The “Butcher’s Dog” Report

Reading time: 3 minutes...

You know that old saying? “Fit as a Butcher’s Dog!” – well, that’s pretty much me!

I’m hardly ever ill (apart from a bout of COVID back in 2021 and my, so-good-I’ve-had-them-twice, Kidney Stones).

So, 2023 turned into the year when this old dog had multiple trips to the vets!! 😬

Deaf in Paradise

It all began back on March 14th. I woke up to a whistling/whooshing sound in my ear. I assumed it was ‘nothing’ and would disappear as quickly as it arrived. Err, No! ☹️ After multiple visits to our ‘good old’ NHS, it turned out to be Tinnitus (although no-one’s really 100% sure). There’s no cure, just techniques for managing it. Once you’ve got it, you’ve got it… and its volume, over the years, only goes in one direction!!

Oh, joy! 👎

Of course, it’s not a life-threatening illness, thankfully, and I should be grateful it’s nothing more serious – BUT it is a major annoyance, especially when I’m in quiet environments. Next stop? Having hearing aids fitted that push out a sort of ‘white noise’ to ‘fool my brain’. Fooling my brain has never been an issue, so that’ll be easy! Not sure that I like the idea of hearing aids though!!! 🤔

Next..!

2.30

Back in December LAST year, I had a problem with one of my wisdom teeth. Rumours that it was because it hadn’t been used much over the years were unfounded, but the Dentist said that a filling would sort it out. It didn’t. I then spent the best part of the next 12 months battling with the local dental practice to get it fixed. Multiple cancellations/postponements of my appointments by them only added to my frustration in getting it fixed. I could live with the pain – just! – but my love of food was seriously hampered because the left-hand side of my mouth was out of bounds!

Finally, a few weeks back, on November 27th, after an agonising period where the pain over the two prior weeks increased so much, that I almost ODed on painkillers, the offending molar was removed. Ouch! Of course, it wasn’t straightforward! 😩. After the obligatory two injections, I could still feel the twists and turns of the Dentist’s mole-wrench! Cue another jab… and then another… and yet another! We stopped at SIX (I think they ran out of ‘juice’!) where finally, after a bit of twisting and turning, I was now wisdom-less. Well, at least I now have a space to hide Ann’s Christmas pressies!

But there’s more…

No Pressure

Well, lots of pressure actually! 🤔. In previous years, for as long as I can recall, my blood pressure has been spot-on. In fact, I’ve always been complimented at my annual medical checks, on how ‘text book’ my numbers were. Recently, a chance opportunity to have a free blood pressure test revealed…

Actually, nothing at all!

Literally! 😮

They couldn’t get a reading on their machine. I didn’t understand (and nor did the Tester). My question to him: “Am I dead?” missed his funny bone by about a gazillion miles, and I was asked to ‘test it myself’ when I got home (as you do!).

After much self-testing, more self-testing and even more measuring… the readings WERE on the high side (in between the BP monitor getting no readings at all!). Not ‘OMG high’, but enough to confirm the results with the professionals. So, now I’m coping with my third surprise of my ‘medical year’! Not what I expected at all!

Could things become more challenging? Of course they could!! 😮. This time, nothing to do with illness, it was simply attempting to get an appointment at my local Practice to discuss my figures. In short, the stuff of nightmares!

How so? Who knew that recording my own BP readings for a week on my own paper was unacceptable? Having presented these at the Practice, I was advised that I needed to record the figures on THEIR form! Simples! I’ll just copy over the figures. Oh no, that would be far too pragmatic – I was informed that I had to do ANOTHER week of testing! Commenting to the Receptionist that I might be ‘dead by then‘ proved that the Practice obviously shared the same funny bone as my first Tester!

How we laughed! 😂. Not!

Although not directly comparable, I also now realised that I’d outlived my Dad by about two weeks (who had sadly keeled over with a massive heart attack back in the 90s!) – not really conclusive at all, but it did play on my mind.

Finally, after much more bureaucracy, I arranged an appointment with my Doctor. And so, to bring this tale fully up-to-date, we are now in a period of (ahem!) experimentation to get the tablet mix right for my condition. Initially, it’s 5mg of Amlodipine – the smallest dose offered for relaxing the blood vessels and then, every four weeks, they’ll test and then tweak, maybe introducing additional tablets or changing them. Eventually, I’ll be on the right combo of magic pills. Oh, in a final twist to test my resolve, the statins I’m on for cholesterol (that I’ve been taking for over 20 years – Simvastatin) that work a treat in trimming my bad cholesterol figure, apparently don’t play nicely with the heart tablets, so they’ve been replaced by 20mg of Atorvastatin.

And so it begins! I guess it’s “Welcome to getting old”!! 😡

Off now to have a word with the Butcher for a rewrite of my Job Description! 😉