Well today was the
first day at my new job. It's a bit
early to tell but I think I may like it here. For one thing we dress in casual except when we are actually meeting
clients - no more
suit and tie every morning for me.
Of course my first day was meant to be yesterday, but I took a
sick day instead. Not a great start for a
new job I know but since I spent the previous nightand most of that day in the
Alfred Hospital I think its excusable.
I woke up the previous morning in
Sydney with a pain just below my ribs. I thought it must be
indigestion from
something I ate the night before, but it slowly got worse as the day progressed. I flew back to
Melbourne that night by which time I also had
referred pain in my left shoulder. I thought that eating something might help, so I went out to get some dinner and on the way I started having difficulty breathing. I left my dinner on the
living room floor and drove myself to emergency.
At the hospital they seemed stumped and over the course of several hours performed every test imaginable on me including
blood tests,
urine tests,
ECGs,
X-Rays,
ultrasound and
sticking a finger up my bum. All in all it was quite scary and at one point I realised that if it turned out to be
something serious then I didn't have anyone who I would want to call. It was a very lonely moment.
They also stuck a
drip in my arm for 14 hours or so which was one of the most
unpleasant things I have ever experienced. Eventually they injected some sort of
muscle relaxant down the
dirty great plastic tube stuck in my arm and this eased things up enough for me to get to sleep for a while. I
woke up again when the pain returned, higher up and to the left this time and literally
writhed with it until I passed out. When I woke up again it was gone and eventually they
discharged me.
One of the doctors presented a theory that perhaps I had damaged my
diaphragm muscle either in a coughing fit or by sleeping in a strange position on the plane, but another thought it might have been
gastric.
Who Knows?
I still felt a bit weak for most of today but things seem to getting better.
When I checked my email I found that a friend of mine who I have not seen for a long time ( he lives with
her and
I don't want to see her ) had invited me to dinner with an old friend of ours who had come to visit. I decided to turn up but they didn't. I waited for
15 mins and then left again - Strangely I'm not really
pissed off. Somehow I don't seem to really care.