Friday 30 July 2010

the last week

Monday, Bob went to London for a sleep study at the Princess Grace Hospital. We had a few options for getting him down there, but finally decided on the bus (which is called a coach). There is a station in Mildenhall, but we saved 18GBP by using the station in Bury St Edmunds. So Bob got on the bus and I got to drive home from Bury. Neither of us enjoyed it.

Bob was in London for several hours before he had to check in, so he walked up and down from the Victoria station to the hospital (made the 2 mile distance into a 6 mile walk). By 7pm he'd arrived, and had double blisters on both feet. He sat in the park until check-in time, and then got hooked up and went to sleep. About 1am they woke him up to put on a breathing thingy (CPAP) and he tried to go back to sleep.

At 9am he had a meeting with the doctor, who said Bob does indeed have sleep apnea. They programmed his personal CPAP (with a heater and a humidifier), and made an appointment for Sept 3.

Then Bob had several more hours before he had to get on the bus to come home. Given the condition of his feet, he shelled out the bucks for an open-top bus tour of the city. In retrospect, he should have done the bus tour the first day, and then been able to look closer at the sites of interest the following day. Oh well. He still doesn't like London, but he has admitted there are some spots he'd like to see again.

The buses leave from a different place than they arrive, but nobody told us that, so Bob ended up missing his bus home. So he bought another ticket back, this time going into Mildenhall. His ticket said he'd be here at 8:40, but it was not quite 7 when he arrived. Too bad about that frustrating experience, but we were all glad to have him home anyway.

He went back to work on Wednesday, which somehow I thought was Tuesday and so he missed an appointment on Wednesday. He turned in his keys to the shop, and really isn't expected to much by way of work anymore, so he comes home early and happy. It's just as well, as he isn't sleeping at night because of the CPAP. It starts off fine, but gets more intrusive as the night goes on. We checked it today, and the doctor locked in the settings so we can't turn it down. Sorry, all y'all who don't have apnea and have no idea what I'm talking about. The CPAP is a machine that forces air down your throat while you sleep. Also it has bright lights, which is annoying.

Anyway, I think I'm anonymous enough here to say that we are leaving tomorrow for our 3 week holiday. I've been washing and packing and getting directions all week. I don't know if we'll have internet while we are away, but I do plan to write at night and publish when I can.
Better get back to work.

2 comments:

Wil said...

Have a great time on your trip. :-)

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