Awful night for Karen last night. I had a great sleep, but felt her get in and out of bed several times. She was very unsettled and as she put it in the morning…..

kp:- I had a really lonely night last night.

Anyway, I got her up about 12.15pm. This afternoon, we went to Adele’s as it was Louisa’s 3rd birthday party.

kp was flagging even before we left, but she managed to have a good time.

Here is kp and Louisa………….

Here is Louisa blowing out her candles…………

We took Marie back to her house on the way home. Middlesbrough has more bloody speed bumps per mile than any other city I know. It has ALWAYS driven me crazy. I personally think we should all drive over the blasted things at 30mph and send the bl++dy council the bill for the damage caused. Blimey, I am not half irritable coming off these fags !!

Anyway, Karen doesn’t like any bumps in the car anyway since her accident, but at the moment, being so soon after the op, she hates them as each one causes her pain and I WASN’T even going 30mph. I was really slowing down ! One is a joke, but we must have done TWENTY on the 2 mile trip to Marie’s. Bloody pathetic.
Poor kp.

Within 5 minutes of dropping Marie off, kp was snoring in the car and slept the whole way home !!

Gorgeous weather today.

kp was in a bit more pain today from the op. Her stomach was very tender. Coincidentally it is the day the patches are changed, so maybe it is wearing off a little.

I needed a snooze late morning as I had been up since about 5am.
At lunchtime, Adele and Abbie arrived. Adele came to clean our house. while Abbie came to wake me up in style by jumping up and down on me in bed.

Abbie spent most of the afternoon helping Karen tend to the garden…..

I left at 2.30pm to attend Newcastle United Football Club (NUFC). The company I work for has a cracking box there and we were treat to a 3-course meal before the 5pm kickoff against Lillestrum. The experience was amazing, NUFC’s football skills were atrocious in the first half, but they managed to equalize in the second half. But, it didn’t deter from a fabulous experience. Big thanks to Julie (work colleague) for taxiing me there and back. It allowed me to maximise the use of the free bar

The box is dead centre of the pitch and directly above Sir John Hall’s box. He was within spitting distance of my seat, but I didn’t as it would have put his cigar out.

On my return home, we watched Poker Face and Big Brother. Marge had arrived for a few days stay and that’s it for the day.

Good Nights’ sleep all round last night.

kp got up at 11am. Another scorcher of a day, so we breakfasted outside and then I got kp ready. She had got badly sunburnt yesterday. Strangely, her left side (stroke side) always gets more sunburnt than her right ?!

It hurt her a little when she was in the shower with the hot water touching it, but not as much it would a stroke-free person.

Afterwards, she wanted me to put some sun lotion on so she didn’t get more burnt today. I applied it, and said……….

dp:- “Does that not hurt ?”

kp:- “No, can’t feel a thing”

dp:- “Eeeee, you’re lucky you have a stroke otherwise this would really hurt”
DOH !!!! I didn’t mean to say that !! But kp was ok with it !

Marge has been kindly jobbing on, doing washing and hanging it up……

kp watered her plants. She shouldn’t really be exerting herself this much, especially stretching like this, but she is feeling remarkably well and wanted to. She did feel like she had overdone it after !

Time for a rest after that. Her head was too hot, so Marge got her a tea-towel…..

Marge, Marge, Marge…..what are we going to do with you ?!

Regular blog readers may be familiar with Marge and her malapropisms. We had more today…………

My dad has very kindly offered to buy kp a new wardrobe of clothes to fit the new-look kp. kp was telling dad this. It went something like this………..

kp:- David’s dad has said he is going to buy me a new wardrobe.

Marge :- Oh, that’s nice.

PAUSE

Marge :- Why do you need a new wardrobe ? Where would you put it ?

kp (laughing) :- He meant a new set of clothes, a wardrobe of clothes.

Marge :- Oh, that’s nice

And it continued……

Marge :- you should go to to MataLAND

She meant Matalan

Good Old Marge !

Scorcher today. Too hot really ! Bring back the rain and the cold !!

Generally uneventful day. kp watered her plants. Marge has been jobbing on BIG TIME. The rest of the time was spent out in the garden.

Here are kp and Marge on the phone to Marie…………

Bad Night for kp.

kp:- I didn’t sleep a wink.

dp:- But you were snoring at 7am when I got up, love.

kp:- Well, I didn’t have a good night’s sleep.

To be fair, she didn’t, I awoke a few times in the night and she wasn’t there. I thought maybe she had another fella, but I couldn’t be arsed investigating any further than that.

Today, Marge has been jobbing on continously. I can’t even recall what she has done, but pretty much every room has been tampered with in some way. Thanks Marge !! You’re a star. Amazing what OAP’s can do !

