TGIF

It has been a week and a half at Lala Towers and I am absolutely cream crackered. On Monday it was such a lovely day we thought we would take advantage and pop over to Verulanium Park in St Albans with the children to visit the Splashzone. We loaded up two Zafiras with kids, lunch, towels etc and headed off .... if anyone else was in the area I was the fruit loop with a gaggle of kids, bright pink floral trolley laden with lunch etc and one three year old boy singing Gimme Gimme a Man after Midnight at the top of his voice !!!! The Splash Zone used to be an old fashioned type paddling pool but it has been modernised into a safe enclosed soft surface area with some fantastic water jets that come on and off and the kids absolutely love it. I needed a day out as husband was still in hospital following his knee replacement operation on the 13th and I wasn't expecting home until the following day. We had only been there half an hour when the mobile went to let me know he was coming out that day but luckily not till later in the afternoon so we could continue with our fun in the park. The ambulance arrived with him at tea time and just at that moment our chook Ginger decided to make another bid for freedom and was found wandering round next door's garden.

Tuesday was another lovely weather day and our local park has had a play rangers scheme running this holiday .... they are there for a couple of hours with loads of equipment for all ages and it is free. We had lunch and walked the ten minutes it takes to get there and the kids immediately got stuck into cricket, crafting and tree climbing. I sat back with my daughter and watched the idyllic scene and opened my big mouth and said that this was what summer holidays were about ...... carefree children enjoying themselves in the sun without a care in the world ....... bad move!!! By the end of the day I had used my accident book three times, one bee sting, one grazed knee and an injured foot from jumping out of a tree (not all on the same child I am pleased to say). Poor old L was very distressed about her foot so we carefully got her home and sat her down with an ice pack .... there were no signs of trauma or swelling but it turns out she had bent it like Beckham and had damaged a metertarsal bone. So I now have two patients on crutches.

Wednesday was bad patient day .... my fifth child (the husband) took it upon himself to overdo it and was in a foul mood because of the pain. I tell you what he tried my bloody patience .... what is it with men that they can't admit defeat and do what they are flaming well told!

Thursday brought the nurse to check his wound ..... she was lovely and invited the children to take a look at it as she changed the dressing ..... they all peered over his leg which has an 8" stapled gash over the knee .... looks like a shark bite she says and they gasped in awe! Following her other checks on him she was concerned about swelling in his calf and a possible DVT. We ended up with a visit from the GP who referred him to hospital for checks ..... an hour later the ambulance arrived to take him and the children had never seen so many people in uniform in one day. My daughter went with him and I followed on once the children had gone home and what an evening we had ..... hospital politics with orthopedics and medical arguing over who was going to take responsibility for his care ..... by the time they had decided the scanning department was closed and at nine o'clock we were sent home following blood thinning injections with instructions to return this morning to the Anti Coagulant Clinic for another injection and then visit to have the leg scanned. Quite straightforward you may think.

But no Friday morning brought the ambulance transport just before nine ..... when I arrived there at ten thirty I expected to see him in scanning because it was clearly written in his notes that he should not be kept waiting ..... but jobsworth on the desk said no she couldn't do that and told him to take a walk around while he was waiting!! This to a man struggling on crutches with a leg twice the size it should be .... doh!! He waited nearly two hours for a two minute injection and then to add insult to injury was told scanning knew nothing about him and that he should go back to the ACU ward he was on last night. This is on the other side of the hospital in a different building on the second floor so I went over to see them .... an hour and a half later we finally spoke to the ward sister who went off to find out what was happening. It turns out that the scan can't be done till Monday afternoon and in the meantime the home care nurses are to administer the blood thinning drugs. At one o'clock we finally left the hospital to find it was chucking it down with rain.

So as you can see an exhausting and eventful week so TGIF ...... I haven't lifted a needle all week.