Cataract Three

Back to opthalmology outpatients last week for my post operative assessment. Following an eye test I sat, comparing notes, with the patients who had been operated on the same day as me. My turn came to see the doctor and I told him that my eyesight had been improved a great deal by the procedure but I would not be able to see without my glasses (as had been suggested by the surgeon who had carried out the op). "Oh no David, your eyes are fine now. You can leave the glasses off and you just need reading spectacles. Your other eye doesn't need doing yet so we will discharge you."

I leave the hospital and walk into town without my specs. It feels really odd and I'm not sure I feel safe without them. Is it psychological, I still haven't decided. I'll let you know how I get on.

The moped at the top of the page is a 1965 Raleigh Runabout RM6 which I have had for about nine months and am now renovating in my usual penny pinching way. Just think the Beatles (and myself) were just coming into their prime when the proud first owner wheeled it on to the street and popped away.

Right now better get ready as off to Leigh on Sea to visit my daughter and family and the Hackney Slasher for a couple of days. As they say these days "speak to you soon".

Cataract Two

As an unreconstructed hypochondriac my initial euphoria at getting past the operation soon gives way to the jitters. This is mostly fuelled by a combination of:

• Too much time on my hands as I am off work recuperating.
• Access to medical sites on the Internet.
• Sometimes conflicting information on these sites.
• A little knowledge but not enough.
• A fertile imagination.

So by mid afternoon yesterday I had concluded that my continuing blurred vision (which can be quite normal) was evidence of a problem. This view was reinforced by the fact that my pupil appeared to be refusing to return to it's normal size. Susan, my wife is used to my health panics looked bored and told me to ring the hospital. Probably on the grounds that this might stop me going on to her all night rather than because of any real concern. I rang the hospital.

"Is your pupil stuck or opening and closing even though it is wider than the other one?" asked Staff Nurse Lucy.

"I'll check it out and ring back" I said. Then followed half an hour of trying to get into alternative light and dark places, shining a light in my eye and panicking, all whilst looking in a mirror.

I rang back, "Can't tell" I said in a quavering voice.

"I'll speak to the eye doctor and ring you back".

Ten minutes pacing and the phone rings, "David?"

"Yes"

"Lucy here, I've spoken to the doctor and she says it's nothing to worry about at this stage, ring again tomorrow if there is no change or you are worried".

Woke up this morning, anxious dash to the mirror, removed fetching plastic eye protector provided by the hospital. Pupil seems to be returning to normal. Phew. Of course I was never really worried.

Oh by the way, it is quite difficult delivering eye drops accurately to yourself.

Cataract Operation. A Nervous Patients Eye View

I had a cataract operation yesterday. Before I go on to run through the events of the day I would like to commend the staff at Newark General Hospital for the excellent, professional and friendly service they gave to me and the other patients who had the operation.

Arrived at the day hospital reception at 11.50 in a state of abject terror to find the fire alarm sounding and staff and patients pouring out of the doors. My first thought was "Oh no they'll cancel the op". Once you've got yourself keyed up for something like this not having it is worse then getting it over with. Anyway they didn't cancel so down to the waiting lounge (yes really) to meet my fellow victims. There I met eighty year old Sheila a lovely up beat ex-publican who had one eye done six weeks ago and assured us all that it was:

• A doddle
  
• Painless
  
• Had excellent results which made any minor discomfort more than worth it.
  
• Most important it was excellent value for money as it would cost £4000 to have two eyes done privately (I suspect from her other attitudes that she was a life long Tory which probably goes to show that people don't let ideology get in the way of a bargain).

Anyway Sheila was a support to the other five non-veterans for the rest of the day.

Register checked by Nurse Rita to make sure we were all present and then a cup of tea. I was informed I was last on the list. Not where I wanted to be. Plenty of time to stew and imagine the worst (or even worse).

Nurse Rita began dishing out the first of sixteen doses of eye drops. She informed each recipient that some would sting, Sheila told me she had "hit the roof" on the last occasion. I sat watching my fellow patients stoically wince as the drops went in. By the time Nurse Rita got to me I was tense to say the least. In go the drops and ............nothing. I relaxed. But not for long, my innate pessimissm soon reasserted itself and it was not long before I had convinced myself that the medication I had been given must have been the wrong stuff, maybe even just water. Mental image of myself writhing about on the operating table as the surgeon makes the first incision.

Off we all go down to theatre where we sit in the order that we are to be "done". Jovial theatre technicians, friendly nursing staff and anaesthetists, and post operative patients returning to their seats saying " it's not to bad" did not seem to lift my mood. All I could seem to do was note ( and with hindsight misinterpret) the sights and sounds around me:

• "They stick a blunt needle round behind your eye" I heard someone say. Aargh I'm off home.
  
• I knew that they removed the old lens with the cataract by emulsifying it with sound waves. Every so often I could hear this dreadful loud noise like a jack hammer in the building which seemed to coincide with the time the last patient went in. "I'll leap off the table when they start that up" I thought.

My turn came and I slipped the backless nighty over my clothes. Not very fetching, and no turning back now. Into the preparation room, for the blunt needle and later the jack hammer?

What really happened? I will tell you what I can remember.

The (impeccably polite) surgeon and anaesthetist asked me to get on a trolley and make myself comfortable. I was wired for monitors. The anaesthetist explained what he was going to do and as far as I can remember he:

• Put some drops in my eye which I presume offered some anaesthasia.
  
• He inserted a device which held my eyelids open.
  
• He administered anaesthetic in and around my eye.
• He did inject something from a curved needle. He informed me that this would entail various sensations including pressure behind the eye. It was not painful and at worst might be described as a little uncomfortable.
  
