notice of risk of redundancy

have had a slightly surreal weekend. on friday afternoon there was a staff meeting at work so that we could be updated on the ongoing structural changes in our work. we have been aware of these for a while now and with a new bishop and following a staffing review, a new staff structure was being created. we have also been told that there would be loss of jobs and as i work in one of the affected departments was aware that this would personally affect me.

however i was surprised by the method chosen and the number of job cuts that are being made. there are eleven of us on notice of risk of redundancy, 5 officers and 6 admin staff, and whilst there are 7 new posts being created, it doesn't take much effort to 'do the math'. i think the timing has also been a bit pants as we were told on friday afternoon with a series of interviews, for those affected, set up for today and wednesday, but then we were told to go home for the weekend and forget about it. as if...

unfortunately today i am only half fit for work and have a meeting this evening, so have not been in the office today, so am missing out on the general thoughts of my colleagues. i think more is being made clear through the individual interviews, but until then there are a lot of question marks and not even the chance to look at the summary job descriptions for the available posts. hopefully i will find out more when i am in tomorrow.

i suppose there is no easy way to deal with this kind of job loss, and in some ways treating everyone the same is fair. but some work has already been done in this re-organisation and those posts were treated slightly differently with posts being advertised and people invited to apply. i had assumed and from my recollection of previous meetings been told that this was the way that this process was being organised. therefore it was a shock to be told that i was at risk of redundancy in the way that i was. matthew and i have been doing some talking over the weekend and obviously there are a couple of the new jobs that i shall apply for, though i have to also say on a personal level that the timing is also pants as i really do not want to be thinking about application forms and interviews at this particular point, i would rather be concentrating on getting fully fit.

talking of which, i had an inr this morning, which has climbed to the heady heights of 5.6, so have to reduce warfarin and go back again next week. still building points towards my frequent visitor status...

oven cleaning update

i thought i would let you know that yesterday i finally got around to cleaning the oven. it only took two weeks to build up the motivation, with a little help from matthew who left the can of oven cleaner in a prominent place!

it was not the worst oven i have ever had to clean, that honour belongs to the oven that came with my house in essex - though technically it was the grill pan that was the worst. on first inspection it looked as if there was a thick layer of grease on top of a layer of tin foil. closer inspection revealed that there were actually at least three layers of tin foil, each with a layer of fat and grease inbetween. delightful! actually that house was one of the messiest ones that i have inherited, it makes me wonder why i spend so much time cleaning up my house when i move.

today is one of my 'fit days' as opposed to 'sick days', so i am well enough to work... after the weekend i will be working monday evening and tuesday and wednesday before having two days holiday to go to the isles of scilly for the gig rowing. funnily enough i am looking forward to a few days away.

fit note v sick note

this fit note thing is a bit weird, having worked out a phased return to work it now appears that one day i am considered fit for work, the next i'm not. so what should i do on days when i am not working? retreat to the sofa and day time tv?

one of my biggest faults is probably that i take too long to recognise that i'm not well and should take some time off to recover, combined with the fact that i often go back to work too early, when actually taking a further day or two might have been better in the long run.

take for example the time i had an operation on my head. the operation was on a monday morning, i went to my aunt and uncle's to convalesce and was back home on the thursday of the following week. the next day i went to my gp to get a sick note for my time off and to ask him to sign me back to work as i had to take some young people away for the weekend that evening. he promptly signed me off work for another two weeks and told me what i did in my spare time was up to me!

today i feel at a bit of a loose end. i went to work on monday for five hours and was quite tired by the end of it. yesterday i had a meeting in the afternoon and came home quite tired. today i am not to work, and i am twiddling my thumbs - there is plenty to do housework wise, but that doesn't inspire me! i know that i have a long to do list waiting for me, but officially i can't touch it. and tomorrow i am not working either...

i don't feel that i can gad around town, do a little shopping, lunch with friends etc whilst i'm not well, but i am not wanting to sit around the house all day either.

so any suggestions gratefully received...

what i have done so far today is - set up my wormery (purchased the other week, but you had to send off for the worms and they arrived in the post this morning) and walk to the chemists to pick up a prescription. the walk was a lot easier than when i attempted it last week, which is progress. i can also report progress on the landscaping at the new gp surgery, more plants have been put in and there was a man working on it when i walked past. it really does not look like the picture on the previous post, but i can't find a more up to date one. i also had a facebook conversation with one of my cousins and admired some of his course work via the medium of youtube. isn't modern technology wonderful!

