One less pill

A very interesting two days since my last post.

On Wednesday I got stuck in to a few little projects that I'd been meaning to deal with for a while, and started contacting various staff members at school to see if there were things I could, in the next few weeks, start getting involved in from home. Of course everyone has been telling me to relax, but I'm keen to get the ball rolling as I know it will take some time.

I also went out for a little walk 'around the block' which turned in to a bit of an epic journey. I've just used Google Map Pedometer to calculate the distance I walked in the end and it tells me it was 1.8 miles! I was a bit tired by the end, but I'm thrilled that I could go that far without any real problem. I definitely find it very hard to go any faster than walking - I tried jogging across one road and it was quite painful.

Later that afternoon my sister-in-law Kathy and my gorgeous 2-and-a-half year old nephew Patrick came over to see me. Patrick, thank goodness has become a little more independent, but seemed delighted when I came to sit in his 'den' with him (under the dining room table) and read him books. Little bit hard on the stomach, but an absolute delight. He scared everyone else to death by playing a game jumping around the sofa right next to me - everyone else was convinced he was going to land squarely on my stomach!

I slept very well that night, although needed quite a lot of painkiller, not entirely surprisingly.

Thursday I started working on my friends Chris and Hazel's wedding website. As their best man its something I promised I'd do ages ago, but the circumstances haven't really allowed! In the afternoon Dad and I set off to Kings College Hospital to go to an outpatients appointment. It's a long drive across London, though we stopped to buy some presents for the nurses in my old ward, and pick up a few things from my flat.

The appointment was at 4pm but I had to wait for ages - it was 90 minutes late. The surgeon I talked to was very helpful, and seemed pleased with my progress. He reduced my daily steroid dosage (hooray, now down from 33 pills a day to 32!) and said we'd look at the immunosuppression dosage when I start on the clinical trial next week. After this appointment I waited 45 minutes for a blood test. Finally we finally headed off home, via a bagel-bakery and a deli-restaurant for a truly delicious salt-beef meal (which I ate record-breaking quantities of).

Once again, a great night's sleep. I now have a blissful week to go before my next hospital visit, and plenty of lovely things to do. I'm getting comfortable with my 7-times-a-day drug-schedule, and the 32 pills I have to remember, plus the 3 nutrition-drinks and the 4 oral-rinses I have every day. Still - it will be nice when it all starts cutting back. I'm particularly looking forward to the pain reducing, though I guess I'm putting more strain on with all the extra exercise.