just completed a one week course of high-dose steroids, which has sought to reduce the levels of inflammation in my lungs. I need to take steroids like this because I only have one kidney. The trouble is that high-dose steroids have very unpleasant side-effects: they made me mentally hyper, anxious and insomniac. After a week of this I was burnt out, and my lungs were only a little improved. The next option is to trial an asthma medication. This was my suggestion, after doing internet research.

The NHS has a website: Your Covid Recovery. It’s targeted at people who take longer than 4 weeks to recover. But it is largely devoid of meaningful information, and spends a lot of time stating the obvious. For example: if you get tired and breathless doing something, then stop. It does tell you that if your symptoms persist for three months then you are considered to have Long-Covid. And there must be plenty in this unfortunate situation. The most recent government statistics reveal that there are now half a million more people on long-term sick than before the pandemic.

My own research found that the problem seems to be related to age and pre-existing conditions. Studies show that half of those aged over 50 take longer than 4 weeks to recover from Covid-19. And for those with pre-existing lung conditions, such as myself, Covid-19 did make their symptoms significantly worse. Three years into the pandemic, these facts should not be surprising to the medical profession. After all, Covid-19 is a type of viral pneumonia. So why does the NHS appear to have no clinical guidance on treating the many thousands of people in the UK who have this very common chronic illness? Is the NHS so consumed with firefighting acute problems that it has no capacity to do this?

Under Quarantine

I finally caught Covid-19, after three years of keeping myself clear. It began with a headache, a dry cough and a runny nose. But within 12 hours I was lying in bed shivering. T piled blankets on top of the duvet. But still I shivered and shook. My temperature was sky high and my head was pounding like mad. ‘I’ve never seen you so ill,’ she said. I lay there drifting in and out of consciousness. It was as if I was in the grip of a tropical disease (which I suppose I was). The test confirmed I had the bug. ‘You look like death warmed up,’ said T, with cheery bluntness. I tried to smile. It was more of a grimace.

Three terrible days ensued. But by the third, my temperature was reducing. I managed to sit up in bed long enough to eat a little food. The next day, the sore throat began. It quickly went to razor blades every time I tried to swallow. The virus also went into my larynx and I lost my voice. It was miserable. However, the bug still had some tricks up its sleeve. My chest became extremely sore and I began to cough up yellow mucus.

By the start of the second week, my temperature had returned to normal. But I still had a bad chest and my sinuses were all bunged up. I was quarantined in the bedroom. T nursed me, always wearing a mask, and brought me food on a tray. I took another test. I was still positive. The bad chest and sinus symptoms continued for the rest of the week. I got very depressed. The GP had classified me as clinically extremely vulnerable. Was I never going to get over this disease?

At the end of the second week my body went into a horrible prolonged spasm. I was burning up, my head was thumping, my chest and throat were aching, I couldn’t stop coughing, my eyes and nose were streaming. I was shivering and extremely thirsty. I drank pint after pint of water, but that didn’t seem to have any effect. I collapsed into bed.

I woke to an exhausted calm, feeling completely burnt out. T had been on to Dr Google. She told me that the spasm was probably caused by my own immune system going into overdrive. Over-stimulated by a strange animal virus, my own defences were attacking me, putting my organs under threat. Apparently this had been the mechanism behind the deaths of many people - even the young, healthy and fit.

I took another test. Surprisingly, it was negative. But I still felt awful. I was coughing up yellow gunge and my sinuses were bunged up. T was relieved. She could take off her mask and relax the quarantine. Allowed to walk around the house, I found I was as weak as water. I had to rest after even the mildest activity, mental or physical. I watched plenty of TV and DVDs. And T continued to nurse and feed me. Over the week, my sinuses cleared but my chest was still a problem.

I was in the shadow of the virus. But I had survived. Thanks be to God, and T. Although at times it’d felt like a close run thing. No-one knows how badly Covid is going to affect them until they get it. I’d received all of the vaccinations. The last one had been six months previously. So I suppose its protection had pretty much run out. I’m now three weeks in and still feeling groggy with a sore chest. I know it’s going to take me some time to properly recover. I’m crossing my fingers and hoping that the virus hasn’t done me any lasting damage.

Good Friday

This day has many anniversaries. The Christian one concerns an event that took place two millennia ago. In Northern Ireland it’s also known for a Peace Agreement signed in 1998. And on this day twelve years ago, I was diagnosed with stage three cancer. I remember the occasion vividly. At the time I thought my life was at an end. In truth, it was. The life I’d known up to that point in time had ended. I was embarking on a new phase of my life, as a cancer patient. And more recently (touch wood) as a cancer survivor.