• Pressure was then applied to my eye (by a band round my head) "to assist the medication to work". This band was left on for five minutes.
  
• When the band was removed I could not see out of the anaesthetised eye and I presume I could not move it as this was checked by the anaesthetist.
  

I was then wheeled into the adjoining theatre and:

• I was positioned under the light/binoculars used by the surgeon.
  
• I was given an oxygen vent to hold. This is because your face (apart from the eye being treated) is covered during the operation. I have to say I did not feel claustrophobic in this situation.
  
• During the procedure I felt absolutely nothing except occasional small amounts of water on my face.
  
• You can see a bright light and the vaguest outlines of some of what is going on.
  
• Staff chatted, music played and one of the theatre technicians sang (not well and not the same song).
  
• The lens emulsifying machine emitted a low hum, and also told you in a female voice what part of the process it was carrying out. I found this helpful though I appreciate it is not for the patients benefit.
  
• The whole procedure lasted probably ten to twenty minutes (time goes quickly when you are enjoying yourself).
  
• Out of theatre, short rest, checkover by surgeon to see that the lens implant is ok and then off for a cup of tea and instructions from the nurse on post operative care.
  
• No walking or driving home.

At about 9.30pm last night the anaesthetic had worn off sufficiently for my drooping eyelid to come to life which it did slowly. The eye muscles weren't quite so quick so for a period of time I had one eye looking straight ahead and one somewhere to the right (strange place for my other computer...hang on I only own the one!). This had more or less righted itself (and back to the one computer)by the time I went to bed with plastic eyecover on to protect the healing organ.

When I woke up this morning, having had no post operative pain, I found the vision in the operated eye was brighter than it had been but was blurred. My literature from the hospital tells me that this is not abnormal. I now start on the regime of ten lots of antibiotic and anti-inflammatory eye drops per day. Just had two, two more at teatime.

I will let you know how things progress.

Oh, and another thing

Something very rare has occurred. Usually when small pubs close that is the end of them. However the New Inn on Barnbygate in Newark has reopened after being shut for business for eighteen months.

I haven't told you about the New Inn yet but I will if it stays open long enough. Best of luck to the young guy who has taken over but it may be an uphill struggle. Since closure the pub has lost its darts, dominoes, and pool teams and a long standing fishing club to other establishments. All these activities bring punters in and keep a small local hostelry viable.

Bantam JSJ 207 replaces the Hackney Slasher

What has happened since my last blog entry?

I became sixty on March 7th so will now be eligible for free bus pass and ten percent off at the local DIY superstore. I am almost persuaded to start doing DIY, but not quite.

I am pleased to report that the Hackney Slasher left the McKenny home a week ago. Those of you who have read my previous blogs will recall that the HS is my daughters bad tempered old cat who whilst staying with us has terrorised our two timid and charming feline companions. They will no doubt be receiving PTSD counselling for some time. The HS is now happily settled in her new home in Essex. The local cat community are as yet unaware of what they have got coming.

I bought a BSA Bantam registration JSJ 207. It is supposed to be a 1953 model and I think the frame is but the engine appears to date from 1954. It looks like the original machine could have been a GPO telegram bike if I have understood the frame numbers correctly. Obviously a previous owner had a supply of ex WD green paint which he or she has liberally applied but underneath there appears to be some red. It was last on the road in the Falmouth area of Cornwall. My plan is to return it to a roadworthy condition.

If you know anything about this bike or if you have a BSA Bantam 125cc engine that you wish to dispose of then I would be delighted to hear from you

Out clubbing and looking for trouble

Two young fellows enjoy a drink at Newark Working Mens Club. One is a retired window cleaner the other an aspiring keyboard player. So if any band has a vacancy........

Sonia keeps a keen eye on them. She has just had to step in to curb an outbreak of riotous behaviour from the lads. She won't take much more of it! She knows their "couldn't care less" grins betray a thinly disguised rebel nature. They could explode at any moment.

Racism alive and well

I live in Newark, a small though growing market town in the East of England. It has a very small population of what are termed ethnic minorities. There are some black people in the town most of whose original family members arrived here in the 1950's. More recently Eastern Europeans have become resident in the town and I understand are working locally often in posts whch do not reflect their qualifications. Perhaps we should not be surprised that these newcomers are now attracting vilification from some people in the indigenous population that their black counterparts did some fifty years ago. The critical comments have not changed much over time for example:

• Large numbers share accommodation
  
• They take our jobs
  
• But they won't work and are after every benefit they can get

I was in the local working mens club the other night talking to a group of people. Another man joined us and said he had a racist joke to tell which he had had relayed to him on his mobile phone. The "joke" was unfunny and offensive and went like this.

Two old men had been playing bowls, and having put their bowls in the boot of the car set off home. On the way they had an accident and knocked a young black boy off his bike and killed him. Not knowing what to do they put the bike and his body in the boot and carried on. They were then stopped by the police who asked to look in the boot. The officer who did this was heard to radio in to his station, "we've discovered a n*****s nest, ones hatched out and he's already stolen a bike". As I said an unfunny and vile story. But think, this kind of thing is being spread like a virus through mobile phone texting, mostly eliciting sniggers, but in some cases possibly underpinning or encouraging a propensity to engage in racial violence.

The teller of this "joke" then went on to inform us that blacks are unable to "retain" information. "You mean like Condoleeza Rice, Colin Powell and Nelson Mandella" I said. "Right f*** it! I'm off, I've had enough", he said and walked out leaving nearly a whole pint.