Tonight, we went back to the Washington BUPA hospital to get kp’s staples out. The surgeon was “very pleased” with how quickly kp was back on her feet and he was VERY proud of his work and the left-over incision. It is very good even from a layman’s point of view.

I managed to get kp “sign off” to post a picture of kp with the staples in.

With all the staples out, we went to Sainsbury’s shopping and then retired early.

Some other good news. I have finally finished the blog “book style” version. I will be releasing it over the weekend. Karen is really looking forward to reading it. A lot of hard work has gone into it. For those interested, it contains…..

1. A prologue explaining where kp and I were in our lives pre-accident
2. Details of the accident itself, including witness statements from police and others, including photos
3. An immediate aftermath report, detailing what people at the scene of the accident did to help kp and the other victims.
4. The first 3 weeks of the blog have been substantially changed or added to in order to paint a much fuller picture for Karen

It was quite upsetting for me to do but I know kp will be interested to fill in these missing weeks.

Another scorcher and quite a busy day today.

We had a visit today from Karen’s occupational health person. Not a very productive meeting and the poor lady had come all the way from Larnock in Scotland. She basically just asked how Karen was and if they could do anything to help her. Nice lady though.

The day before yesterday, I dug a big hole and cemented in a new sign post for our house to replace the rotting wood one we have at present. With the cement all set, I hung the sign today. Here is kp admiring my (and Tommy’s) handiwork.

At 1pm, a work colleague of mine came round and we spent the afternoon working from home. Marie arrived and along with kp spent most of the afternoon outside in the heat. Marie had done her usual “I have bought a bargain” routine. The bargains were in the form of sun hats. Guess the price…………….

1 quid each !!

We had Sirloin Steak, Mushrooms, Onions and Chips outside. It was the best part of the day.

I did more work on the blog today. Most of the pictures have been resized so they fit more neatly in the blog. Michelle was having problems seeing some photos so I expect others were too. The photos appear smaller, but if you want the full-size, you should be able to click on the foto.

The blog book is now complete. It can be accessed by clicking on “Book Version” in the top right hand corner. Over the next day or so, I will be expanding the chapter list so you can navigate straight to key parts of kp’s recovery.

Weather still hot, but note quite as nice today. Cloudy, but muggy.

Marie was up until 4am reading the Blog Book, so didn’t get up until later than usual. kp wasn’t up until 12.45pm. I was at a meeting from 11am until 2pm and came back to find that Karen was cooking tea (with Marie’s assistance). Lamb Shank.

I could do with a nice Lamb Shank

After it was all prepared, Marie and Karen took the dogs for a walk……

Apparently, on the walk, Marie and Karen went to say hello to 2 horses. All fine until they walked away from the horses and the horses decided to follow kp and Marie. Marie freaked. kp was as cool as a cucumber trying to calm Marie. The horse nudged Karen (ever so gently). kp told Marie who nearly burst into tears.

Now that would have been a good photo for the blog

Tears today !

To set the scene, last night, Karen and I started reading the blog book version from the start. I had asked her not to read it on herself as I wanted to share the experience with her. We read the prologue, the accident and the accident aftermath sections and then retired for the night.

But……..Karen couldn’t sleep, so she decided to read some more of the blog book.

This morning, Karen got up for her shower, was very quiet, hardly saying a word and I listened out for the usual bang of the shower door and went into the bathroom. The bang of the shower door is my cue for drying duties. I started drying her and then out of the blue…………..

kp:- Did you tell the hospital not to resuscitate me ?
dp:- Have you been reading the blog ?

kp:- Yes.

I got upset (to tears) and told her that this was the very reason she shouldn’t be reading it on her own, because I wanted to be there to explain things to her. Karen started getting more upset than me about the “DNR” (Do not resuscitate) discussion. I went on to explain that I HADN’T told the hospital not to resuscitate her, but that as a family we had discussed it and organ donation because things were THAT bad.

Karen then got upset over the fact she had been reading the blog on her own when I had specifically asked her not to.

This is the ONE thing that I DIDN’T want her to read on her own. There are other things that will need explanation, but this is the one I was dreading.

Anyway we got past this. Although it has knocked her for 6, and I know she is still thinking about it and will be for a few days, but I am sure we’ll get past it.

Today, we went to the RVI Hospital at Newcastle, to get Karen’s eyes sorted. They really get her down at times. She has little useable sight in her right eye, really only seeing light and dark, and psychologically, she needed this sorting.

So, after seeing a nurse who checked kp’s blood sugar levels and eyesight. we saw Miss Dayan at the RVI ( a lovely lady eye surgeon ).

She tried to get Karen to explain what the problem was. Karen explained the problem as what she sees is jumbled up. This was too vague for Miss Dayan, so she expertly narrowed down what kp meant by this to……..When Karen looks at something, quite a large section to the right is missing.

