Tom had his operation on Saturday morning and has been doing well since coming out of theatre. We went to see him on Sat evening and he was a bit groggy but awake. So far today it seems he will have the drainage tube removed from under his arm and if all is ok then he should be allowed home tomorrow, which I'm obviously thrilled about!
It's a strange conflict you feel when someone you love has a health problem like this. In this modern age of medicine and healthcare your chances of success have never been higher, but there is always a potential for things to not quite go to plan. Despite the medical knowledge of Tom's condition and the operation itself being fairly routine and straightforward, you are still prone to worry about things going wrong.
Waiting at the hospital and hearing the original op had been cancelled as things in previous surgeries that day had not gone to plan is a bit nerve-racking even though I think the complications weren't too serious. As another patient said, having the op cancelled was annoying but it must be so much worse for the person on the table.
So now if everything has worked as intended he should be home and spending the next few weeks resting to get his muscles and lungs functioning normally. (Unfortunately) I get too look after him and I'm no nurse...!
Monday 31 October 2011
Thursday 27 October 2011
Tom's (lack of) Operation
Just a quick note.
We went to Heartlands hospital in Birmingham today for Tom's operation to fox his lung. We'd had only about 4 hours sleep and had to get up at 5am to be picked up at about 6.30am by Tom's mum and got to the hospital for about 8am.
And waited...
And were warned that they were lacking beds so the operation may be cancelled but we would have to wait to see.
More waiting...
Tom was fasting so not allowed any food or drink all day as he could have been called up at any moment. There were other people waiting for different surgeries in the same area and in the afternoon several of them were told due to a problem in one of the earlier surgeries with a patient they needed to cancel the afternoon ones. No one was pleased but felt more grateful that they were not the poor person on the table having who knows what issues.
More waiting... [I am skimming over how tired, sick and bored we felt all day. And stressed and fed up because hospitals generally seem to involve a lot of waiting around and watching the staff attempt to organise themselves to say "not sure" to any of your questions.]
4pm rolls round, a full 8 hours after we checked in, and unfortunately there had been problems in the thoracic theatre too so they had to cancel Tom's operation. He was not too happy but the surgeon came and apologised and explained the issue.
The result is that Tom is staying overnight in a ward so he is guaranteed a bed and will probably have the op on Sat (maybe tomorrow if he is lucky) and got some dinner. We hope to be able to visit him tomorrow evening as he will probably have been bored all day. I feel lonely at home by myself so bless him being stuck on a strange ward in a weird bed surrounded by sick people when he is currently fine.
More updates as and when we know. All prayer requests needed!
We went to Heartlands hospital in Birmingham today for Tom's operation to fox his lung. We'd had only about 4 hours sleep and had to get up at 5am to be picked up at about 6.30am by Tom's mum and got to the hospital for about 8am.
And waited...
And were warned that they were lacking beds so the operation may be cancelled but we would have to wait to see.
More waiting...
Tom was fasting so not allowed any food or drink all day as he could have been called up at any moment. There were other people waiting for different surgeries in the same area and in the afternoon several of them were told due to a problem in one of the earlier surgeries with a patient they needed to cancel the afternoon ones. No one was pleased but felt more grateful that they were not the poor person on the table having who knows what issues.
More waiting... [I am skimming over how tired, sick and bored we felt all day. And stressed and fed up because hospitals generally seem to involve a lot of waiting around and watching the staff attempt to organise themselves to say "not sure" to any of your questions.]
4pm rolls round, a full 8 hours after we checked in, and unfortunately there had been problems in the thoracic theatre too so they had to cancel Tom's operation. He was not too happy but the surgeon came and apologised and explained the issue.
The result is that Tom is staying overnight in a ward so he is guaranteed a bed and will probably have the op on Sat (maybe tomorrow if he is lucky) and got some dinner. We hope to be able to visit him tomorrow evening as he will probably have been bored all day. I feel lonely at home by myself so bless him being stuck on a strange ward in a weird bed surrounded by sick people when he is currently fine.
More updates as and when we know. All prayer requests needed!
Tuesday 18 October 2011
Signed off
Just to let you all know I have been officially signed off of work for three weeks by my doctor for stress and exhaustion.
I've been suffering a lot lately with having to deal with stress. Those who have known me for some years will no doubt be aware of the pretty dire consequences when circumstances get too much. In fact I ended up quitting a job very suddenly only last year because I just could not deal with it anymore.
At the moment there are some things to sort with work, but this is not the place to discuss it. The additional burden in my life at the moment is that I simply cannot deal with work problems as well as Tom's situation with job hunting and his operation. In my opinion his health and our life must come first. I'm sure most people will agree and if they were in a similar situation I would hope you would do everything you could to look after yourself and everyone around you. I'm also afraid my work will suffer if I were to continue working whilst all this happens and then no-one wins.
