Well fancy that !! I’m back in hospital again, looking out over the Galloway Hills.

Got a slight fever on Wednesday evening after spending several hours pottering about in the garden. Did I over do it again ? I was on my legs for a fair time. Was it sunstroke or was it connected with a little piece of wickedness from earlier in the week or none of the above? Anyway, a few phone calls later and I was packing my bags for an overnight stay in Dumfries Royal Infirmary.

Christine and I left the house about 9.30 pm for the half hour journey into Dumfries. She set off back home about 12.30 am but they were still messing about connecting me up with antibiotic drips well after 3 am. It’s very nice to be so well looked after but utterly exhausting when all you want to do is lie down and sleep. But that’s just hospital admissions procedure; it always seems to take a long time.

Day 1: The following morning my haemoglobin count was 81. The Doctor in charge decided to give me a blood transfusion - two units of type A. Quite exciting to be given type A for the first time it’s always been type O up to now. A real sign that my new donor cells are settling in and taking over. Good bye to the old Rodg.
Although my temperature had subsided a little it was back up again in the morning so, with a bag of blood in my hand to a line in my arm, I was transfered from Admissions Ward 7 to Haematology Ward 10. Having had only 4 hours sleep I was feeling a bit rough whatever else was going on inside me. I snatched what sleep I could but there were staff coming in every 20 mins disturbing me for one thing or another. It was only after lunch that an extended period without disturbance occured and I went out like a light, dead to the world for about 2 hours. I felt refreshed by it.
Examination of tests that had been done on samples I’d left last week showed I did have a stomach virus - norovirus. Other tests were underway. I was definitly in for a second night.

Christine dropped by in the early evening and left me with the local paper which I read from cover to cover while the beautiful evening light faded. I managed to get the nurse to disconnect the transfusion line long enough to get into my night clothes and wash, then I crashed out on the bed and they were free to do what they liked to me. I remember little else until the first stirings in the corridor at 5.40 am.





Day 2: Midday. Big Chief Doc. wants me confined to my single room in case I still have norovirus or have CDiff. Says it maybe GvHD or a combination of several things: at the moment they’ve no idea. Definitely here for a third night. Damn ! the weather’s glorious; I want to be outside in the fresh air. Sampling this volcanic ash that’s coming from the Iclandic volcano and closing all the airports.