When her right eye is covered up, the sight is much improved. The solution…………

Cover up the right eye. The long term solution is for Karen to wear a special contact lens that has a big black area in the centre, which looks very natural, but blocks all vision from the right eye. But, before they go there, she has to check that this will actually help. Cue the glasses………………

Karen needs to wear either of 2 pairs of glasses to find out which is better for her…………….

One is a frosted right lens……………

The other completely blocks the right eye and right eye peripheral vision………………..

Understandably, kp doesn’t feel very attractive in them, but they are only temporary to find a more permanent solution.

Uneventful day.

I bought a new computer for Karen today and so have been configuring that.

She has been feeling a bit stiff today. We think it is because her 100ug Fentanyl Patch has dried up with all the recent hot weather and had peeled off yesterday, leaving her in a bit of pain today.

New patch is on tonight so hopefully tomorrow, she will be ok.

Mixed bag of a day today.

Despite the pain patch, kp wasn’t feeling 100% right today physically.

kp:- I feel like my body isn’t working too well today.

dp:- Whaddya mean love ?

kp:- It feels slow and hard to do anything

I am hoping it is down to the dried up pain patch from yesterday and the new patch hasn’t properly kicked in yet.

As well as physically not being 100%, I think I saw the starts of a downer as well Whenever her body lets her down, this tends to happen. But I kicked into action and kept her entertained. I am a bit concerned what will happen next week when I return to work.

Time will tell.

Today, kp and I read through the first 3 weeks of the blog. It was such a lovely day, we did it outside.

Click on the photo to enlarge it

A few tearful moments along the way, specifically when I was explaining the time Karen really wanted to come home with me on a night time. This is when she couldn’t get out of bed and was on IV drugs etc in the Intensive Care ward.

Heartbreaking. But we also had lots of laughs as well. It was great to see the pleasure on Karen’s face when we read the bits about her first waking up and some of the things she said to the nurses.

So, as I say, a mixed bag….

Better day.

kp seems to have got a bit more fluid in her movement. But her current patch is drying up now, so perhaps tomorrow she will be stiff again – we will see.

kp had an awful night’s sleep and didn’t really get to sleep until 6am Consequently, she didn’t get up until 2.30pm. But, she was up in time for Ronnie’s arrival up from the Big Smoke.

Here are Karen and Ronnie sunning it……

Click on Photo to Enlarge

Me and Ronnie (wearing kp’s sunhat)…..

Click on Photo to Enlarge

And here’s a curious photo of Bonnie crossing her legs in the most strange fashion…..

Click on Photo to Enlarge

Karen and Ronnie stayed up late enjoying each other’s company.

Karen had a great sleep until about 5.30am when a strange thing occurred. I was dreaming a very vivid dream. I piloting a light aircraft trying to land it at Blackpool airport, but the weather had got really bad and the winds were howling. I tried to turn more into the wind to line up with the runway and was managing just fine, when an AA man (or an RAC man) who was on the ground pulled me back in another direction with ropes that were already attached to my plane. At this, I gave this man the biggest of kicks to stop him disrupting my landing, BUT, the kick happened in real life as well and I gave kp the biggest of kicks.

kp:- DAVID !

dp:- What?

kp:- You’ve just kicked me really hard

dp:- Sorry love, I was dreaming !

I sleep on Karen’s left side so had kicked her stroke side, which doesn’t have as much sensation. Had she been kicked on the other side (at that force) and if she had been awake herself, I feel sure she would have retalliated if not physically, with a more tyrannical bit of verbal abuse.

I was lucky to get off with a few words and her falling back to sleep.

Uneventful day apart from that – went to the Doctors to get kp’s prescription back to what it should be – after it was previously cocked up. It wasn’t the Spanish doctor’s fault that we saw the other week – they had migrated IT systems apparently and it had been changed in the migration.

Lots of sun lounging for the ladies as I worked from home.

Steak, Onions, mushroom and Chips tonight

Thanks to Tracy for letting us know that the blog wasn’t accepting comments. This has now been fixed.

Any comments will (as always) be read out to Karen – Thanks Tracy !

Working from home again for me.

Karen couldn’t sleep again despite a full sleeping tablet.

I got her up at 10.30am as she and Ronnie had to be at the hairdressers for 11am. Ronnie couldn’t believe her hair doo only cost £16 as she would have paid £34 down south.

Here is the result ….

Click on the photo to enlarge it

Jane arrived with some raucous tales from her 3 week stay in Thailand……We have been in stitches at her experience in the boy’s town (gay part of the city she stayed in)……She was invited to a sex show by someone the age of her son (17)…..She said “NO” for the record. Or so she told us.

Lovely day overall. Karen went for a walk with Ronnie. About 1/2 a mile in total, a new record. Hopefully she won’t cop it tomorrow.