Back (Mostly) At Home

The road to recovery is a hard one. Mentally, getting out of hospital means 'bad stuff gone, good stuff coming' but as I write this at 3.30am I think I've already twigged that getting better is going to be a longer and tougher process than I'd hoped for.

My mouth behaved pretty well in Parkside but was obviously biding its time. It's sore, there's a dark brown dead spot on my tongue and a pile of ulcers, but worse, it's full of thick saliva mucus. So it's like trying to breathe in and out past a wet curtain of spider web. It's making me cough to try and clear my throat, and having a sip of a drink is a sharp addition to the party. Only certain flavours of squash (the 'soft' ones like pear, summer fruits or strawberry) and milk are going down, still painfully but less so than pink grapefruit or lemon, which is unfortunately what H kindly brought up last night and which is foxing me right now. The old 'I need a drink, but it hurts' conundrum

On the upside, first bath back at home was lovely. Albeit a bit weird with H trying to shave and flannel off the couple of remaining stubbly patches on my head, so it all looks the same. Front and top of head came out fully, back of head was hanging on in there. Different follicles? Thinner skin on top of head? Cosmic joke to make me look even more of a twat? Who knows..

And I feel kind of hungry and sick right now, but just don't fancy food – as it means disturbing the mouth beast – even if I could get up and down the stairs. So it's all about killing time and distractions while things slowly improve.

Just about crawled out of bed to Parkside for 2 bags of platelets, took 3 long hours. Liz T was a star, helping with texts and getting me back in order as have just felt too crap to get on this myself. Spotted on way back that some tosspot has run into the front of my car while I've been in hospital – not lots of damage but a bit of a poo.

Nice visits from James W, the bearer of all things dairy to help me spoon my drugs in, then Helen T and V this eve, as Mr H getting some R&R with the boys. Actually slightly too much as I've realised I'm a bit too poorly still, so will scale back for a few days and swap chat for rest. Dull, but this mouth somehow has to mend…

Most laughable moment of day was about 3.45pm when suddenly, through the thin walls of London terracing, and from the direction of our disliked neighbour came the relaxing sound of….. a kid trying the first 4 notes of 'Oh When the Saints', on a bloody trumpet. Over and over again. And very badly. Followed by a thin sounding recorder. Please let this be a play date one off and not the new wonder birthday present x