Anyone around... scared

[DarkSuitsSadSongs]

I'm home alone with my 12 year old twins as my husband is working away and not due back until tomorrow evening. He's about 6 hours away.

Over the last few days I've had a painful boil under my boob. I saw the GP today as it doubled in size overnight. There is a red circle around it. She prescribed doxycycline (2 a day) and said to phone back if it gets worse.

I've been getting more and more unwell. My left arm has started tingling, I'm sweating with cold hands and feet, the pain is indescribable and I'm exhausted. I slept for 6 hours this afternoon and I'm still utterly exhausted and all my joints hurt.

I've had to phone my father in law who is an hour away to come through to sit with the twins. I'm on hold to 111 but a 45 minute wait to call answer as a minimum they said.

I'm not sure whether just to call a taxi when FIL gets here to go straight to accident and emergency.

I'm a little freaked out at how unwell I feel.

@DarkSuitsSadSongs so glad to read that you are on the mend.

What a wonderful way your family welcomed you home! I hope you felt totally loved.

Does your DH have a brother or a cousin or a friend? Just asking for myself.

Sounds like you have a kind and thoughtful family who love you dearly.

I hope this is the end of the health challenges.

ps - you should really have videoed the "popping", just speaking for the Sporners on here.

💐

Christ, that sounds horrific. And no gin. Deepest sympathies.

Id have loved to see a video of this. Glad you’re on the mend though x

I'm still in significant pain with it. It's burning and throbbing much more than it was when I went in this morning.

On the way out the nurse said the burning pain should ease by tomorrow.

I'm very teary and my gut reaction is ro provide feedback (not a complaint) that I should have been spoken ro more before he flushed the betadine.

He simply said he was going to clean it and started.

He filled a syringe (no needle) with the betadine, inserted the end of the syringe into the small hole and pushed the plunger down. I screamed and he kept going until I begged him to stop. Afterwards he said anaesthetic is not usually used for a basic clean.

I feel like he maybe could have been clearer about what this cleaning involved - I.e. it wasn't a surface clean but an irrigation flush and that it would hurt. To me that is not a basic clean and I should have been told so I could consent.

I'm probably overreacting as I'm in pain and Tearful but I just can't believe how much it hurt with no warning.

They also didn't provide a drape like previous times so I was lying on the bed with both my breaststroke out. I just felt so vulnerable and exposed and then in agony.

I'm being such a wet blanket.

You most definitely are not, it sounds horrible and I would raise it with them.

You are absolutely not being a wet blanket. You’ve been incredibly brave and have had a lot to deal with. I’ve loved your updates and your sense of humour shines through.

You are also probably sleep deprived and that alone makes anyone feel shit.

Hang in there; you’ll beat this! I haven’t read everyone else’s comments but has anyone asked you to post pictures in Sporner Corner??? 😂

You poor love.
You are right.He should have warned you.
It sounds awful.. but at least its over.
Maybe talk to PALs about it.

Will you need more of this?

I don’t think you’re a wet blanket in the slightest and none of the things that you’ve wished had happened are unreasonable in the least. If you feel up to giving constructive criticism then I’d encourage you to do so - if it saves someone else from going through the same it will be well worth it xx

Everyone can be a wet blanket when it is pouring with rain.

What I mean is you have had so much to deal with it isn’t surprising that you feel teary. Be kind to yourself

Sounds hellish, mate. Honestly, you've had an awful time of this, with the thought that your appointment today would be another step forward and being given such a painful treatment, I'm not surprised you screamed, and, actually, I'm glad you did because it might give the Dr pause for concern before he does this to someone else!

Get yourself a big treat - ice cream / doughnut / McFlurry or similar. Look at your treat as being a big fat Gold Medal for endurance.

@DarkSuitsSadSongs

You are not in the slightest a wet blanket - you have been really strong and sensible throughout this horrible experience.

I am so sorry that they just started flushing your wound without any advance warning. That must have been awful.

Also having to ask for them to stop several times can feel quite disempowering.

It reminds me of when I burnt my hand really badly in the kitchen and I had an absolutely insane, pulsing, liquid filled blister covering my whole hand and I went to the burns clinic (after a loooong wait in A&E) and the lady who was seeing me (after hours waiting in the waiting room in pain as told not to take any pain meds) just gave me about 2 secs to sit down before she picked up this mini scalpel looking thing and just literally started scraping the blistered, swollen skin off my hand. No warning at all, no offer of any pain relief she literally just started scraping the skin off my hand at a really fast pace.

I now know this is called a debridement.

I was so shocked I kept asking her to stop and she just kept going - it was awful.

When I left the room I literally burst into tears and called my mum (at my big age) and just cried for about half an hour. It was so unexpected and so very painful. I am not trying to de-rail your thread but just wanted to share because I completely agree that it is never ok to just start a potentially painful procedure without explaining what is about to happen.

I do think sometimes (I said SOMETIMES, before all the HCP come for me), people who do these procedures regularly or under time pressure can be quite desensitised about certain things.

For them it's routine, for you it's the first time and you don't know what to expect plus you are worried, in pain and sleep deprived ....

Please give feedback if you can. It might help someone else in the future.

I really hope you feel better soon.

oooh Metronidazole is a hefty one - That might also be making you feel rough.

I don't think you're being a wet blanket - you've had a rotten week and I think anyone would feel just like you do 💐

Another vote for not a wet blanket at all. Honestly, you've had a shit ride recently, and it is entirely valid to feel that having some warning that it might be painful would have been a good thing. Big hug, OP.

