MAY 18 2008
Well I am still here and still waiting for summer. Last year was very eventful with a fall causing broken ribs and a collapsed lung (pneumothorax) & I ended up in intensive care and a high dependancy ward on morphine. Quite an experience! And that wiped out a couple of months. Then I was tested for a number of trials in the Royal Brompton & Harefield Hospital - did not prove to be an ideal candidate. Found out that my FEV1 had dropped to just over 15% & my mood plunged with it. Dancing with death doesn't cover it!
However due to a high concentration of carbon dioxide in my blood I was calledc back in October for a sleep study and came away five days later with a NON - INVASIVE VENTILATION MACHINE so I now sleep with a mask over my face and the machine breathes for me. It lowers my carbon dioxide levels and rests my respiratory muscles. So some hope returned.
Survived the winter without an exacerbation and tried to exercise most days on the walking machine. But now I'm on oxygen 24 hours a day (from last August) so that again took some getting used too. Appeared on TV with Liz Dawn talking about emphysema but our conversation was not a success. I don't think she knew where I was coming from.
Most days I get up at 10 AM, at 11AM start answering letters & writing to my professional friends and doing researcj for the internet but to be honest by 1PM I've had enough. If it is raining I do 20-30 minutes on the walking machine or go out and walk on the promenade. By 3-4PM I've had enough & go back to bed on the machine for 2 hours. In the evening if I can face it I fiddle around on the internet, on ebay, Google Earth & so forth or watch TV and back to bed by 12.
I've appeared in the press a few times and added more to the site and promoted the main site to the point that it has about 400 visitors a day. There is always more to do than I have energy to do it.
Right well that all sounds rather bland so next time I write I hope it will be more interesting. Oh and by the way I collect old postcards of St. Ives, Cornwall and intend to publish them for anyone interested in that area on this site very soon.