I had so much to say about our little hospital trip, and the further we get from it the less likely I am to write it down. I'm like this with a holiday, if I don't get my thoughts down straight away they're lost for ever. As a modern day Samuel Pepys I can't take this risk. And it was kind of like a holiday, albeit a crap one.
I already mentioned the palaver of getting someone to see our boy when he had the same symptoms as two weeks ago, we were bounced from GP to 111 to walk in centre, a detour to the GP, back to the walk in centre, and then the walk in centre called me and said just go to A&E. Hopefully there's not a next time, but if there is I'm going to A&E first.
Clare came home from work early and drove us to Ashford. I wondered if she'd like to go into the hospital instead of me but she couldn't risk it with her work, mine ought to be more understanding, and indeed they have been. When we got into the children's A&E bit all the computer systems were down, so they also had no access to previous records and had to deal with us from first principles. They could not just accept this was an infection that needed antibiotics they had to treat the symptoms in front of them (sickness, fever, and dehydration) and then do tests to work out what to do next. He got a saline drip again to rehydrate him. Did you know you can taste it when it goes into your veins like this? Amazing. They pumped an anti-emetic in too, which stopped the puking, and in the end they worked out, yes, he needed antibiotics and so they put him on a drip of that too.
At this stage I thought we might be able to go home, but something was going on and there was a delay with the doctor coming back to us. I could hear the other staff saying "where's he gone, he's only got thirty minutes until breach". The words sound like it's relating to a pregnancy, but it became clear there was some sort of time limit, if the doctor didn't come back and see us by a certain time, something was going to happen. I think he just got to us in time, but then it was just taken as read that we're going to the ward and we're staying in overnight. Could have done without this especially as he was much improved after the drugs started going in, but because of lack of information they wanted to keep him in for observation in case it was something else. Same as last time they were looking out for some kind of coronavirus complication or for meningitis or something else horribly serious like that.
When we got to the ward we were given the same bed as last time, and then basically left there for two days. He had nurses checking on him, we were not abandoned, but it didn't feel we needed to be there. He only had his antibiotic drip once per day and for the rest of the time we were just sat.
The first night was quite disturbed, his temperature went up a lot again, over 40°, and he got delirious again. That was a bit scary again but easier to deal with. This time the gabbling was clearly video game related, as I heard words relating to specific games that he plays, Brawl Stars and Fortnite. It's odd that it was the same sort of chatter in the same location, so partly it's to do with him just feeling disturbed, as well as the fever. And we were disturbed, the ward was very noisy as we were in a room of four with other people. As well as the delirious fever, he got up a couple of times, once when I was asleep, and he had to be put back to bed.
Our second night was a lot calmer, we both slept through until he was woken for observations. We assumed it was about 1am but it was half six, so pretty pleased with that. The ear plugs and wine that Clare brought me probably helped me have a peaceful night here. Again we had nothing to do until we were eventually released at about half five.
The trip was very boring, for me and for him. He watched a lot of Youtube on his tablet, which would be his dream day really anyway. I tried to read, I will post my reading as a follow up to this. My friends were a life saver here, they were entertaining me on our Signal group, and I think I was entertaining them with my observations of the others in the ward. They sent me a hamper of snacks too, what amazing boys, I am very lucky.
I asked as we were leaving, if he is not cured and this flares up again badly who can I call? Just go to A&E again is the answer.
Interestingly and topically the nurse who discharged us lived on the same street as the police who is accused of murdering Sarah Everard. She didn't ever meet him, but her partner bought a Volkswagen Beetle from his family's garage, one of the premises being searched as part of the murder investigation. What circles I am moving in.
And then (with only a minor drama of not being able to find the car park ticket and having to pay a tenner to get out) we were on our way, and then home. We had completely the wrong tea for a Friday night, as all the food for the week had not been eaten. Then after tea the boys opened the XBox and were very pleased.
Thing two was super pleased to see us home, and has been politely impressed with the new console, though I think it will be the other one who uses it more. I have given it a go myself, I set up after they went to bed and installed some games. I played Day Of The Tentacle1, which must be thirty years old, so I've not really put it to best use. We played a little Forza1 today though which is quite amazing, not like a game, it's like real.
Ooh, thirty-two years ago today was my first gig, Anthrax at Hammersmith Odeon.
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Paul Clarke's blog - I live in Hythe near Folkestone. Wed + dad to two, I am a full stack web engineer, + I do js / nodejs, some ruby, other languages etc. I like pubs, parkrun, eating, home automation + other diy jiggery-pokery, history, tree stuff, Television, squirrels, pirates, lego, and TIME TRAVEL.