I have spoken to a couple of doctors about my health as I witnessed problems like my weight drop, poor sleep and becoming more agitated. From my experience it's best to go to get help sooner rather than at the last minute as at least then you have made preparations in case things do get worse.
I need to spend the next while resting, putting some weight back on and just getting my head back into a place where I can deal with day-to-day life.
I've been suffering a lot lately with having to deal with stress. Those who have known me for some years will no doubt be aware of the pretty dire consequences when circumstances get too much. In fact I ended up quitting a job very suddenly only last year because I just could not deal with it anymore.
At the moment there are some things to sort with work, but this is not the place to discuss it. The additional burden in my life at the moment is that I simply cannot deal with work problems as well as Tom's situation with job hunting and his operation. In my opinion his health and our life must come first. I'm sure most people will agree and if they were in a similar situation I would hope you would do everything you could to look after yourself and everyone around you. I'm also afraid my work will suffer if I were to continue working whilst all this happens and then no-one wins.
I have spoken to a couple of doctors about my health as I witnessed problems like my weight drop, poor sleep and becoming more agitated. From my experience it's best to go to get help sooner rather than at the last minute as at least then you have made preparations in case things do get worse.
I need to spend the next while resting, putting some weight back on and just getting my head back into a place where I can deal with day-to-day life.
Monday 17 October 2011
I don't really have anything good to say at the moment
so instead let me try and distract us all with a few nice pictures:
Yes that one is actually Rusty
This isn't but it still made me laugh! Be careful if you dress up your pets.
'Normal' service may be resumed soon when I get some progress with our situations. Tom's pre-op went well last week and his operation is still on schedule for the 27th.
Sunday 9 October 2011
Contentment and beans
THEORY: In life we seek certain things: food, shelter, community, safety.
When all of these things are assured we should therefore be content. But if you look around, we're not.
Thus, if we were to make some of the things we needed more restricted or threatened (eg war, rationing etc) then would we learn to be happier? Could we become more content on less? Is it greed that blocks us from achieving satisfaction?
EXAMPLE: Think about it like this, if you please: when you go to a supermarket for a tin of beans, there are several options available to you in the form of expense/ quality. There are standard own-brand beans, branded beans, cheap 'value' beans, fancy beans, different brand of beans... now they are all beans. Yes there may be some variation in the quality of them, but they've all passed the standard to be allowed to be sold to us as beans.
Now let us remove all but one type of beans. Bang, there goes your choice.
There would be no more competition for bean brand; between people buying the more expensive brand vs. the cheaper brand. The misery of having to buy the cheap beans rather than having the wealth and opulence to afford the very best [see opinion above] is removed. Assuming there is some misery to buying beans.
Beans aside, my point and principle is that by giving us choices and divisions based on supplying us with things that we need based on the money we have is a possible cause of losing happiness. I would hope that if the world's bean supply was suddenly restricted and thus distributed by one organisation then we would just be grateful for being able to still have beans.
When all of these things are assured we should therefore be content. But if you look around, we're not.
Thus, if we were to make some of the things we needed more restricted or threatened (eg war, rationing etc) then would we learn to be happier? Could we become more content on less? Is it greed that blocks us from achieving satisfaction?
EXAMPLE: Think about it like this, if you please: when you go to a supermarket for a tin of beans, there are several options available to you in the form of expense/ quality. There are standard own-brand beans, branded beans, cheap 'value' beans, fancy beans, different brand of beans... now they are all beans. Yes there may be some variation in the quality of them, but they've all passed the standard to be allowed to be sold to us as beans.
Personally, I prefer Heinz brand.
Now let us remove all but one type of beans. Bang, there goes your choice.
There would be no more competition for bean brand; between people buying the more expensive brand vs. the cheaper brand. The misery of having to buy the cheap beans rather than having the wealth and opulence to afford the very best [see opinion above] is removed. Assuming there is some misery to buying beans.
Beans aside, my point and principle is that by giving us choices and divisions based on supplying us with things that we need based on the money we have is a possible cause of losing happiness. I would hope that if the world's bean supply was suddenly restricted and thus distributed by one organisation then we would just be grateful for being able to still have beans.
Wednesday 5 October 2011
Bureaucracy
Just a quick muse at one of my least favourite subjects (also I can't spell it so had to check before posting the title...)
Case #1 - consulting my work handbook at home to see about leave/ time off around Tom's op (finally got the dates!) so I can be around. The term "Compassionate leave" is not mentioned. What is mentioned is about getting time off for caring for someone, but the details are apparently in the Company Policy.
This document is not one they issue copies of to employees. I think I can only access it via the company intranet at work -_- not helpful.