fit note = back to work

it had to happen one day, but now i am back at work...

last week the doctor gave me one of these new 'fit notes' (as opposed to sick notes) and we decided that i would attempt a return to work this week. fortunately work are happy with the suggestion that i have a 'planned re-entry' and i sat down with my line-manager and my diary and we worked through the next four weeks, looking at what days i would work and those that i wouldn't. it was a matter of prioritising meetings and so if i don't come to yours - sorry it's not a priority!

in many ways i was grateful to see my desk again, though even just writing that might imply that i am obviously not well, but it was a bit quiet as my colleague was working in north cornwall today. though maybe that was for the good as i was able to put my head down and work through the emails and the post and come up with an a4 page of 'to do's', but bear in mind this is also on top of the 'to do's' that i had prior to being ill.

anyway this week i worked today 11-4, have a meeting tomorrow afternoon and then another one on friday afternoon (very important one). i did also have a training day on saturday but at lunch time an email came through cancelling it, which in some ways i am disappointed by, but as i now feel very tired after a few hours work is possibly a good thing.

it was also a good day to be back as i had missed some cake whilst i was away (birthday/ leaving do's) and today was claire's birthday and she had brought some cakes - so i enjoyed a jelly tot cupcake with my afternoon tea.

lady of leisure - it's exhausting!

you would have thought that having time on your hands would be fun, but let me tell you it can be exhausting!

yesterday my mother-in-law took me to charlies (a coffee shop in charlestown (a fishing village just south of st austell)) for coffee. terry (my father-in-law) had arranged a meeting at their house at 11.30, so marcia very kindly thought to take me out. just about every time i go to charlies i meet someone i know and yesterday was no exception and what started out as coffee at 11, soon merged into lunch at 12.15. just as marcia and i were finishing our lunch, terry finished his meeting and decided to come down and join us. and just as he was finishing his lunch in walked another lady from the church who had decided, on the spur of the moment to come down to charlestown to have a coffee and a walk on the beach whilst enjoying the sunshine. so we stayed and caught up with each others news whilst maureen had her coffee.

so we didn't leave charlies until around 2pm!

then we had a little wander down to the gift shop before marcia brought me home. i was surprisingly tired, it is amazing how exhausting sitting, eating, drinking and talking can make you.

as one of matthew's friends says 'i am looking forward to going back to work for a rest!'

House visitors

it is amazing just how many people come to your house in a day. matthew normally leaves for work first and when i leave i lock the door, get in my car and drive to truro. then i don't really think about my house until i return sometime in the evening.

being at home, you suddenly realise how many people visit or even telephone your house. i have fielded a few calls from talktalk - for some reason they want us to change to a new package, which costs more and offers less than the one we are currently on (?) - and other sales people during the last ten days or so. fortunately they all seem to want matthew so i'm suitably vague as to when he might be around.

yesterday though we had an unprecedented number of people wanting to deliver things. i had to go to the doctors first thing and i returned before the postman had been. a few minutes later there was a noise at the front door. i went to investigate - it was a leaflet from the libdems wanting our vote. then a while later another noise - this time it was the postman, one letter, two leaflets. a while later whilst on the phone i was aware that something else was being pushed through the letter box - the kleeneze catalogue. then a while later some leaflets from lidl with their offers of the week. by now i was ready to go shopping (not at lidl).

when i came back there was a gardener mowing next doors lawn, once i had parked he came over to me with a parcel that had been delivered in my absence.

it would appear that our house is being targeted by leafleters - there must be some money in delivering them, but the reality is that apart from the letter and the parcel, everything else went in the recycling. it appears that the recycling gets more post than matthew and i!

the cupboard under the sink

it's not that i'm bored but...

i decided it was time to clean the oven...

below is an inventory of the cupboard under the sink in the kitchen:

persil washing powder (7.5kg box)

fabric conditioner (5l)

flash floor cleaner

dishwasher tablets (3boxes - 153)

window cleaner (x2)

baby bio

pledge

oxywhite powder

bleach

dylon whitener

cream cleaner (x2)

fairy liquid (x2)

astonish

finish rinse aid

neutradol carpet cleaner

silver polish

clothes stain remover (x3)

silk and delicate wash liquid

sticky stuff remover

water filter cartridges (x2)

compost crock filter (x2)

nik wax waterproofing

chamois leather

all purpose cleaner

1001 carpet cleaner

antibac spray

disinfectant

bleach spray

kitchen cleaner (x3)

shoe protector spray

dishwasher powder

2x sponge scourer

stain removal block

barkeepers friend

butane gas

super glue

lint roller and spare roll

dusters (x3)

microfibre cloth (x3)

multipurpose cloths (x24)

pan scourer (x2)

dishclothes (x2)

lots of stuff, but no oven cleaner.

