This is what happened in London, I will remove it in a few days, it is just for the select few that I have chosen to show this to, save me going through it in detail again... this is what i remember... please do not pass this on to anyone else...
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“So you’re a climber …” that was the last thing I can remember hearing before the general anaesthetic kicked in…
I was in London for what was supposed to be a straightforward minor day case procedure, I was due out at 2pm and Jim was waiting. We had skimped on the hotel the previous night, it was a right shit hole… I am sure it was used as some dirty stop off for hookers and there clients, but at £65 for the night between the two of us we were not complaining.
Jim had come down to sign me out, because I was going under a general for the day case procedure, I needed someone to take me home, and to be honest I didn’t fancy the train journey back to London, having had a general, the chances were I would wake up in Sheffield or Nottingham, this was not to be the case, instead I woke up in recovery at 2:30pm.
“there have been a few complications Iain” said the nurse.
I was aware for an excruciating pain in my bowel… I needed a poo…
“I need the toilet” I said to the nurse, hoping she would just let me get up off the bed and stroll over to get rid of this pain.
“you don’t need the toilet, you have had surgery and there have been a few complications, we have had to attach you to a catheter, and your bag is empty.”
I looked, there was a blue tub running straight out of me, how truly undignified I thought. But the pain in my stomach was unbearable, I needed to go…
“nurse, I need a poo, I have got to go” I informed her.
Of she went, bonus I thought, as my stomach was cramping again..
She returned with a bed pan, shit, I thought, I can’t do this.
“Nurse, I am having stomach cramps.. I need a proper poo”
She looked disgruntled but she unattached me from my drip, lowered the bed and duly escorted me and my catheter to the toilet, I was worried about the blue tube falling out … but I wasn’t about to ask about how it would stay in, my stomach pain was horrific and I felt as though I was about to shit myself.
“we will leave the door open in case you have any problems” she said… great I thought, all the world and sundry are going to be exposed to me doing the toilet, at this moment in time, I didn’t care too much about that.
I sat down and tried to balance the blue tube, in a position where it was not painful, and waited expecting to feel the relief of a nice poo… but no.. there was more pain, unbearable pain.. It was a combination of hot fire and needles, coming straight out of me, blood, thick lumpy blood was running down the tube, not into the bag but down the tube and dripping into the toilet bowl..
As I stood up the blood was not only running down the tube but it was running down the inside of my leg from my bum…
The pain was unbearable… the room went swirly..
I woke up in bed again.
“we are going to have to take him back in… “ it faded off and the nurse cut in “Iain, how are you feeling?”
I felt weird, sort of numb, a floating sensation, gradually moving up through my boddy, I looked down and the catheter was still there, except they were pulling clumps of clotted blood out of it… there was blood all over the place, all over my legs, sheets…
“Iain, how are you feeling?” said the nurse. “his Blood Pressure is dropping.. We need to.. “ faded off again with the nurse right in my face ..
“IAIN, How are you feeling?” she said sternly…
“I feel.. Weird…” I replied. “weird.. in what way?” she replied…. “We need to decide what we are doing, his blood pressure… “ was cut as the nurse asked … “weird in what way Iain, Iain, how are you feeling… whats weird?”
“weird in a numb sense, running towards my head, kind of floating, I cant feel anything.. “ I couldn’t, it was the best way I could describe it…. My thoughts were brokesn and quickly brought back to what was going on as I heard
“put him back under now..” from the voice I hadn’t identified, I felt a cold rush going through my right arm and everything drifted off. I can remember thinking.. Was this what it was like to die, would it feel this peaceful.
I woke up again… was it all a dream.. I wonder where Jim is.. The time was 3:45, well according to the clock.. That pain… it hurt .. I was shaking, I couldn’t stop shaking… I wasn’t cold, just shaking and the pain, unbearable I was aware of someone talking to me..
“Iain, can you hear me?” said the nurse. I looked to my left and saw the familiar face.
“I can hear you” I replied. “whats going on… I can’t stop shaking… I am in pain, can you make it stop… whats going on?” it all seemed to come out at once…
This time I was aware of a whole lot more going on, I was connected to two separate drips in my left hand, something in my right hand, there was wires attached to my shoulders and chest… but the pain…
“why am I shaking and why am I in pain, whats …” there was a rush through my right arm and I was drifting off again..
“Iain, how are you feeling?” said the nurse.
Fine I thought, I glanced around, I was still hooked upto everything, there were other people about me, I recognised the surgeon and his registrar, the nurse, and there was someone standing on my right who was holding something to inject into my right arm….
“Iain, are you still in pain?” said the nurse.
“no… whats going on?” I said.
“the operation had some complications and we had to stop, we could not proceed” explained the surgeon “from that there is some internal bleeding which we are trying to stem”
I glanced at the catheter which instead of being full of urine was in fact full of blood, I was also lying on what appeared to be a nappy sheet that had blood all over it.
“we may have to put you back under, open you externally and re-stitch, this is a last resort, we are going to try to flush you but your blood pressure keeps dropping you too low while you are under, we need you conscious to do it”
Flush me out… open me up… where is Jim and what time is it…
“do you understand what I am saying?” asked the surgeon abruptly
I presume so, but flush it, how are they going to do that…
“Yes I understand” I didn’t feel it appropriate to ask too many questions.
“Iain, are you still in any pain?” asked the nurse
“no, I still feel like I need the toilet though, I don’t suppose…” she smiled, first smile I had seen all day.
“the surgeon is going to attach a large syringe type thing to the catheter and push fluid into your bladder, and then extract it, this is going to be very uncomfortable, but you have to bear with it, and stay alert” the nurse explained.
“Just do whatever you need to do” I said, my thoughts were running away with the fairies and I did not like the idea in any way shape or form. This is like winning the lottery, stuff like this does not happen to me.
The surgeon and his registrar re appeared with a thing that required two hands to carry it, this was a syringe??? Bollox I thought, they are not going to use that.. How wrong could I be.
The catheter bag was disconnected and this thing was connected to the tube, that blue tube…
The room was swirling again, and the pain was unbearable.
“Iain, you need to stay with us, you have to try to ignore what is going on, concentrate on something” said the nurse as fluid was forced up the catheter and into my bladder.
Easy for you to say … you are not lying here … my thoughts ran off and I could hear the beeping of my heart rate on the machine above my head… concentrate I thought.
That beeping became the only thing in the room… it was getting faster, and I could feel it in my body… but… that pain… was excruciating..
“nurse, the pain.. “ I felt a rush go through my right arm and everything was going numb… what pain I thought.
I seemed to lie there for an eternity, wincing as they continually pushed stuff in and sucked it out.. Eventually after being flushed 6 times it started to clear and there was a steady flow of bloody urine running into the catheter.
I was express fed through an IV drip to make me wee, and it seemed to be steadying out at what appeared to be a very dilute bloody orangey red colour.
The pain was just more of an uncomfortable pain, a guy with an ultrasound turned up to do a scan, “..there is some fluid trapped behind you bladder, this is nothing to worry about, it will be absorbed by the body in due course…” I was advised.
Jim was allowed into recovery at 6ish, he had been sat by the bed I was supposed to be back in by 2pm.
“you will be held in till your urine is clear and you stop bleeding, you need an IV drip and also IV antibiotics, so the earliest you will be out is Monday”
Jim went back to Leicester… I was allowed to leave recovery at 8:45pm and taken to the ward where I would stay till Tuesday.
So going into hospital for a simple day case procedure is not all it is cracked upto be… I went in on Thursday at 7am and was discharged on Tuesday at 12pm… I still need to have put right what went wrong…
