Living the Good Life – Update

73 days and counting #soberlife and loving it, yes I have had the challenges especially when I have met up with friends in a pub for the first time since my hospital stay , it’s been ‘Pint of Carling Dean’, well the old me would have said yes and I would be back to living on the edge again but no the new me id headstrong and mentally strong for the first time ever, I knew if I fell off the wagon what the outcome was so as Simon Cowell says ‘It’s a no from me’. I even feel comfortable around people who drink although I still get the usual ‘You will drink again no doubt’ well to those who doubt me it won’t happen.

Now onto why Blog 12 is here, 8 weeks I have been off work so now that I was feeling better and a bit stronger it was time to go back to the madhouse, so after discussions with HR and my boss it was decided to bring me back on reduced hours for 4 weeks and take it from there, I would start on 4 hours then build up slowly towards my full hours. January 26th I had a company medical to decide what the path to return would be, I did explain that my boss had sorted all this out.

February 6th, my first day back, 4 hours per day for 4 days but paid full hours 8am to 12 noon it was mainly to get used to early shifts again and even though my sleep pattern while I have been off was pretty crap it was still a shock when the alarm went off at 5am on my first day. First day back was okay, it was good to be back and see people who I had not seen for a while. I met my boss to do the usual back to work interview and paperwork and to talk through a few things then I just spent a few hours catching up with people who were glad to see me back, I did get asked few questions about why I had been off (some people did know, some didn’t), answering stuff didn’t bother me, at the end of the day I had nothing to hide and felt comfortable answering things, some were shocked but just glad I was on the right side of life, when I was given two choices back in December it changed my outlook on things and I am feeling better day to day and hopefully this will continue. After being off so long I thought I would be okay getting back into work life but even though I was on 4 hours it was draining and a lot of things had changed so getting my head round all that and updating a lot of stuff I couldn’t do at home was a lot of hard work to do, my password for my work account had expired so I had to mess around sorting that out (IT not the quickest). My second week back would only be one day of 5 hours but starting later in the day then after that I would be taking my last 3 days of Annual Leave that had been booked for a while then I would do 6 hours then 7 hours before going back full time from the 15th March which will be a shock to the system definitely.

Like I have said in my previous blogs somewhere I have been waiting for a hospital appointment for a gastrophy scan (camera down my throat) which I wasn’t looking forward to at the least considering my last experience a few years ago it felt like I was being slowly suffocated, hopefully this would be a better experience. My appointment was Sunday 12th February so darts match missed this was more important, at New Cross Hospital Wolverhampton. I arrived at the hospital a bit early, I didn’t know where the scan centre was, the map was confusing, 10 minute walk at least from the main entrance up corridor down corridor it was a mystery tour to the centre. I checked in at the Reception then waited for somebody to see me, I was taken into a side room for the usual checks and paperwork then a cannula put into my arm for the sedation (after last time I wasn’t going to suffer again)I then had to wait to be taken for the scan. When I entered the room I was told to lay on a bench then the doctor put a guard like thing round my head which had a bit that kept my mouth open so the camera could go straight down my throat without feeling of strangulation again. What I didn’t know before I got to the hospital is what they were checking for .. I just thought they were checking my throat and stomach to make sure everything was okay and healing okay but no, nothing like that they were checking for cancer (yes the dreaded C word), they also took some biopsies of things they found and although I was told not to worry and everything was good it still worried me a little but what will be will be. As far as I was told they found no cancer cells and I just had to wait for the biopsy results in about 6 weeks.

So thats the latest update on my recovery so far, more to come in a few weeks