I had a practice nurse put iodine on open, weeping leg cellulitis: my god the pain !!! I had to keep irrigating it with saline to get rid of it and then the pain subsided.
Honestly I do wonder if my nurse and your doctor had ever attended teaching on wound care. There used to be wound care nurse specialists who could recommend the best treatment and dressings but I suspect that role probably doesn't exist any more.
Certainly putting something known to be irritating/caustic on an open wound (with exposed nerve fibres) is bound to hurt.
I am glad all your previous care was so good and hopefully your future care is up to that standard.
Sending best wishes for a speedy recovery 💐

Your dignity and privacy were compromised and ignored when they failed to cover you.

Your right to pain relief - or at least clear explanation that what he was intending to do would HURT - was denied.

It was not properly explained.

Therefore he did not gain your consent.

Therefore what he did was assault.

It's hard to think in those terms - but the medical profession can so often treat women as less than human, somehow less worthy of pain relief than people (IE men) are.

This institutionalised misogyny must end.

When all's well, please take this further.

The doctor did not handle the situation right at all, I agree with the others about feedback once things have settled. They may not realise, they may need more training….but both those things should be been done before they start on patients! Still, if they aren’t then at least feedback may help.

You poor thing, you have been and are an absolute trooper. It sounds like your body is becoming quite sensitive to some of the things they are using. Your immune system is under assault and you’re taking lots of medications, it is a time when allergies do sometimes develop. It’s unlikely but if you get any itching or wheezing contact someone right away, and I would make sure you have some anti histamine in the house just in case to manage a mild reaction. I really don’t think it will happen, but it happened to me once with Metronidazole so I am just very aware of it.

I hope you can find a tolerably comfortable position later and watch something escapist.

You’re definitely not a wet blanket! I would definitely talk to PALS. Hope you recover quickly from here on in. 💐

When she announced that it had started to go overnight, I'm pretty sure I heard the voices of a thousand Sporners' Corner occupants raised in disappointment for a second and then heard no more.

Thanks all. I've had a wee nap and do feel a bit better.

What gave me pause was that the nurse in the room didn't say anything and I probably thought at the time that had anything not been done correctly she would have said something so that's probably why I just left without saying anything. It wasn't until I got home and the adrenaline etc wore off that i started to question what had happened to me.

I have had several episodes of soft tissue infections and cellulitis, 4 of which have resulted in surgical drainage (and a big 'ole opening made which then have to be packed and re-dressed every other day for weeks on end). What I have learnt along the way:

• The damn things fill up again at the speed of light after the initial drainage. And it bloody hurts when they do fill up; the throbbing starts all over again, until it discharges a little and eases up slightly. Then the whole cycle starts again. This can go on for weeks. It reminds me a bit of vomiting when you've got a bug...you feel like hell beforehand, then you have a good puke and feel much better until it starts to come on again!

• Prior to sending you to theatre to surgically drain an infected mass, the men in white coats will try anything to coax the thing to a head of its own accord. In my cases, this has ranged from physically squeezing the centre of the cellulitis area, at which point I screamed the ward down. To blatantly stabbing the centre with a long needle, at which point I screamed once more (and threatened to call security). Both times I was told "This might sting a bit, just grit your teeth"

• On one occasion, I had to return to the hospital's fracture clinic two days after being discharged home, for them to check the site (this was a particularly bad one on my arm - the cavity after drainage was the size of an egg). A young, but seemingly capable doctor was called and he proceeded to yank the copious amounts of packing out with his tweezers, and completely disregarded my yelps of pain. He then opened a large sachet of what looked suspiciously like soy sauce and poured the contents into the gaping hole on my arm. To say I screamed is an understatement. Stuff security, if I hadn't been so busy trying my damndest not to pass out, I would almost certainly have called the police! I was told afterwards that iodine in an open wound wouldn't feel dissimilar to acid being poured into it.

• On most occasions, I have been discharged to the care of my GP for the wound care - and the nurses there are amazing. The removal of the packing and washing out of the wound is done with such care, that whilst it's no walk in the park, it's bearable (and the nurses helpfully suggest taking my prescribed painkillers just before my appointments). They were horrified that anyone would attempt to apply iodine based products into a large, open wound. I have had most success with Medihoney gel and dressings, but those were pretty painful too, for an hour or so after application.

I sincerely felt your pain when I read your last post, and I really do know what you mean when you say it has left you tearful. I felt just the same, and it took a while to forget that pain. I honestly felt butchered and almost violated... I generally have a pretty robust pain threshold, but it disappeared completely during these experiences!

I hope you hurry up and heal, but please do be prepared for it to take a lot longer than you think. Eat well and stay hydrated, and rest as much as you can. Your body is using a lot of energy to heal at the moment, so you're going to feel done in I'm sure. If you're on antibiotics for quite a while, I found Kefir products really good at helping with my unhappy gut.

Sending you lots of healing thoughts...hopefully it's not too long before all this is a distant nightmare and behind you.

Contact PALS, it’s what they’re here for. Even just to talk through your experience, to make sense of it, to validate your feelings. They will decide what to do next. I do think it sounds like male doctor = it’s not that bad, woman can cope 🤨

You could ask if there is a tissue viability nurse who could assess the wound, it does sound utterly dreadful.

OP, once more with feeling, you were not a wet blanket, that doctor should have known better. A lot of NHS professionals would have known better. Let's hope he learns something from it.

And that you get some rest and feel better soon.

Bloody hell @DarkSuitsSadSongs, that sounds absolutely horrendous, you poor thing. You're being really brave.