Dr Jane reminds me that it is one year since I was carted off into hospital and so nearly met my maker. It's been a titanic struggle since with eleven operations, months in hospital and some extremely painful treatment but I'm still here to tell the tale. Even better, my sense of outrage and grumpiness is still wonderfully strong and fuelling my blog. Writing each day has been great therapy but there wouldn't be much point to it without you, the people who visit, comment and sometimes enjoy the things I have to say. The months in traction would have been unbearable without the great debate, conversation and friendship so many of you have provided. Thanks for listening.
Wow, your visitors' countries list keeps spreading over more parts of the globe!! Best wishes from Barbara (Styria)
ReplyDeleteThanks, Barbara. I really love seeing visitors from so many parts of the world. The internet is great at shrinking the globe and making us realise that although we may speak different languages and live in different places, we're not so different from each other at all.
ReplyDeleteHi XTM!
ReplyDeleteNow what else would I do in the wee small hours (our time) without your blog to read.
Doesn't time fly when you are having fun.
Great thought provoking and humorous posts and most of all 'Maintain the Rage'. Certainly great similarities with de civil service/ hospitals and we almost speak the language, if you forgive us our wonky vowels.
With all of our best wishes from Melbourne and 'carn the leg' ( just practicing - nearly time for our crazy AFL footy season )
Keep well!
Chris & Co from Melbourne OZ
First Anniversary! WOW!
ReplyDeleteThe things you have been through!
Well done for not giving up the fight. The fight to live, the fight to get better and the fight to improve the lot of others in hospital where nutrition is concerned.
I hope the next 12 months prove to be less problematic for you.
Good on you TX xx Keep going forward sometimes with a grump sometimes with a smile xxxx
ReplyDeleteThank you XTM for being who you are under very difficult circumstances....I think we all love you for your humour under extreme preasure and your passion in speaking your mind with the everyday things in life...dont change... just get better(pun intended).
ReplyDeleteno problemo, your curmudgeonness has been a delightful "food for thought" source. For me anyway.
ReplyDeleteOne year since your life took a 'road less travelled' route and led you around the world. Congrats on making it through and may you never have to backtrack down that muddy road.
Good day eh from Libby in Alberta
Hi XTM, tahnks for your kind greetings. I love you had a cake for your anniversary (you did have a cake, did you?!). In ancient times people used to add another birthday whenever they outlived a serious illness. I don't know if they had a cake though, or some other kind of festivity marker. What I remeber from your blog, your health boards would sooner abolish the one birthday cake than instal a second one, but IMHO you should defy them. On another note: today I was able to hang out my washing into the sunshine for the first time this year, and it even got nearly dry! I so love the smell of outdoor dried laundry! (Did you know that there are areas in the U.S. in which it's prohibited to hang one's washing outside to dry? And in some state it is even more explicitly forbidden to hang women's undies next to men's undies. Isn't that weird?) Best wishes from Barbara (Styria)
ReplyDeleteHas it been a year already? Ahhhh, how time flies when you're in agony, immobile and completely dependent on a health system that works against itself.
ReplyDeleteOh.. I mean.. I've enjoyed reading your blog. Your sense of humour has always put a smile on my face. Keep it up :)
XTM... I can from the heart tell you, that without your blogg, life here for me would have been very mundane.
ReplyDeleteEvery night I visit your blogg site. I laugh, I cry, I am uplifted and enjoy everything you post. The comments from others here not only uplift me, but inspire me, and your reports of the madness the UK is going through plus your own comments, is brilliant.
I have regularly visited " The Devils Kitchen", I leave the site in stitches of laughter,the man deserves an award for what he says ... the truth.
It is also nice to see a familier Welsh word... Yachydda.. ddiolch cariad ( thankyou sweetheart).
Congratulations , and I for one cannot thank you enough XTM, for bringing us laughs when you were not in the best of health as it was. For opening our minds to your world of experiences, and what we should expect should we ever have the misfortune to have to spend time in a hospital, now we know exactly what to pack for a stay there.
May the future shine for you, and your health improve. I am selling up my home here in Crete as my mum is ill and I want ( note , want to ... not need to or have to )to look after her , my sister wants her in a home... no bloody way will she go in any home.
As soon as everything is sorted out I shall send you a donation, meanwhile , anyone wanting to move to beautiful Crete, house going cheap , with furniture and car overlooking Fodele Bay ... contact me....lol
Ness..
Congratulations on surviving with attitude intact. Keep up the bad work, the more thorns in the flesh of the National Fiddle the better.
ReplyDeleteHi ExTM! Wishing you a full and complete recovery! I was last a NHS patient for 10 weeks in the "good old days" in 1980, when the pea soup was green and the water clear, not the other way around! However, as a 12 year-old one tends to eat everything that is placed within striking distance, so maybe my memories have been clouded by time!
ReplyDeleteAny positive prognosis as to the strength and length of your leg?
All the best,
Michael (Hannover, Germany)
Hi Michael... the leg is being very naughty. It's excruciatingly painful and won't bear much weight which tends to put more stress on my good leg. Also, with 4cm missing, my back is aching and bent so that normal mobility is a real problem. At the moment it doesn't feel as if my leg is going to get any better but we shall just have to wait and see. I could not have imagined one year ago that my life would be turned upside down with so many ramifications. I don't think there's one are of your life that goes unaffected when something like this happens. I guess it goes to show that we must appreciate all the good things that happen in our lives and never take anything for granted.
ReplyDeleteThanks for entertaining us with a very serious subject indeed. Hope hospital food is a little better nowadays.
ReplyDelete