18. A Change Is As Good As A Rest?

They say ‘A change is as good as a rest’ but that doesn’t mean that all changes are good as I discovered in 2019.

This was the year that I got to visit some new departments at the Conquest hospital, not just the orthopaedic department.

In February I had what they call a Transient Ischaemic Attack (TIA) or mini stroke.

This happened while I was at work at our old community shop (which closed later that year). While I was serving a customer on the Post Office, I couldn’t remember the words I needed to say. I called a colleague to take over and went and sat in the office and the words came back to me but as it was so strange, I got Bob to take me to the hospital where I was introduced to the Neurology Department, they gave me a CT scan which showed no permanent damage proving that the TIA was, fortunately, very minor.

Then, in August I awoke one morning and one side of my face had dropped and Bob knew straight away what the problem was as he had seen the same thing in his father, Bell’s Palsy. This time I got to know the E. N. T. department. Fortunately, this also went away after a while.

Also, in August I got fed up with people complaining that I had the TV too load or asking them to repeat what they were saying so I accepted that my hearing was not as good as it used to be so my GP referred me the Audiology department and so now, I have hearing aids.

Three new departments in one year I’m really getting my money’s worth out of the NHS.