Cancer treatment has taken away bits of my body and caused a range of physical frailties that I always have to contend with. It has put me and my nearest and dearest under enormous stress (and still does). But it has also given me resources. Or more accurately, made me develop them. To survive you have to be determined. To struggle against the odds. To struggle against a system that sees you as just another patient. To struggle against yourself. In short, you have to be someone who will ask the awkward questions, who won’t give up when encountering an obstacle, who will keep on keeping on. There is no one word for this survivorship. Resilience, fortitude, endurance are in the right area. It’s more a package of qualities that grow when you are under duress for an extended period of time. Not weeks, nor months, but years.

All of this is undoubtedly crucial for survival. Yet something more is required. You have to be lucky too. All the will in the world cannot alone save you. The stars have to be aligned as well. So today, I remember the friends and family who had the determination, but who didn’t have the luck. My brother Rob. Jean Morgan. Elizabeth Sloss. Charlie Adams. The list goes on and on. So many have met an untimely death at the hands of the Big C. May you rest in peace.

 

The Big Rewrite

While I was laid up with sinusitis, I distracted myself by rereading the crime novel manuscript I’d submitted to agents in early December. ‘Sounds like you were a bit desperate’, do I hear you say? To tell the truth, I was. You can’t lie in bed with sinusitis. That increases the pressure inside your head. You have to sit up. So I wrapped myself in a heated blanket and plonked myself down at my writing desk. As I reread the manuscript, it dawned on me that it was flawed. As I read on, I realized that it wasn’t just a bit of tinkering that was needed but a significant rewrite. To go with my bunged-up head, I had a sinking heart. No wonder half of the dozen agents I’d sent it to had rejected it. I’d submitted the manuscript too soon.

With a sigh, I went through the manuscript again. I had read it several times before I'd submitted it. But this time I was trying to look at it with an agent's eye. I focused on the bits that didn’t quite work or that didn’t really belong. Red pencil in hand, I was pretty ruthless. And when I stopped, I found that I’d cut 9000 words. At the same time, I was reshaping the story. I rewrote the backstories of the two main protagonists. This impacted on their motivations and how they related to each other and responded to the challenges they encountered. I also built up a minor character into a major one. When I looked back, I found I’d added 7000 words.

My rewritten manuscript still has the same start and ending. It keeps most of the scenes it had before. It’s just that the story is now flowing and working better. The two months of editing had produced a manuscript that was much the same length. But the shape and emphasis had changed, especially in the personal journeys that the two main protagonists take. And that had improved the whole significantly.

This daily engagement with the manuscript, the work of editing and rewriting, gave me a focus and a purpose at a very difficult time. It got me through a debilitating and depressing illness. The improvement of my manuscript was a bonus. But an important one. I also had the presence of mind to withdraw my submission from the half dozen agents that hadn’t rejected it. I shall shortly begin submitting the revised version.

Sinusitis Remedies

This New Year I got a new illness (for me) and one I don’t ever want to have again. I went down with a dose of the flu over Christmas and that left me with sinusitis. For the past two months I’ve been plagued by it. Essentially, the sinuses are a human design flaw. These narrow lined passages that run through the bones below, between and above your eyes are easily infected by viruses, leading to the infamous, bunged-up, head cold. But sometimes the inflammation persists when the cold has gone. Hence, sinusitis: characterized by persistent headaches, hearing and balance problems. So I worked my way through the over-the-counter remedies. I think I sniffed almost every type of decongestant up my hooter. But to no avail. In desperation, I turned to my GP.

Reassuringly, he told me that acute sinusitis could last for two months. And the problem wouldn’t be regarded as chronic until I’d had it for three months. He prescribed me a steroid nasal spray. That helped a bit, but it didn’t solve the problem. So I turned to natural remedies. The best I found were Olbas Oil and steam inhalation. These did give me some temporary relief. But the symptoms always returned. So I rang the group practice again. A different GP prescribed a new steroid spray and recommended I do nasal douching. ‘What’s that?’ I hear you say. Well, you mix one teaspoon of salt with one teaspoon of bicarbonate of soda and add one pint of boiled water. When the mix cools you squirt it up your nose with a syringe whilst sniffing hard.

I don’t know whether this was what did the trick, but over the past couple of weeks the problem has been easing and I’m beginning to return to some sort of normality. One thing is for sure, my poor old nozzy certainly needs a good rest.