Case #2 - we rent our flat through an agency and as such will have periodic inspections. We had one the other week and the results came back today. Generally everything was ok, the only real maintenance issues were a door handle being loose (like that when we got here) and some dampness around bathroom window.
What did make me chuckle a bit was this: we've got a crack in our double-glazed window, which we have told the agency about twice (and the landlord) but no news on it. The inspector missed it completely, but did put in the very brief report that there is a dead insect in our net curtain.
Go figure...
Case #1 - consulting my work handbook at home to see about leave/ time off around Tom's op (finally got the dates!) so I can be around. The term "Compassionate leave" is not mentioned. What is mentioned is about getting time off for caring for someone, but the details are apparently in the Company Policy.
This document is not one they issue copies of to employees. I think I can only access it via the company intranet at work -_- not helpful.
Case #2 - we rent our flat through an agency and as such will have periodic inspections. We had one the other week and the results came back today. Generally everything was ok, the only real maintenance issues were a door handle being loose (like that when we got here) and some dampness around bathroom window.
What did make me chuckle a bit was this: we've got a crack in our double-glazed window, which we have told the agency about twice (and the landlord) but no news on it. The inspector missed it completely, but did put in the very brief report that there is a dead insect in our net curtain.
Go figure...
Tuesday 4 October 2011
So bored
Life isn't very fun at the moment. Tom has his operation at the end of the month and will need about 1 month of recovery time. He's also leaving his job next week as his company were cutting staff but to buy himself more time he handed in his notice so he could an additional 6 weeks (instead of leaving at the end of Sept when his contract ended). So currently he has no new job to go to, despite looking hard and going to interviews.
I know it's a familiar story among many people our age out there but trying to get a (better) job is a nightmare these days. I can moan that there are no jobs, but that's not strictly true; people just offer jobs to apparently very experienced individuals. The rest of us don't get a look in. The remaining jobs offer insultingly low pay from companies you know can afford to pay better. I've seen positions advertised for a high street clothes shop paying less than £6/ hour, which I think is disgusting. Also, another company had adverts for retail associates and managers. The manager's salary was about £20k. The associate's was "minimum wage". How awful is that?
Tom went for an interview with a job agency after applying for a position which was a little ambitious, and paid a lot more than either of us have earned. But you may as well take a shot at these things. When he returned from the agency he was annoyed because they had told him the job in question was out of his reach and they wouldn't be bothering to put forward his application. I figured that the agency's role is to get the companies people for their jobs, so in turn they are not going to be willing to put forward a high risk candidate with little experience.
So how the hell do you get experience in fields if nobody gives you a job in them? We can't volunteer our time, simply because we need full-time jobs to get by. Also, you can only go for jobs in your area. If all that's around you is the same field of work (the one you have no experience or interest in) then what? You can't move without somewhere to live and until you have a job secured, as well as a large amount of money for moving and deposits etc. then you can't do it.
Also education doesn't seem to have much of a bearing on things. Unless you're a qualified nuclear physicist (you get the idea) then no-one is interested in the average bum with a few GCSEs/ A Levels/ degree tucked away in the box somewhere. Why were you getting an education when you could have been getting experience in the work field, hey?
It'll all work out, I suppose. Times like these you need to have faith, even if a small scrap is all you feel is left.
I know it's a familiar story among many people our age out there but trying to get a (better) job is a nightmare these days. I can moan that there are no jobs, but that's not strictly true; people just offer jobs to apparently very experienced individuals. The rest of us don't get a look in. The remaining jobs offer insultingly low pay from companies you know can afford to pay better. I've seen positions advertised for a high street clothes shop paying less than £6/ hour, which I think is disgusting. Also, another company had adverts for retail associates and managers. The manager's salary was about £20k. The associate's was "minimum wage". How awful is that?
Tom went for an interview with a job agency after applying for a position which was a little ambitious, and paid a lot more than either of us have earned. But you may as well take a shot at these things. When he returned from the agency he was annoyed because they had told him the job in question was out of his reach and they wouldn't be bothering to put forward his application. I figured that the agency's role is to get the companies people for their jobs, so in turn they are not going to be willing to put forward a high risk candidate with little experience.
So how the hell do you get experience in fields if nobody gives you a job in them? We can't volunteer our time, simply because we need full-time jobs to get by. Also, you can only go for jobs in your area. If all that's around you is the same field of work (the one you have no experience or interest in) then what? You can't move without somewhere to live and until you have a job secured, as well as a large amount of money for moving and deposits etc. then you can't do it.
Also education doesn't seem to have much of a bearing on things. Unless you're a qualified nuclear physicist (you get the idea) then no-one is interested in the average bum with a few GCSEs/ A Levels/ degree tucked away in the box somewhere. Why were you getting an education when you could have been getting experience in the work field, hey?
It'll all work out, I suppose. Times like these you need to have faith, even if a small scrap is all you feel is left.
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