Woke up Monday morning at 6am opened the curtains to glorious sunshine a beautiful calm sea and a really cute nurse bringing me a coffee in bed ....... heaven !!!
After breakfast and seeing the nurse for my blood pressure I decided to go for a walk along the sea front I went about 1and a half miles into the town of Littlehampton which was great to be able to get a few things I needed like shaving foam and shower gel . Went back had lunch afterwards sat out on the patio in the sunshine in my shorts chatting away to some lovely ladies and just chilling. Then I thought why don’t I do another walk so I left the convalescent home at the 3.45pm and didn’t get back till 5.30pm it was just fantastic the sea air was awesome and I was so pleased with my progress I had a smile on my fact that evening like a Cheshire Cat.
I woke up on Tuesday morning the sun was shining and the same cute nurse brought me my coffee BUT !!!!!! I had pains in my ribs and my left shoulder and I felt shocking it was a real struggle to get out of bed and get showered and I really didn’t want to go down for breakfast so had it in the room. The nurse came to see me to take my usual readings and boy did she give me a “bollocking “ when I told her what I’d done the previous day. With hindsight I can see I was slightly cocky, arrogant and foolish to even attempt two large walks in the same day I think I just got carried away by the weather the scenery and my own foolish competitive streak . During Tuesday the pain in my shoulder and my rib got worse and even though I was back on strong painkillers I needed two heat pads throughout the day to try to calm the discomfort.
Please please if your pre op now don’t be foolish or cocky like me when you are post op and do far too much in one day as your body will just shut down like mine did and give you a damn good reminder that your progress needs to be done gradually and sensibly. To be honest your body is an amazing machine but it has to be nurtured and treated with respect to get it and you to where you would like to be . My family just said take it easy over the next few few days and I’m sure you’ll be ok . I suppose they were just being diplomatic . Then I told my best mate and boy did he give it me I got both barrels and then some he called me all the usual non complementary names with expletives mingled in . Let’s just say I got the message and he was right so what I’m saying is please be more sensible than I was and be happy with any progress it doesn’t have to be massive.
Confidence in your new new valve is something that doesn’t come automatically as I found out yesterday what a dilemma it can be, ....... this is not the most subtle of examples but one that we may all face . I felt like I wanted to go to the loo for a “poo” and sat on the toilet as we all do and found I was a little constipated and under normal circumstances you would just push a little bit to help it along and my natural reaction was to push but I stopped myself as I was worried it would put a strain on my new heart valve so I was sat there for about 30 minutes with this dilemma do I push do I not push will it affect my new valve if I did should I have more confidence in it ............oh it was doing my sodding head in and to be honest I didn’t have the confidence to do a full blown push and just did a lot of little pushes untill I managed to go that’s why I was sat there for such a long time. I hope I haven’t put you all off with my example but it’s funny what your head does after such a short time post op. I’m sure as time goes by my confidence levels will increase and eventually I won’t overthink things but at the moment I am.
I hope the storms aren’t affecting you all too much stay safe keep warm and just enjoy being with your loved ones
Hugs and kisses
Pete ❤️❤️
.
