I'm having my mind messed with in the furtherance of medical science.
I returned to the hospital this morning. Well, I say 'the hospital' but strictly speaking, it was the hospital across the road - the Loony Bin*.
First problem. On Friday, one of my tubes of blood defrosted en route to Belgium for analysis. So the doctor needed to take another sample. He took one look at the arm that had failed to yield a drop last week and decided he wouldn't try that one. An attempt on my right arm yielded nothing, just a needle sticking forlornly into my vein with not a drop surrendered.
He then tried my right wrist. Again, the needle sits there, but not a drop a blood would I relinquish. So he started beating up my left arm, and finally concluded that I don't have veins in my elbow. I had tried to explain, my mother has always had the same problem. I have in the past given nearly a whole armful of blood through the elbow, I'll have you know. But like my mother, I try to insist that a woman does it. Or is it a nurse, I can't remember. I have been bled so often in the past two years it really isn't an issue. But I do need a phlebotomist.
Still, I have a new personal motto. "If you prick me, do I not bleed?" (No). And you have a new expression "like getting blood from a Gert." So we all win, don't we? Except the vampires in Belgium. And medical science.
But that was the least of my suffering. The main purpose was a pain threshold test. I had to fill in yet another questionnaire. Self-analysis shows me that pain isn't my main problem; it's the complete and utter exhaustion, lack of energy and inability to concentrate that affects me mostly. And the pain is just there. All the time, but liveable with.
As she applied an increasing pressure to my tenderpoints, I held a button that I had to press when it felt like pain, rather than pressure. And then I had to use a special gadget, plugged into a PC owned by a German University, and, no doubt, connected via the wonders of the internet to Belgium. I had to stick my thumb in a tube. Pressure was applied in increasing amounts and I had to record my measurement of the pain. Then it was randomised, and at times, it hurt. My poor ickle thumb was sore and marked. I had to suck it better.
Tomorrow, we go in search of my brain (which, inevitably, at first attempt I typed as brian). An MRI scan. I have to think carefully what I wear. Nothing metallic. I'm not sure whether that includes my bra, a masterpiece of engineering. And it will be cold. I shall have to concentrate** on the pain, whereas normally for scans they will play music as a distraction. I have to keep my eyes open. Presumably I can't wander off into daydreams, or thinking about the working day ahead, or compiling a shopping list.
I will blog the experience. If it I survive it. That also will be in the Loony Bin.
Naturally, this post cannot be brought to you without a quote from the immortal Tony Hancock
* I know, I know, politically incorrect. But it was me who was admitted to the Loony Bin, not you
** which I am unable to do...it's a symptom of the syndrome
