Life is good ! ?

I can’t help being struck by how much cheerier I feel today. For once I’m not feeling stressed out. I’m not worrying about my benefits for the moment. I dare say I will again when I hear about medicals, results of the latest application or the appeal to the previous one, the job-related activity interview, but for the moment I can relax. Even my health is doing better. I’ve had no abdominal pains for a few days, my knees ache but that is the normality of life & has been so for many many years. The Fox is cooking – a Thai chicken curry, hopefully a bit more successful than the meal we had at the Thai restaurant – so there’s nothing that has to be done today. The sun is even shining, the sky is blue – rare events these days. The Fox seems more relaxed too. Life is suddenly feeling good.

The only slight blot is that our neighbour, Dave, is once more in hospital. He spent months last year in the one at Blackpool due to heart problems. On Tuesday the ambulance was round once more. I had a chat with his wife, Fran, on Wednesday. He apparently started with a bad pain in his head which paracetamol couldn’t alleviate, followed by pains in his legs so he couldn’t walk, sit or stand unaided or without severe pain. It went on for over a week with numerous doctors’ visits. Eventually he started hallucinating.  At that point Fran decided it was time to see what the hospital said.

When he reached the hospital, it sounds as though he saw the same silly Chinese doctor I saw on my second visit to Accident & Emergency. She diagnosed my pancreatitis as a mild case of constipation. In Dave’s case, she decided as he is 71 & was vague on the dates in his medical history he must be suffering from dementia – actually he was just suffering so much discomfort he couldn’t think straight & even started to show the signs of a further heart attack due to the pressure & insensitivity she was showing him. Fran can’t help thinking if they could just sort out the cause of his pain, so he wasn’t on as much morphine, he would be mentally fine. He certainly was before the pain began. It goes to show what happens when you reach a certain age. He’s still not home, having been put in a geriatric ward!