i blame this excess of cleaning products on the amalgamation of two households last may, just before we got married. we did manage to sort and sell unwanted furniture, and clothes, though i still have boxes of books and ornaments in the garage. we have now eaten the duplicate food stocks (though for some reason we seemed to have had completely separate tastes in herbs and spices - lots of jars!!).

the mega amounts of washing powder/ conditioner and dishwasher tablets were due to 'deals' at matthew's work. though i did work out that we now have enough dishwasher tablets to last us almost a year - assuming a wash every other day and allowing for holidays...

i hasten to add that we do clean - it's just i prefer not to use too many chemicals. however i have now gone and bought some mega oven cleaner - now waiting to be re-motivated to use it!

otherwise have been feeling a bit weary today - probably because i didn't sleep too well last night.

everyone needs good neighbours?

one thing that has surprised me slightly is the number of our neighbours who were aware of the ambulance being outside our house in the early hours of the morning. the paramedics must have arrived around half past five and were gone by six, but they were spotted. our immediate neighbour does leave for work at 6.20 every morning, so unsurprisingly he was around as we were leaving for bodmin and managed a quick chat with matthew, later on in the week he was sent around by his mother to find out how i was, but also to offer any help. he informed matthew that another neighbour in the corner also wanted to know what had been happening.

i think all areas must have them, the nosey neighbour. well our road does and her house is strategically placed to look right down the close and she can keep an eye on everyone's comings and goings. i have even heard from another neighbour that when she had been away for a couple of weeks her husband had gone around asking everyone what the news was, so he could update her on her return!

last saturday they popped in. mr neighbour had been awake and seen the ambulance. in order to try and find out more she had asked our immediate neighbour what had happened, who at that point didn't know a great deal and had even tried calling on us one afternoon in the week, obviously matthew was getting home too late in the evening for them to pop in then. so there they were on saturday afternoon wanting 'find out what had happened', please note, not 'how are you'. a slight but very different difference!

extreme bonjela testing - update

my apologies for not updating you on the extreme bonjela testing that was mentioned in a previous post.

having written my intentions to numb the ulcers on my tongue and then try to consume either the sweet chilli flavoured crisps (impulse buy) or some chocolate (thanks to some of my visitors), i begun the experiment.

as the chocolate was already open i decided to start with that (why waste a whole packet of crisps?), having given the gel time to work, i then consumed one piece of swiss chocolate. a slight tingly sensation, not too bad. i then tried a second, that hurt!

i'm not sure if it was the saliva washing away the bonjela after my first mouthful or if i hadn't applied enough (apparantly you need 1cm of gel - but i'm not sure if it is for each ulcer or the entire tongue) but i have to report that in my case the bonjela let me down.

the ulcers have nearly gone and are probably doing me a favour at the moment as i can only eat small amounts of chocolate. this is good as i have a small pile of chocolate to get through from both the kindness of my hospital visitors and the easter bunny! i have however eaten the crisps, one side of my mouth is worse than the other, so as long as i crunch on my left, it's not too painful!

on another note, according to this months good housekeeping magazine, you can use bonjela to numb your eyebrows before plucking them - bet you never thought of that...

picture

now that i have full access to a computer and have discovered that people are still reading this, and want me to continue (are you mad), i'm slowing adding bits to the blog template. one thing that is, i feel, important is pictures - tell a thousand words and so on, so hopefully most posts will now have a picture that vaguely relates to the content.

i've added a nice picture of the trelawney wing at treliske to the front page. this is the side entrance, the one that i arrived by on the 26th, in a green and yellow van - not too dissimilar to the one in the picture. i spent a couple of hours in a + e before being whisked up to the high dependancy unit (hdu) immediately above. take note of the single window immediately above the ambulance canopy, this was my view to the outside world for two days, not only could i see trees, but also the entrance to the maternity wing, where there were dads on mobiles making phone calls.

