I still don’t know how I made it back to the car but I did. Once safely inside I sat for nearly an hour in the driver’s seat and did nothing. There were no tears, not even anger but mountains of emotion, the largest of which was numbness. No matter how hard I tried I could not shutdown the black and white silent movie running at the front of my head, the one that was made up of a constant loop of the images of my brain with the black holes in it. After perhaps an hour I was finally able to make the phone call that I knew I had to, to my partner. I tried to explain what had happened but I failed to do a good enough job, so much so that most of what was a short conversation centred on whether I had upset the Consultant by my response to her questioning if I had taken my meds. It’s not my partner’s fault, she has worked in the NHS all of her working life and has a complex relationship with doctors, which sometimes means that she sees them as omnipotent.
On the drive home and over the next few hours there were many thoughts competing for space in what was already a struggling brain.
The first and almost overpowering one was that everything that I’d been told since arriving at hospital was wrong, well probably not all of it but there were certainly large portions of it that I was having real difficulty deciding which was and which was not true.
The feeling that I had not been told the truth was a very strong one. All the medical professionals that I had come into contact with had assured me that I had had a small stroke and with the proper treatment and life style changes, by me, the chances of having another one were very very small. Well, I no longer fitted into either of those categories. I had had what the Consultant had described as a “massive stroke” and I had already had multiple strokes. Of course I knew that people like my Stroke Nurse and GP had not lied to me but at that moment it did feel like it. If it was unfair to say that these medical professionals had been party to a lie it was true to say that they did not have either the tools or the authority to challenge and test the results given to them by the ineptitude and possible lies of others.
The second was that my high blood pressure had become even more of an issue of life or death than it had been before. So much so that I took it again the moment that I got home (161/91).
It had been made very clear to me that it was my high blood pressure that had caused my stroke (now STROKES). At less than two months after having what was now the latest stroke my blood pressure was still a very big issue for me (and indeed very high, even with the Meds). I was still taking a measurement three or four times a day and it took a real effort not to up that to five or more as I had been at times during February. My Stroke Nurse (RP) was a major factor in my ability to resist the urge.
Another was the issue of the new medicine. As we were travelling the next day there was almost no chance of the Consultant’s request being received by my doctor by the time we left for the Alps, never mind it being fulfilled and I really did not want to be going away without it.
I really could not understand what was going on with the prescribing of the additional drug that I apparently needed. It seemed farcical that the Consultant was able to tell me that I needed a drug, name the medicine and even define the dosage, BUT not issue a prescription. Worse than that, there appeared to be no rapid way of getting her views in front of my GP. Have they never heard of email, text or heaven forbid electronic access to my records?
The possibility of travelling without the Doxszosin brought into focus a whole range of thoughts about the actual holiday.
I had always had reservations about travelling to the Alps and all the meeting with the Consultant did was to reinforce them, but it was so important to my partner. So crucial was it that almost the first thought in her head after I had been diagnosed was the effect it would have on the holiday. Even in the A&E cubical it had had been one of her first questions.
After talking to my partner the next call was to my Stroke Nurse (RP) but she was busy.
The morning following the meeting with the Consultant was busy with packing. Mid morning RP called and I explained the problem with the new meds and she promised to do what she could. As we were loading the car RP called back with the news that she had arranged for me to be able to pick up the prescription that day but we would have to wait until 14:00 hours, which was later than my partner had hoped to leave, not wanting to hit the rush hour traffic.
After picking up my additional Meds at 14:20 we headed west toward Manchester. The journey was as easier than one could expect for a Friday late afternoon/evening.
I had taken my Blood Pressure twice before we had headed for my partner’s mother’s (08:00 − 145/87 and 09:00 − 144/90). I am not convinced that I remember much of the journey along the M62 but I am sure of my BP on arrival (156/95 & 143/78).
The evening got worse from a stress point of view as my partner fell out over text with her best friend from school.
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