This is the one blog that I did not want to write. It had been going well at home, I had been home a couple of nights and had been a lot brighter on Sunday and thought it was all going well. Having been for a walk with the dog in the sunshine, I started to feel a bit rough and was wondering if maybe I had over done it a little bit. I decided to have a little nap on the sofa and hoped that would brighten me a little. I was rudely awoken by the Sainsbury’s man knocking on the door for delivery and it all seemed to go fairly quickly downhill from here. I was back having toilet attacks again incredibly frequently and I was in pain again. We had chosen to have a BBQ that evening anyway and so I stuck to the low fibre foods and thought I would manage to get away with it. As it was a weekend there was no support available in terms of the IBD Team or the Crohns and Colitis UK helpline.
I was still passing blood but it was mainly the pain that was the problem. I decided that having a bath might help. Often heat helps to relax muscles and I was just sort of clutching at straws if I am completely honest. I had a bath and it didnt really help, I had to keep getting in and out to go to the toilet. I even got Jordan to bring me a ham sandwich in the bath just in case I really needed to eat and that might help!
I went upstairs hoping that if I could take my medications I would feel alright, get a good nights sleep and it would all pass. I think I laid down for about 10 minutes and I was in so much pain that AGAIN I needed to call 111. I was just not OK and I think I was learning my body enough to learn when I was and wasnt doing alright at this point. 111 advised that I needed to go to A&E and so again at about 11:45pm at night, Jordan and I put the dog in his bed and headed up to the Norfolk and Norwich.
For me, I wont lie, this was absolutely crushing. I’m not going to lie, I cried before we left the house because I didnt want to go. I was so upset. I felt like my body had let me down and wasn’t reacting as it should have done.
When I got to the hospital, I was quite concerned because I was supposed to be shielding and I was in the main part of the hospital and I was not seen at all quickly. I understand that social distancing was in place, but it did not fill me with hope that I was sitting in A&E without a mask with a load of other people and I was immunocompromised. Eventually, when I was seen by triage I was moved into a different area and I felt a lot calmer. I was again hooked up to fluids and IV paracetamol and told that I was going to be admitted. I was gutted. I told Jordan so that he was able to get home for some sleep as I would need him to return later in the day to give me my stuff but the whole trip to A&E was made even more dramatic by the tales and dramas of the people int he cubicle next to me. I shall have to write about it in another post. Eventually, after 6 hours in various parts of A&E I was fully admitted, this time onto a different ward AMUH (I believe) and was wheeled over there in a wheelchair. I was in so much pain but the doctors had not prescribed any morphine for me. I spent probably the first 4-5 hours in AMUH crying, on the toilet, apologising to people for being on the toilet when they needed to talk to me and then asking for morphine. At points I was so tired and in so much pain that I was kind of just passing out in bed.
It was certainly not pretty and this started another long-ish stretch in hospital. I will write about “hospital – round 2” in due course… for now though, this is when I was re-admitted to hospital!