I Get a Hickman Line

Thursday 20th to Sunday 23rd September 2007

Thursday is a day for relax and recuperation, before going down to Brighton on Friday for blood tests and the fitting of my Hickman Line. I see Tim Corbett about my chesty cough and he prescribes me Augmentin to ensure any infection is sorted out. I have a sedative to help make the Hickman line fitting a lot easier for me and it knocks me out from 12.15pm to 3pm. That’s the way to do it! I have no idea what happened and that suits me fine. I weigh in today at 75.8 kgs and my blood results are good - Wbc: 9.2; Neuts: 8.3; Lymph: 0.5; Hbn: 10.2; PLT: 113; and CRP: 10.

I am feeling the after effects of the fitting of my line by Saturday morning, with a rather bruised collar bone area and chest. This is not helped by my chesty cough seeming to be worse than before. So we call off our planned lunch with Tony and Pam at Seasalter. Tina takes me down to the RSCH where my Hickman line is cleaned and re-dressed in the Haematology Ward. She learns how to do this for me for the next few days. I then have a quiet day, watch England beat Samoa and have a good three hours sleep afterwards. Later Tina and I have a “heart - to - heart” about the impending transplant and its potential prospects. In the course of this we talk about what happens if I do not survive the procedure. We had often talked in the past about who might survive whom and about buying a burial plot in the village cemetery, but had not discussed these things since I was diagnosed. Delicate territory I suppose. I tell her that I had bought a very nice plot a couple of months ago but only wanted to mention it when it was the “right” time - whenever that might be. This was it. Although all this is difficult to talk about, we feel very close.

I am not feeling much better on Sunday - in fact my shoulder area is decidedly tender - and my cough is no better. We have Matthew, Charrise and the girls for the day. This includes my going through a number of practicalities with Matthew following our talks last evening. I have typed out a fairly comprehensive list of things “in case anything happens….” Matthew is super about it all and I know will be a source of great support to Tina should the worst actually happen. I plan to talk these things through with Anna as well when she is with us in the next couple of days. By mid afternoon I am tired out and have another three hours sleep on the bed.