Lockdown Diary - Saturday 10th April 2021

Not a normal Saturday: I was up when the first carer arrived this morning at about 20 past 7, but I wasn't dressed or showered.  I got up mainly because I was parched and had no water and as I was up I thought I might as well let her in and have a chat.  Had a chat, she left, I drank loads of water and took some upstairs as I was due to take painkillers at 8 a.m. anyway.

For some reason I didn't sleep very well and woke up at about 3 a.m. and couldn't get back to sleep for ages, dunno if this was the effect of the anaesthetic or what, but, by rights, I should have been knackered and slept like a log.

The painkillers seem to be working and I'm more uncomfortable than in pain.  Nevertheless some movements do cause pain, reminding me that I can't do the things I'd normally do.  I find relaxing very difficult, even when I meant to be doing it to recover, so I am trying to do nothing but every time I see something that needs sorting out (the boys are doing a good job, but they do have a tendency to ignore things that could easily be sorted) I try and see if I can find a way to do it that isn't too painful. This is wrong and I must stop myself.

I've spent a fair bit of the the day lying down listening to music - I have so much to catch up on (I've listened to all of 'Carnage' (Nick Cave and Warren Ellis), 'Daily O.M.' (Raf Rundell), 'Manchaca Vol.2' (Boogarins) and a load of other stuff on random play) - but not much reading, yet.

Both my sisters phoned in the afternoon to see how I'm doing and catch-up, which was nice: we seem to be having much more soul-searching conversations these days, often harking back to our childhood and family life (if you can call it that) from which we each bear our own set of mental scars.  It may just be me (I don't think we've explored this avenue much yet) but until we all became adults and had children I'd always felt like we were just three people who grew up in the same house, rather than a family - don't get me wrong I always cared for my sisters, but I never felt really close. Over time the bond between us has become more apparent and stronger, especially since our parents died, and we are closer now than I can recall (though memory can be wrong). Does this have a point? If it does, I've lost it.

Son #2 (the only one here today, and just as well he is as he had to take the shopping delivery in, which I certainly couldn't do) and I made a late lunch. Late as in after 4:30 p.m.  My contribution was just the salad part, but around this time I started noticing more pain. I don't know if it's the anaesthetic clearing my system or what, but suddenly pain became more centre stage and I realised I probably haven't been as relaxed as I should have been.  Each time I've had an operation this seems to be what happens. The day after I feel not that bad and think 'you know what, this isn't that bad after all' and I start to think I'm some kind of superman, then bang! It hits me. That's what seems to have happened.  I've had to switch to the higher dose of painkillers (it said one or two tablets and I'd been running on one (mainly to limit the side-effects, or one in particular). I'm going to have to lie down and listen to music.

By 9 p.m. both sons had returned from their travels and I joined them downstairs to eat dinner.  Film night and tonight's choice (from son #2) was 'Insidious 3', a horror film. Just what the doctor ordered.  It wasn't bad, had a reasonable level of scariness, but nothing that spectacular.  Took more painkillers during the film then afterwards to bed, hopefully for a better sleep than last night.

I think I'm going to have to take it much easier tomorrow.

Can / 'Moonshake' / 'Future Days'

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