Well I have been very slack at updating this blog since my first post and Emily has been nagging (ooops I mean encouraging!) me to update so here we go....A few days after getting back from France I went up to the Brompton Hospital to start on IV's. For anyone who doesn't know what that is, it involves having a very fine tube inserted into a vein in my arm, which then remains in place for 2 weeks during which I administer diluted drugs straight into my bloodstream. I am on two antibiotics during this time and they are given three times a day.
It was really difficult getting the line in, as my veins are very scarred from 14 years of doing this to them! It took four exceptionally painful attempts at different sites to find a vein that the line could be inserted into. This took about an hour and during that time I think I crushed Brad's hand to pieces, but eventually it went in and it has thankfully lasted nearly 2 weeks without packing up, so at least I haven't had to go through putting another one in as well!
The side effects of the drugs have been really bad this time round. For the first 48 hours I had temperatures and had to lie down all the time because otherwise I fainted. After that the temperature dropped but I felt like I had flu for a week and could hardly do anything. The last few days have been a bit better, but I've still not been out really and I am soooo tired! Tonight I feel so tired I can hardly function...it feels like I'm too tired to breathe. I can't wait until I finish the course and remove the line tomorrow, and can start to feel better YAY!
The one day out I have managed in the last 2 weeks was to see Emily WOO HOO!!! We had such a fantastic day and I really enjoyed it. We decided to make a giant pink sugar mouse in the garden (looooong story!) and it involved a great deal of mess and laughter. Emily kept trying to insist she knew exactly what she was doing (when clearly she hadn't a clue) and the picture of us makes it look like we are escapees from a hospital (which actually is probably worryingly close to the truth given our totally mad behaviour....)
On Friday it was Daisy's 2nd Birthday!!! Daisy is my doggy for anyone who doesn't know, and she is simply the cutest and loveliest little thing in the world. She has the ability to make me smile even when I feel really sad, just by looking at me with her huge eyes and wagging that tail madly. We decided to spend the afternoon in the park with my Mum and Dad, and had a barbeque. It was such a lovely day..the sun shone all afternoon, Daisy played with her new football and lots of food and drink disappeared. My Mum (bless her) even made Daisy a Birthday cake out of her dog food and chicken...which disappeared in about 1 minute flat!
On Tuesday we are off to Barcelona for two nights to celebrate our anniversary (although its not until May 29th, so a little early). On the Wednesday night we are seeing Il Divo in concert there and I can't wait! It will be the second time we have seen them and I love them and their music to bits, so it will be an amazing night. We have booked a really nice hotel and I think it has a spa that you can pay to go into, so we are hoping to spend Wednesday afternoon there!
I have been studying in the garden today and I studied all afternoon yesterday too, but I'm still really behind on my course. It's so difficult to keep up because I'm supposed to put 12 hours work in a week, and what with feeling rubbish and sleeping loads and trying to do stuff for the campaign, it's nowhere near that! Anyway, I'm just going to keep at it and accept that if I can't get it finished this year, I'll just have to carry it on through next year. At the moment I'm doing a block all about the structure of planets and the Earth itself (including volcanoes, earthquakes etc) and I'm really enjoying it...much more than the last block which was all about climate change and nearly drove me insane!
Things are still going well with the campaign. Emily appeared on ITN lunchtime news on Thursday and was an absolute star! The feature was about how 41% of families refuse consent for their loved ones' organs to be donated and about how the UK has one of the lowest rates of organ donation in Western Europe. I'm so desperate for Emily to get her transplant. Every time the phone rings late at night I think it might be a phonecall to say she has been called. Knowing that Emily needs this transplant so much is what spurs me on to keep doing all we can with the campaign.
Well I think that's about it for this update. I am definitely going to post more often as it takes ages to go through 3 weeks worth of news! Hopefully next time I'll be able to write all about a lovely time in Barcelona. Byeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!! xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
