Some recent pieces.

Bulletins

They want to know why people are stressed
and so depressed in this modern age.
People’s lives were always tough
you took the smooth along with the rough
yet stress has mounted, year on year
so why is that? Could it be fear?
In days of yore concerns were yours
you didn’t know of far off wars,
of other nations’ trouble and strife
of some guy beating or killing his wife,
unless that guy lived very near
these were things you’d never hear.
You see what I mean? The more we learn
the more we worry, the more we burn
with deep concern
for matters we haven’t a hope in hell
of ever solving. Might as well
turn off the tv, the PC screen,
close our eyes to what might have been
and kiss the world goodbye.
Or simply sit and cry.

© August 2014


The Start of Another Day

I wake from a good night’s sleep for once
as the sunlight streams through the window,
growl hello to the cat - my mezzo soprano
is coming out basso profundo.
No energy yet to rise and shine
I submit to her feline wishes
and contemplate having to go downstairs
and deal with a sinkful of dishes.
When the caterwauling becomes intense
I turn myself onto my side
push myself up to a sitting pose
and wait for the room to subside.
I follow her to the bathroom
- she knows my habits well -
then, ablutions done, we go downstairs
to the unkempt kitchen from hell.

©  July 2014


Winnie the Pooh

At times he reminds me of Winnie the Pooh
which  may seem odd to you;
something about his shape perhaps,
the rounded tum, the flattish bum;
he’s sweet and round as a sugar plum.

And the way he walks, and his tender heart,
and his simple child-like intellect
which nonetheless is very wise.

Yes, he can be foolish, thoughtless too at times,
a bear of very little brain?
But he’s such a soft old cuddlesome thing
my sunshine through the rain.

July 2014.


Shot ( A poem of M.E.)

Imagine you’re a rag doll,
sounds funny but it’s not,
for instead of using something soft
they’ve stuffed you with lead shot.

And as you lie upon your bed
in this most parlous state
moving feels impossible:
like shifting a ton weight.

You lie there thinking what the hell
has someone done to me
when suddenly you realise
you really need to pee.

You summon up some energy,
just an ounce or two,
enough to get your body
off the bed and to the loo.

You remember having muscles
but those, it seems have gone.
And as for bones, forget it.
you may as well have none.

For me it isn’t always so,
most days I manage more.
For others it’s a way of life,
truly, I’m in awe.

© July 2014



I Want My Body Back

Someone stole my body; it’s really most remiss.
They took away the one I had, replacing it with this.
Please, I want my body back, I want my body back!

The one I had could walk for miles and running was a cinch.
This one barely moves at all, inch by painful inch.
Please, I want my body back, I want my body back!

Mine was slim and firm and lithe, it loved to dance all night.
This one’s twice the size of mine, a doughball, soft and white.
Please, I want my body back, I want my body back!

I used to have such healthy skin. I’d show it off with pride.
This substitute is spotty - a thing I can’t abide.
Please, I want my body back, I want my body back!

Just look at it: the dimpled thighs, the sagging breasts and butt,
the bingo wings, the flabby skin, the elephantine gut!
Please, I want my body back, I want my body back!

I really am not happy with the one I’m wearing now.
The former Running Deer has been replaced by Sitting Cow!
Please, I want my body back, I want my body back!

If anyone can tell me who took away my body
please let me know, I’d like it back, even if it’s shoddy.
Please, I want my body back, I want my body back!

© July 2014


Opposable Thumbs

I sing in praise of opposable thumbs
and yes I know that may sound dumb
but thumbs are so useful, thumbs are fine
and oh how I miss the use of mine.
With one of them out of action for now
life is much trickier. Thumbs, take a bow!

 June 2014


Fighting For Food

I fight with the fridge to open the door
I fight with wrapping and packets galore.
It’s all for my health and safety of course
as I break my nails and shout myself hoarse.
I don’t know who invents this stuff
that makes my life frustratingly tough.
It only adds to my dejection.
Do we need so much protection?

