(To read my cancer story from the beginning start here – April / May 2018 – You Have Cancer)

Drips, overnight feeds and blood transfusions

With still not eating properly my weight was getting lower and lower, now down to about 12 stone so I was put on overnight feeds as well as my daily 4 or 5 fortisips a day.

The feeds were about 8 hours long so I tried to get them started by about 10:00 so they would be finished nice and early in the morning when the activity started, it meant I was supposed to be sleep upright in bed on my back but by the 3rd night I was soon on my side again with bed just slightly tilted.

Daytime I was on 4 fortisips a day and a small amount of fork mashable food, yoghurts and ice cream.

My temperature had stabilised but they were still worried about my bloods, initially I was on drips throughout the day but then I had to have a blood transfusion 🙁

The blood transfusion was right fun and games – They are obviously very careful about matching the blood to the patient and it has all sorts of security on it one of them being a scanner that has to match in with the wrist strap that all patients wear when in hospital.

Also the blood has to be used within a set time period or it is scrapped.

They bought my little pouch of blood along, went through all the checks and double checks then went to scan my wristband before they could hook me up.

They scanned it – Nothing, they tried again – Nothing.

Off they went to get a new scanning machine, came back, scanned my wrist again – nothing

We were now getting a bit close to the cut-off time when I could be given the blood or it being scrapped and me having to wait another day.

They called someone else down who fiddled with the scanner, fiddled with my wristband , tried scanning again – nothing!

They were at a bit of a loss what to do when one of the nurses suggested getting me a new identity band printed.

Off they went and came back 10 minutes later with a new wristband and just 5 minutes before cut-off time scanned it again and this time it worked 🙂

They quickly set everything up with just minutes to spare and left me in bed having my 1st blood transfusion, something I didn’t really like but I knew it was for the best.

I was more comfortable now, my face was still badly swollen, but my scarring wasn’t really noticeable apart from still having a few annoying stitches in my lip, the dressing on my trachy wound and the small hole in my neck which was still occasionally dripping.

It was now 5 weeks after my initial jaw cancer operation and my consultant was keen on getting my radiotherapy mask made so they could start scanning me to map out my radiotherapy and chemo treatment.

Being extremely claustrophobic, the radiotherapy mask making was something I wasn’t keen on but Knew had to be done 🙁

Continues here – Having a radiotherapy mask made

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