A Stitch in Time...

Alan woke up full of smiles this morning.  Almost back to his usual self.

He still wasn't keen to eat any lunch but he drank lots and sounded less chesty than he did yesterday.  Coughing less too.  I think his throat was sore from having tubes down it whilst under anaesthetic and that seems to be better too.

The District Nurse phoned to say she'd pop in around 12.30 to remove the final stitch (the other two fell out!) and when she arrived Alan was very charming and let her poke and prod, despite it being a bit uncomfortable.   After a few attempts she admitted defeat and said the stitch was very tight and she would return at 2.30 with a colleague to have another go.

She phoned me back about 1.30pm to say she'd spoken to the dietician for advice and told her she'd managed to snip a bit of the stitch but didn't think she'd got it all.  The dietician then told her that if she'd snipped a bit of it, the rest would probably work loose and she would check it when she visits on Tuesday.

Now given the stitches were attached to little button-like things and the button-like thing was still stuck fast to Alan, we weren't so sure the stitch had been snipped at all and given that the longest the stitches are meant to be in is 24-48 hours post surgery, there's no way we were leaving it till Tuesday. 

I phoned the dietician and told her I wasn't happy to leave it till Tuesday with the button still attached.  She said she would speak to a colleague at the hospital and phone me back.   She phoned back 15 minutes later to say  if the stitch had been sipped, the button-like thing should fall off and that she'd phone the District Nurse and get her to come back and try again. 

Honestly, there seems no end to this farcical gastrostomy journey and once again, if it wasn't for us pushing things and questioning things, poor Alan would be worse for wear.

The District Nurse came back with a colleague just before 3pm and this time they managed to get the stitch out.  Phew!   Alan was a star through it all, smiling and blethering.  I'm so proud of him.

In other news, we bought cakes from the new cake shop today.  We were very restrained and just bought 2 little cupcakes (banoffee and double choc - see extras).  We had them with coffee this afternoon and they were lovely.

Paul the tile specialist also popped in (it's been a busy afternoon!) with the sample tiles for the pool room wall, floor, pool itself and the wet room.  Restricting our choice to 4 or 5 was definitely the right thing to do as even out of these samples we are struggling to chose the ones we like the best.  They're all lovely!

And in between watching the Federer and Murray games at Wimbledon (well done Andy!  :-)))) I have painted our 4 kitchen paint samples onto white cardboard to try and decide the colours of our kitchen cupboard doors.  Will investigate that tomorrow with fresh eyes.

Right now it's time for feet up and a G&T and the sound of T in the Park wafting in the window.  

Happy weekend lovelies :-))