June 2014








Living in Second Life


Why do I live in Second Life? Cause living there is easy!
I dress with a click, don’t have to wash, and don’t get knackered or wheezy.
There I can walk and run and fly, dancing is a doddle.
Here I can barely get out of bed and walking is more of a waddle.
Want a new house? No problem mate. I’ll have it done in a jiffy.
My island is landscaped, with lake and trees, and none of them look iffy.
Here I’m a sad old so-and-so if occasionally funny.
There I’m young and fit again, in fact a bit of a honey.
So now you know, I love my lives, each for different reasons.
But I have to say it’s rather nice to be able to change the seasons!

:)

© June 2014


Too Early 


Early, too early.
No hint or tint of dawn disturbs
the eastern sky and yet
she wakes me, makes me
beg for mercy. Please
please show some pity
pretty kitty, let me sleep
today.

© May 2014


Little Tablets

Little tablets on the bedside, little tablets made of ticky tacky
little tablets, little tablets, and they all go down the same,
there’s a pink one and a green one and blue one and a yellow one
and they all come in little boxes and they all look very tame.

And the tablets in the boxes all give us some side effects
but the doctors still prescribe them and we take them just the same
And the people don’t imagine that tablets might do them harm
so they swallow all the tablets and they know they’re not to blame.

© May 2014

Hospitals I Have Known. - Not for the squeamish.

Hospitals I Have Known.



I have been admitted to hospital a few times now with various experiences. My experiences of childbirth deserves a book of its own so I’ll ignore those for now.

My first experience involved a simple lumpectomy, a fibroadenoma. There was nothing remarkable about it. I had to contend with a stream of student doctors coming to examine the beautiful continual stitch around my areola but, apart from that, it went off without a hitch.

The next time was for a hysterectomy due to prolapse. This was a nightmare.  It was supposed to be a simple short procedure but in the event things were not so simple, they couldn’t stop the bleeding nor get the stitches to hold.  I was on the table for hours, had a blood transfusion, and was kept unconscious for three days due to the intense pain.  Also the food was inedible, really. No fibre, fish that was transparent by the time I got it having dried up totally, and so on. I became horribly constipated, for days on end, and when I finally managed after a number of pessaries and an enema, what I saw in the commode looked like something a horse would pass.  Also I couldn’t pass urine because of swelling and had to be cathererized. Added to the physical trauma was a woman in the next bed dying of what I assumed to be bowel cancer. I know she couldn’t help it but the ward smelled like a field of rotting cabbages. The nurses never came if you rang for them so people were left with bursting bladders for a very long time.  And on top of all this the ward above was being refurbished so there was constant hammering, sawing, drilling and so on which meant no sleep.

And talking of bursting bladders, which I was, when the nurses removed my catheter after about a week, they neglected to do a residual test and my bladder started to swell to bursting point.  When the doctor discovered this he exploded and had the catheter put back. By this time the pain and bad food and lack of sleep led to me walking out in my nightie, catheter bag in hand, desperate to go home.  They managed to persuade me to stay overnight, promising me that I could go home in the morning and come back in a week by which time things should have settled down.  So that’s what happened.  Unfortunately I already had ME at this stage and the whole experience left me devastated for a very long time. 

I had a short spell in another hospital for my knee to be stabilized. That wasn’t bad, I coped fine with it. And the next operation was for another tumour, this time a not so benign one, but once more I was treated with utmost care and concern. It was almost like being on holiday. A nice rest, being looked after by people who appeared to know what ME is and made sure I would be safe.

However, I recently underwent an experience in yet another hospital which was remarkable to say the least.  A question: How do you convince hospital staff who basically know nothing about ME that the sensory overload of bright lights day and night, constant noise, chattering visitors, and people in general, causes stress, which leads to adrenaline, which - in my case - sends blood pressure soaring, when all they can say is "Do you normally have high blood pressure?"

Some friends suggested I went to the GP  due to terrible lower bowel pain I’d had. 8.30 am seemed ok for getting in early. Wrong. Waiting room already full. Turns out I don't have a GP assigned to me any more so after a long wait in which I started passed out, due to orthostatic intolerance,  I saw the Nurse Practitioner about the pain and puking I’d done. He suggested I go to hospital for a scan "to be on the safe side." They ordered me a taxi, now late morning. No one asked if I needed to make any arrangements at home if I was kept it.  First mistake. I have an ageing, sick, senile cat at home, who panics if left alone and had no food out.  But I naively thought I’d be home shortly.

