The first post! How exciting!
So, back in 2017, I was enjoying my new life in France, I had moved in with my boyfriend and was settling in to a routine with my new job and lifestyle.
I had noticed a couple of times that if I bent a certain way I’d get awful pain in my right ribs, breathtaking pain but it would go away again if I changed positions so I figured it was trapped gas or a trapped nerve! One weekend we visited Parc Asterix (a theme park near Paris) with some friends, when I got out the car I couldn’t stand up, the pain was so bad! Instead of finding medical help there and then I chose to just take a paracetamol and enjoy the day out with my friends…
Two weeks later, sitting at work, the pain returned and would not go away, I couldn’t walk properly, I couldn’t sit comfortably and I couldn’t concentrate. So I asked my boyfriend to take me to the hospital. I should note that this is completely out of character for me, I would usually do anything to avoid doctors but something that day made me brave and told me we needed to get checked out.
The hospital initially thought that it was gallstones, which I had also suspected. They gave me some pain relief and took some blood while we waited for an ultrasound to confirm. It was at this point my life turned upside down. It took about 2 hours to get the blood test results back, but then it was all go, I was pushed through to have the ultrasound where the nurse tested my knowledge of biology by not scanning anywhere near where I knew my gallbladder was. This was my first suspicion that something else was going on. A doctor was called to confirm whatever it was she saw on the scan, he promptly sent me for a CT Scan. No waiting around here I was wheeled literally from one room to another and plopped in a CT scanner.
You may wonder at this point why no one has told me what was going on. I think they did however I spoke no french at this point. I’d been in the country about a year, working for an American company and surrounded by English speaking friends, my French was limited to the occasional interaction with a cashier in a supermarket or sales assistant in the mall.
After the CT Scan I was taken back to my little room in “Urgances” (A&E / ER) and told to wait, “a ‘blood doctor’ is coming to see you because there is a shadow on your liver” Well this didn’t really mean much to me but we were assured that this “blood doctor” spoke English and could help explain everything.
An absolutely lovely Doctor arrived and explained that they needed to find out what was wrong with my liver but because it was so late (By this point it was about 9pm) I would need to be admitted for the night and then have a biopsy done in the morning. I was given the option to wait for a porter to wheel me up to my bed, or I could walk if I was ok. I chose to walk..
Imagine yourself in a hospital you’ve never been in before, not really knowing whats going on or what could be wrong, just following a doctor through the maze of corridors. It didn’t take long for me to realise that the recurring signs we had been following were for “Hématologie Oncologie” Once that dawned on me, the panic hit. Complete and utter panic and despair. I stopped walking, grabbed on to a wall and started screaming. (Not my proudest moment).
Nurses came running from all directions, the doctor who was leading the way tried to calm me down… The one thing that made me shut up was when someone said “it’s 10pm, patients are trying to sleep.” I still couldn’t move but at least I’d stopped making a scene! Slowly we managed to get me walking a few feet at a time towards my bed, we managed to get me in the room but then I refused to even sit on the end of the bed.. I really feel bad for the nurses on that night shift, I bet I was the last thing they expected to experience!
Slow but sure I was calming down, they brought me a nice cocktail of drugs to help the process and that was the start of a hazy two weeks of tests, appointments and surgeries which I will detail in my next post!
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