after my care needs were downgraded i was then moved to roskear ward which occupies the next wing down in the picture and my view was the yard inbetween the two wings and if i craned hard enough i could see the emergency helicopter either taking off or landing - just.

the slightly bizarre thing about the layout of the trelawney wing is that if you enter from the car-parks you actually come in on level one - which was the level of the wards and to get to a+e you would have to go down a floor (but you aren't allowed to get to a+e that way).

one of the evenings i was in roskear i walked with matthew to the front entrance - only to discover that it is being remodeled. i made to step over the threshold as matthew egged me on 'one more step and you can breath that fresh air', when i was greeted by a faceful of cigarette smoke! it appears that patients still have to have their daily fix of nicotine no matter how ill they are, and the nearest place they can do it - right by the front entrance!

frequent visitor award

went back to the gp surgery today, my inr and warfarin dosage had gone haywire whilst i was on the antibiotics, so i needed to do a new blood test and then on to see the gp to plan the next couple of weeks.

the surgery has only just moved from a rather cramped bungalow near the station in st austell to a brand new building about quarter of a mile from our home. i was a visitor there on their very first day of opening, and was back there again on the third day and the fourth day. in fact the one disappointment of being admitted to treliske on the friday was that i missed the opportunity to have been in the new surgery four days out of the first five, as i was unable to make my appointment that morning. had i made that appointment i was going to ask if there was some kind of award that i would be entitled to enter myself for, 'most frequent visitor' or similar. but then i realised that it might make me seem like a real hypochondriac so maybe i'll just let that one rest.

the new surgery also needed explaining to a few of the medical professionals during my hospital stay, some knew it was changing, others didn't.

after my visit today (it has now been open for two weeks) i can report that the building still looks shiny new, but the offices are beginning to look a bit more lived in - ie packing boxes have gone. the waiting rooms are a bit bare - no mass of posters advertising various help services/ clinics/ websites etc and one child was telling her mum how she might bring some of her old toys down, she obviously felt there weren't enough.

the upshot of my visit is that my inr/ warfarin dose still need to settle down (an appointment has been booked for a week's time) and i have been signed off work for a week - to start with. the gp was supposed to have used these new 'fit notes' that are being launched today - but she hadn't had a chance to talk with her colleagues about how to fill them in.

name and status

this was something else i noticed about being in hospital this time, but i need to explain a couple of things first.

firstly my first name is elizabeth - though i have always been known by my second name of sarah (mum didn't want me to be teased about my name at school, my initials would have been spelt SEW). from talking to others, i know that i am not the only person called by their second name, in fact it is quite common, it just seems to cause confusion.

secondly that i had a very unusual surname - in fact if you come across someone else with the same surname - we're most likely related. for many years i hated my surname being unusual and that no-one knew how to spell or pronounce it, and began to look forward to changing it to something easier. however somewhere in my late twenties i actually began to enjoy having an unusual name (i did once look something up on the internet about the geography of surnames and how they had spread across england over the 20th century, only to be told that they couldn't do my surname as there were under 100 entries on the census).

nine months ago matthew and i got married and suddenly i realised that i was going to have to give up my name, so i compromised and have retained my maiden name as an additional forename and still use it for work - mainly as i have worked around the country and youth work people know me with my maiden name.

so that is the background to my name.

not using my first name is interesting, most people know me as sarah and it is only really the medical/ dental and other official people who ever use elizabeth, so i do answer to it on occasion (but not if they try to be friendly and call me liz - who is she?). previously in hospitals people have referred to me as elizabeth - the doctors, nurses, radiologists whoever. however this time i was very definitely Mrs Hodge, which i found quite strange. probably as after only 9 months of marriage i'm still getting used to it myself, but also the change from first name to married surname. maybe there is some hospital policy? it did take some getting used to and really didn't feel like it was me, though i did tell everyone that i was sarah - some learnt it, others didn't and to one or two i was merely 'the lady in sideroom 2'!

when i was first hospitalised with lupus, many of my student friends came to visit and kept asking for sarah and after some confusion found me (it was a time when a lot of people learnt that i was using my second name). a year later when i went in again for a few days, they very proudly remembered that i was in fact elizabeth - but by then i'd trained the medical people and they all knew me as sarah, so more confusion ensued.

this time there was some confusion, especially for work colleagues who had to think hard about my married surname, let alone what my first name was. but i think everyone found me in the end. so if i did confuse you - i'm sorry, i don't mean to be difficult.

