Monday 22 April 2013

Unplugged

Come as you are, as you were, as I want you to be
Come As You Are - Nirvana

Day 46 : Goodbye to the horrid Hickman line.

A quick trip to hospital to have my line removed. We have a faff about with my blood first, unsurprisingly. I only have to walk in to the hospital and they want to take my blood, these days. This morning one of the nurses decides she needs to do all my blood tests, before we can proceed. The rationale for this precaution is simple - if they took my line out while my platelets were low, I might bleed uncontrollably. Except... we did check all this just last week, and the only reason we're taking the line out is we're confident my blood count is fine. And after today no-one will even be monitoring my blood count, from one week to the next. But I'm beyond arguing about these things, so I just let her take the blood, and then wait while the samples go off to the lab. It's only another hour of my life. Fortunately, the registrar appears a few minutes later and says that he isn't going to wait for the results anyway. So we crack on. I wonder if the blood test people know how much of their time is wasted, too?

It doesn't take long to get the line out. And it is a lot less unpleasant than the process of putting it in. So I am unplugged! I'm also free of hospital (bar my weekly exercise group). I don't need to go to the haematology dept for ages. I can just get on with getting on.

I guess I'll inevitably be blogging a little less frequently here on Dial M, with less to report. I promised this was a myeloma blog, not a "minutiae of Alex's life" blog, so while I'm getting back to other stuff, I'm less likely to be writing it up. For the time being I'll continue to update periodically, as my recovery continues. Longer term, I'll post my test results, as and when. I'm looking forward to a decade of "no evidence of disease" updates...

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3 comments:

Tom Corby said...

Glad the dreaded Leyland Hickman line is out.
Also glad it wasn't a difficult procedure.

I once had a catheter in a place you wouldn't want one.
When the nurse took it out, she told me to breath out slowly.

Good advice.

Tom

Alex Bicknell said...

Thanks for that Tom. I can't think of anywhere I would want a catheter. But some places even less than others, I grant you. This conversation makes your PICC seem almost jolly. Continuing the car theme, I think PICC is a city run-around from Renault (in garish colours, of course).

Anonymous said...

Bonjour Alex

Really happy that you are finally unplugged and free of hospital

I will be in Mexico for the 2 next weeks

I will call you when i'm back

José