Visiting Hospital Again!
Hurray!! I thought I've got through the weekend and I feel OK. Then, my left arm swelled up and became painful. As it was all up my arm but no obvious sign of redness I thought I'd just overdone it with the exercises and so discussed it with the lymphoedema nurse and physio who all thought the same. On wednesday, I had to take AJ for his blood test. Poor child he was obviously worried but very good about having the numbing cream on his arms and then covered up with a plaster. The worst bit was when they took the plaster off and it ripped his hair off his arms!! I distracted him for 20 mins while the cream acted to make his skin numb. That was the easy bit - OK I cheated - Burger King distracted him. Then we went back to the Butterfly Room for him to have his blood taken. My arm had become worse and when I looked at it , I noticed I had a red streak up it and the crook of my elbow had all gone reddish and was very swollen. My first thought was 'I don't want to be admitted' and then AJ got called in. Luckily, the nurse decided to take blood out of his right arm so I could hold it still whilst he and the play worker played with Buzz Lightyear. He only said 'ouch' once and was really pleased with the clown plaster and sticker they gave him. We went up to the emergency chemo ward and the nurse found me a bed and AJ sat with me whilst we waited for my notes and the doctor. Again, they took blood from me so AJ hid behind my scarf so couldn't see and eventually the doctor arrived. She couldn't see that my arm was swollen or the red streak but it was very obvious to me. She arranged for me to have a scan to see if I had a blood clot. We went up to the scanning room and was seen immediately!! They could see that my vein was all inflammed. As they put the ultrasound gel on, AJ asked 'what flavour jelly is it??' I couldn't answer that but it cheered me up. We went back to the ward and the doctor told me just to go home and come back if it got worse. so that was another 4 hours spent in hospital!!
Once home, I started to worry so went to see my own doctor the next day who gave me antibiotics and I also went to see the lymphoedema nurse in the afternoon who gave me a bigger compression sleeve. Hopefully, that will sort it out now.
Spoke too soon about Woody being OK. I noticed last night that he has a ganglion in his left wrist. Presumably, from playing with the XBox as i can't think what else he does with his left hand! It doesn't bother him but I know eventually I will take him to the doctor just to make sure that's all it is!!