home

i'm now home!

it was a frustrating afternoon waiting for my medication to arrive from pharmacy - the hospital has a discharge lounge - which is basically a ward with chairs around the edge, very soulless. people are wheeled in and then either picked up by friends and relations or transferred to other hospitals/ homes.

in a way it was a bit of a shame that my stay finished there - as up until that point i had nothing but praise for the care i have received.

anyway, i slept the sleep of the dead last night, 11 hours, and it was lovely to have a leisurely breakfast this morning, with the wonderful matthew.

the picture is some balloons that my sister sent me, a novel take on flowers.

thank you to everyone who has kindly sent cards, best wishes etc. they do make a difference.

release?

it looks as if thus could be my last posting from sideroom 2.
i am ready to go, just waiting for some drugs from pharmacy. i've packed am just waiting for the ok.
i may have to move from sideroom 2 to the discharge lounge, where ever that might be, so i thought i'd say goodbye from here, while i still can.
the blog has really helped me and thank you for reading and commenting, either here or on facebook you have encouraged me.
i still have someway to go before i'll be fighting fit again, so this may yet be renamed 'life from no 39' or similar, but for now i'm just glad to be going home and am looking forward to spending the weekend with matthew.
thank you.

extreme bonjela testing

in order to keep myself amused this morning i have decided to undertake some extreme bonjela testing. this has come about for two reasons.
firstly, as previously mentioned a crop of ulcers and a fungal infection have taken up residence in my mouth over the last week. yesterday i was given a bottle of liquid antibiotic and a tube of bonjela, these, along with an illegally smuggled steroid mouthwash, have begun to make some impact on my unwelcome visitors.
secondly, when i bought the paper yesterday i made a rash impulse buy of a packet of walkers sensations sweet thai chilli crisps (a fave of mine). it is hard to believe but it is obviously possible to impulse buy in hospital. anyway once back in sideroom 2 i realised that that might not have been the wisest way to spend 99p. crisps, chilli flavouring, mouth ulcers... so the packet remains unopened.
thirdly, yesterday was chocolate day, ie some of my visitors had bought me some chocolate. matthew and i had some in the evening whilst playing cards and i realised that mouth ulcers don't like extreme sweet either.

so in a minute i will be liberal with the bonjela and once it has had time to work, try eating either the crisps or the chocolate. i will off course update you with the results later.

on a more positive note i understand there is now a bed shortage and the 14yr old can see no reason to keep me here, we just need a more mature doctor to sign the form. the only possible fly in the ointment is that i will need some antibiotics to go home with, if it is only for a couple of days there is enough on the ward. if i need them for longer they will have to be ordered from pharmacy... and because of the bank holidays this weekend i will need to get them from here.

major crisis

there is currently a major crisis on roskear ward...
they have run out of male urine bottles and there have been frantic calls around the hospital to try and locate some. fortunately this crisis will not personally affect me!!
on my first night on this ward i could hear one of the nurses asking the men in the next bay how many bottles would they need for the night, one or two? it took me a couple of minutes to work out exactly what bottles she meant.

things i am most looking forward to about going home

matthew
my own bed
watching tv without paying 3.50 a day for it
making phone calls without paying 10p a minute
people ringing me without paying 50p a minute
being responsible for my own medication again
no longer being pricked for blood tests/ blood sugar/ canula's etc
reading 'the girl who kicked the hornet's nest', out today in paperback
a quieter life - not so many bleeps/ buzzers/ phones etc
a nice freshly brewed cup of tea

good morning- day 7

greetings from sideroom 2, it's coming up to 8am and i'm awaiting breakfast in bed. unfortunately i didn't sleep too well last night, my brain couldn't shut off and because the height of my exercise routine is a walk to the front entrance and back (and please bear in mind that roskear is the 2nd closest ward to the entrance) my body wasn't particularly tired either.
anyway i am hoping that today is to be release day - so far my 'obs' are fine which is good news.
once i've breakfasted and dressed, i shall wander down to the shop and get a paper and then the waiting game will begin. i don't want to tempt fate by packing, but then again it shouldn't take too long to pack and in the meantime i've thought of a couple of things to keep myself amused whilst waiting.
so here's hoping that everything can be sorted and i can be ready to leave by lunchtime (as this best suits matthew's diary for the day).