Tuesday 25th April - The long wait is over

Posting to this blog, and keeping up with projects and admin has been erratic for the last couple of months.

There's a reason for this;

Here are some of the daily drawings that I held back;

Thursday 19th January - top right, an appointment with a wonderful gastroenterology consultant (Himself was also there, but I ran our of space to include him in the drawing);

Back in December 2022 I had a routine CT scan of my lungs. At the follow-up appointment with the Lung clinic consultant in January, I learned that my lungs were more or less unchanged, but the scan had shown something in the pancreas area. She said she had asked for me to be referred to the local hospital gastroenterology department for further investigation. This appointment came through pretty quickly, and resulted in an MRI scan just a few days later; bottom left drawing!  

It was a long scan - about 30 minutes, maybe more; hard to tell with your eyes firmly shut! But then I had to wait - and wait - and wait to hear the results. I had been assured by the specialists - lung and gastroenterologist - that the most likely thing was that the unidentified objects would be harmless cysts. I had been in contact with the medical secretary because they wanted to get hold of the original CT scan, so I knew that my case had been reviewed within a week, but then she said the follow-up appointment would be 8-10 weeks... Oh. My. Word. 

I tried to stay calm by thinking that they would get in touch sooner if rapid action was required - I had been referred as a 'fast-track referral'. Even so, 8-10 weeks.

Meanwhile my father (who will be 94 in a couple of months) was ill in March for three or four weeks, so there was worry and appointments and so on for him as well...

Well, he has recovered and is back to his usual self, playing bridge every week, going to the quiz night, and hopefully even joining the weekly chair-exercise sessions which are beginning again!

And yesterday;

We had my follow-up appointment; yes, they ARE just cysts, and nothing else needs to be done about them (let sleeping cysts lie?). Another hugely helpful, knowledgeable, kind consultant - surgeon this time - took the time to explain everything very clearly.

I'm very relieved, and it is only now that the effort of staying calm, coping with the daily round of life plus dealing with what I think of as 'unexpected items in bagging area' is making itself felt. 

Normal service might be resumed soon...

Cross Country Collaboration

There have been many days over the past few weeks when I have been completely unable to concentrate on anything for more than a few minutes. But today was a marathon cross-stitch day. I have worked out that I will need to do 1,910 stitches for April's picture. Today, after an hour or so this morning, and again in the afternoon, I have completed 1,380 stitches! You don't know how good this makes me feel! So that means just 530 to go. I might even get it into the post box on Sunday!