At the hospital they spend an age filling in forms and doing all the usual basic tests until the surgical reg came around. Having had my belly poked and pushed by a variety of people now, one more wasn't going to make much difference. He said we'd do a CAT scan to be on the safe side, considering my age. “To be on the safe side.”

He went away. Then I found myself being fitted with a drip which apparently I had to have before a CAT scan. A drip which unknown to me was to take four hours. Then the surgical reg passed by and asked me if I'd had the scan yet! NO says I.  I was by this time freezing cold, sitting in light summer clothes under the air conditioning vent.  A nurse brought me a blanket to wrap myself in and at least the small ward was fairly dimly lit and quiet.

Then they moved me up to a ward.  Bewildered now I kept telling them I shouldn’t be there.  Around 7pm I was really starting to worry about my poor cat who had now been home alone for nearly 12 hours with no food. "Never mind" I thought, "soon have the scan and home." Then they hung up another bag of saline. Another four hours would take us to 11 pm. No way they'd do the scan that night! In the morning was now the plan. One nurse even suggested I might be there for the whole weekend!

By now my blood pressure was in the 220s which put everyone in a flap. The excruciating pain from the cuff was unbelievable.  This happens to me when I get over stressed.  If I told them once I told them a dozen times.  But of course, night staff, day staff, different doctors….. The night that followed was impossible -  lights left on all night, constant beeping from drip machines, clanging and banging of new admissions coming in. No sleep, or very little. And every 3 hours the torture of blood pressure tests. Me trying to be stoic and failing miserably, nurses saying they were so sorry but they had to keep checking, and systolic staying around the 220 mark. 

During the night a very nice young house doctor bounded in, checked me all over and made the decision that this was just stress, acute hypertension, nothing to worry about. He had previously asked why I was on a drip as my creatinine levels were fine. He was so nice my pressure dropped to near normal when he did it.  But by morning I - and others- were knackered from lack of sleep and the damned torture went on. One foreign nurse thought maybe we'd get a better result on my lower leg. We didn't and it felt like my leg was breaking. I still have pain from that occasionally.

However I finally got my scan. Nothing much to see except gall stones and diverticular disease, both of which were no news to me. So it had all been for nothing, really, though it ruled out anything "nasty". Now could I please go home? Oh no, the doctor has to discharge you. When? When he gets here, he's very busy. Well could I go home, feed the cat and come back? You could but he'll be here between 1 and 2. OK, I'll wait.  2 o clock came and went. Images of a dead cat keep running through my head.  Again with the blood pressure tests, again with the pain. And still the bright lights, and then visiting time. Numbers of chatty people driving me totally insane.  I simply can’t handle it.  I kept walking out of the bay looking for somewhere quiet to get some relief but the whole ward was the same. Eventually one nurse asked me what I needed and took me to a day room I had no idea was there. 

Four o clock came. I couldn’t take any more.  I threw a total wobbly and, sobbing, started walking out with the cannula still in my arm. That got them moving. Phone calls right left and centre. Doctor  will come soonest.  Six o clock he arrived with effusive apologies, so busy today. To be fair he was so dishy, I'd have let him off almost anything. 

He listened to my explanation of stress etc and agreed it was perfectly reasonable but he had to check with his boss and then I could go. His boss was less than convinced. He might keep me in for further tests. NOOOOO.  And they might want to take out my gall bladder at some point.  I just looked at him.  By this time the pressure had dropped to 168 over 90, clearly a huge improvement at the thought of going home.  And much less painful I might add.  So after much deliberating they decided to do a ten lead ECG and if that was normal I could go home.

The ECG was fine, needless to say.   So ok, I can go HOME!

The cat was still alive, thankfully; the kitchen was a bit of a mess where she'd been hunting for food but after some tinned salmon she more or less forgave me for my unwilling neglect.  So, I don't care if my gall bladder explodes with stones flying everywhere, NEVER AGAIN!