I haven´t written a blog for a long while . Reasons being that we first went away for most of the summer but most recently that literally as soon as we got home again, (that very night, in fact), husband fell in the night and broke his hip. Things have been rather hectic, tense and overwrought for the last few weeks as a result.
Only in the last 10 days or so have I had the time or the inclination to do more than is absolutely neccessary. Hence, checking and replying to emails and blog writing has been way down on the list. However, last week I went to my Writers´Circle for the first time in months and wrote a piece for the occasion. I thought I might as well bung it on the blog and that would save me the effort of thinking of something interesting to say. At least this keeps the blog going until such time as I can sit down and and write in a more relaxed way than is possible as yet.
So here you are - what happened in September.
” I want to write something about this” I said to my other half, ”but I thought I´d try and put a bit of a humorous spin on it.” He gave what can only be described as A LOOK and said ”I´m not really the one you should be asking about this”. He was quite right actually. If you´d fallen in the middle of the night, broken your hip and lain there for several hours until discovered, you probably wouldn´t be able to see the funny side, either.
Still, you can always look at things as I often do, in a twistedly humorous way, I suppose. Like the journey to the hospital. Despite being informed of the nature of the accident and the necessity for a stretcher, only one bloke came in the ambulance. Very pleasant chap he was. Quite jolly, in fact. ” !Holá Compañero!” he said to the white-about-the-lips patient and proceeded to haul him into a narrow wheelchair. In acute pain, hubby howled, but to no avail. The ambulance was a pure transport vehicle with no medical facilities at all. He was tossed in the back without benefit of painkiller and I sat up front with the driver, who was very fanciable and flirty, and told me I didn´t look old enough to be a granny. Behind us, heartrending wails came from other half every time we swerved around a roundabout. And there are quite a few between Pilar and Torrevieja.
After two lots of X-rays, still without pain relief, a nigh on desperate and gibbering husband was finally put on a drip, which slowly began to kick in. A room was assigned to us where we were to wait until an operating theatre became available and a male nurse came in with a contraption to elevate the leg and keep it stretched straight. It looked like a mini ski jump and a large plastic bag of water was attatched by a cord around the ankle to keep it all in position. All very medically correct. Except that the nurse hadn´t quite got everything balanced right before letting go and the whole lot slipped sideways and made for the floor. The nurse did a diving rugby tackle and managed to save the day. Hubby lay like a wrung-out dishcloth on the bed screaming blue murder. With true Mediterranean aplomb and a shrug to match, the nurse said ´ No pasa nada` and left us to it.
The operation and the brief stay in hospital went by without major trauma, apart from the day I had to go back to Pilar to set things up for the return home. I got back to hospital to discover that husband was famished, since the meals brought in were put on the bedside table, while he had been moved into a chair by the window and his call bell had not been put within reach. A rapid sortie to the cafeteria alleviated the hunger pangs but made us realise that careful planning has to be the order of the day with small packs of hard rations placed in strategic spots about the room if ever the main carer has to be away for any length of time.
Once we got home after the operation and a few days in hospital, under the tender loving care of devoted wife, hubby´s family jewels came in for some dodgy treatment. Getting used to a newly purchased bed which could elevat head and legs, I mistakenly pressed both switches on the zapper at the same time and was in the process of making a neat sandwich before hubby snatched the controls and prevented a fate worse than death.
On another occasion, unused to threading on loose boxer swimsuit shorts for him, I nearly managed a neat emasculation job, getting his tackle caught in the netting inside and pulling them up rather too rapidly for comfort. He also lost feeling in his vital parts for a while when I slapped a large bag of frozen peas ( meant to alleviate pain) between his legs rather than on the operation area.
There were several other incidents which spring to mind: hubby balancing on a bedpan, which overturned ( fortunately still unused), me threading a recalcitant willy into a pee bottle( unfortunately heavily used), which subsequently obliged by tipping over. When more mobile, under strict medical instructions to put no weight on the bad leg, hubby had to learn to hop in his zimmer frame. Unfortunately, neither of us had thought to lock it into a secure position and on hop number two it started to fold inwards and collapse. I emulated the nurse´s rugby tackle and a quick shunt into the nearby wheelchair prevented a return to the emergency room. Another interesting incident was when I was nervously practising giving bloodthinning injections on a lemon before tackling other half`s mid-section and managed to stab myself. It was, obviously, not a disastrous mishap and I have lived to tell the tale.
All in all, our first experience of an unplanned hospital stay has been, to say the least, traumatic, and one of the better ways of coping is probably to polish up the tiny gems of humour that cling precariously to the grim facade of life´s misfortunes. Betty Davis once said that old age is not a place for wimps and I´m beginning to see what she meant. When I was younger, if you got together with friends, you´d talk about blokes you´d pulled. Now it´s all symptoms and tablets and the next doctor´s appointment. If you don´t want to give in entirely to the ravages of age and tribulation, I suppose the best thing to do is to echo Monty Python´s Life of Brian and look on the bright side of life because the other side is really not one you want to have too much truck with.
We´re off to see the surgeon this coming week to see if all is well and, hopefully, to get some physiotherapy. Fingers Crossed! More news later.
