New Life Cont:

Carole came home, she was very sleepy in the afternoons, quite unsteady, on her feet, in the mornings.
When you are discharged from hospital you are told that the your GP is responsible for for ongoing care etc.
First problem is that there is no 'electronic' communication from the RUH to the GP, it takes around 2 weeks for a patients notes to go from the hospital to the GP."
2nd Problem ; In Carole's case the dischrge notes had her drug regime wrong, the GP made it no better, I had to sort it out.
3rd problem, I am in a full time job, so cannot be at home to look after Carole all the time, so I had to leave her, always worried that something would happen.The NHS assumes you will be ok, and will not provide care to people on modest 'middle class' incomes at all, except we pay all the taxes for it.
The GP did organise CTOPs to come and see she was ok in the bathroom when she got up, I watched take her morning pills before I left for work, and she paid a friend to come round and cook lunch, etc. during the day.
There was always a worry for me between the friend finishing and me getting home.
Carole's steroids were on a tapering dose, dropping by a couple of tablets each week.
As we reduced the dose her old symptoms started to reappear.
One evening, I came home to find blood on her head, she had fallen, it was nearly a year later after she had died, I figured out where.
I rang for the out of hours GP who came and checked her out, she had a cut on her forehead.
Later when the GP had gone, I discovered, that Carole had taken all her next days drugs in the confusion.
Fortunately I only let her have the pills, one day at a time.
I rang the GP and was told that she would be ok.
I was at my wits end, and took the next day off, a Friday, as I recall, to help Carole, things were not good, I was losing weight myself, with the worry.
Here is a picture I took of the weir in Bath on a 15mm lens.

New Life part 2

Once Carole was admitted she was CT scanned and MRI scanned, a junior doctor, made a big effort to get the MRI scanner opened up, as Caroles condition was so serious,
She was on the Medical Evaluation Ward for about a week, until they could find a bed.
They found large lesions on the outside surface of her brain.
The diagnosis was ADEM, Acute Disseminating Encephalymyalitis, and she was put on an older non-neuro ward upstrairs, as neurology was closed due to the noro-virus.
This is an auto-immune disease caused by a viral infection. So she was treated with anti viral and eventually steroids to reduce the brain swelling.
The older ward upstairs at the RUH was not great, and all the wards suffer from noisy people , at night, and too many old folks, who shouldn't be in the hospital, but society doesn't provide other options.
They should put all the noisy patients together, so the other patients get a good nights sleep, enabling faster recovery.
Carole was in for about 4-5 weeks, my employer was very good, allowing me to leave early to visit her.
She was not right on discharge, she couldn't remember the street names on the way home.
I find doing this blog mixed, it brings up memories, but feel others can learn from the events that happened.
Here is a picture I took in Spain this year.

New Life without Carole

I haven't posted for some time, since I last posted a lot has changed in my life , sadly, Carole, my ex-wife, died in May 2008.
I will tell the story to help others not make the same mistakes as we both did in our divorce and preceding events.
This make take a few blog entries.
Carole had started to get headaches and dizziness at the time of my last post, she had been diagnosed with labarythitis, an inner ear infection.
We were both stuck in our house, over valued, trying to sell it.
Still Oct 2007.
One day when we were having a viewing, she couldn't, face going out, so we sat in the car while the house viewing took place, she complained of terrible headaches, she was obviously in pain.
We went inside and she was sick and could only repeat the words' sick and dizzy'.
I called out the emergency doctor,who did tests, called an ambulance, and told me ' it doesnt look good' and expect a long haul.
We went to the RUH ,A&E,
I will continue in my next post here is a picture of Carole taken about 1 year before our divorce.