Thursday night at about 10:30, just after the nurse had been around for obs, I decided to go to the loo, before trying to settle down. My stomach wasn’t brilliant (as usual) so crawled back into bed. No sooner after lying down, I felt myself start to heat up!
Oh no! I’m starting to get a fever similar to the one I had early on in my treatment where I had what is called rigors. Your body shakes violently all night and is very painful. The only thing that they can do is try and cool you down as much as possible. I waited a while before buzzing the nurse to make sure that it wasn’t just some kind of hot flush…. it wasn’t!
I buzzed and the nurse came in and I said ‘It it really hot in here or have I got a tempertures’. Errrr no it’s really hot in here. Thank goodness for that, it wasn’t me. She explained that the air con sometimes blows out hot air, but it should adjust as it is all computerised. Computerised … mmm the answer and blame for everything. I waited about 15 minutes, but it was no good I was roasting. I buzzed again and said she would call the engineer, which she did. about 15 minutes went by and by now I am cooking. All of the nurses came to the door and realised there was something seriously wrong and tried to cool the room down for me with fans and leaving the door open to try and get some cool air in. They rang the engineer again and set it as a very high priority to get fixed. Don’t forget all of the trouble everyone has gone to to keep infections away, now I’m in a room heated to perfection for bacteria to grow.
The staff were trying there best and couldn’t do more for me. It was about midnight when the engineer came, I could hear him working outside in one of the cupboards (so I’m told). He managed to do a temporary fix where it would blow out cool air and wouldn’t be able to regulate it. No problem at least I will cool down. I tried climbing in the fridge naked, but that didn’t go down too well with the staff. At last cold air. I can breath again, few.
The temperature it was set at was cold. I was given extra blankets if it got too cold. Nothing could be worse than being slowly cooked so I said it wouldn’t be a problem ……. why did I say that, I don’t know.
It got colder and colder, to the point where I was trying to climb in the fridge. I also discovered that it is possible to make ice sculptures out of wee!
I couldn’t stand it anymore, wrapped up in my dressing gown in bed under three covers, I was freezing. …. time to buzz again. I can’t stand it anymore you are going to have to ring him and get him to change it again. The time was now about 3:30 am that he came again and adjusted it.
Guess what, this time it wasn’t cold it was hot again, not as hot as it was before, but certainly uncomfortably hot. Again fans on and I tried to get some rest, but never quite managed it.
The morning came (what time does morning start) and I was told the heating engineer would be here as soon as possible, he is awaiting for the part to arrive.
He arrived in the morning at some time, cant’ quite remember as I think I was a bit delirious at this point because of the heat exhaustion. He spent most of the day here but had it working, in that it wasn’t hot anymore, by about 12pm. So during the day I had this oily engineer walking in and out of my room taking bits off the wall and testing the temperature. He got told off by the nurses for not wearing he apron, naughty boy. After he went I wiped all the controls and the surfaces he touched with alcohol wipes. I’m sure he was a clean person, but the though of muck and oil in my room when I zero immune system didn’t thrill me.
There were going to move me to another room as soon as they moved another patient to another ward, but by the time that was organised I said I didn’t mind waiting the extra bit to save all the problems. I’ve settled in the room now and I didn’t want to have to get used to another one.
Today my nose is running, not sure why yet, I’m going to have some swabs taken later to get them sent off for analysis. Lets hope I’m not coming down with a temperature!
