Saturday 17th September
After breakfast a cardiac specialist rocks up with a cardiac nurse.
They’re very jolly types and I immediately like them.
The last couple of heart traces have been good, but the blood test results weren’t brilliant.
I resist the urge to say I’ll try harder next time.
I’m going to be transferred to the Trent Cardiac Unit over at Nottingham City Hospital.
I’ll have more detailed tests there.
And an angiogram.
There may be an operation, if the angiogram finds things that need to be attended.
A couple of hours later I’m moved to Nottingham City Hospital.
The Trent Cardiac Unit is a totally different experience to Ward B at QMC.
For the better.
I text my Director to update her.
Her reply is full of concern.
There are other enquiring texts and voicemails from colleagues who knew that I’d gone home feeling unwell late on Friday morning.
I respond, but I’m wondering how and who I can get to cover the meetings I have on Monday if I’m not allowed home tomorrow?
Sam arrives with many things of goodness for me.
She’s spoiling me so much.
She looks tired.
A nurse arrives to check me in.
This procedure includes a test of my mental powers.
I don’t know if the purpose of the test is to see if I have any mental damage, or just to see if I’m an idiot.
I think I pass.
Later Sam and I go out for a walk around the hospital grounds and Oh My Goodness it’s so good to get out for some fresh air.
As we walk and talk I wonder where my Will is, and try to remember whether I’ve signed the latest version that arrived from my solicitor a few weeks ago.
Sam has been googling heart attack stuff.
She tells me how long I’m likely to be off work and frankly I am absolutely horrified.
She tells me how long it is before I’m likely to be allowed to ride the ZX10R and this news stuns me.
She tells me that I won’t be allowed to have sex for four weeks and the news devastates me.
Four weeks!
I may as well become a nun or something.
Later, during a nursing shift change, I ask about the angiogram that I’m due on Monday.
The incoming nurse expresses surprise.
She feels that it is more likely that I’ll be having the angiogram on Tuesday. Or possibly on Wednesday.
I begin to feel that time is slipping away from me.
Later Sam asks me if my situation could have been brought on by the hotel fire klaxon.
I’m not sure, but I do recall a prescient Facebook post I wrote after the alarm, whilst I was trying, unsuccessfully, to sleep again.
Sam goes home.
There are tears.
I fall asleep watching Live, Die, Repeat.