Reflecting on that anxiety

I suppose that so much of the anxiety about going to this pre-assessment is about what they "might" find wrong with you. I know that it is good to know what you've got or you perhaps shouldn't think abut things that way and yet, cancer gives you a niggle ALL the time.

You see everything is cancer. I made my mouth bleed the other day and that was cancer. Had a nose bleed, a stomach upset, you name it, the mind says its come to get you another way.

I don't think there is any logic at all in those arguments but then again, logic and rationalisation go out of the window with something like this.

The nurse said, as we joked about my heightened anxiety, that one of her patients has been coming in for scrapes for 24 years and he still gets stressed out. Now I read that differently. I don't want to keep having to come back for 24 years. It's been 2 years this July. I may get out of this in 3 or 4 years (well that is my hope). I don't want to add 20 more years on top of that. I don't get ill, I'm not poorly, I am generally a well person and to be ill is very unusual. I would find it very difficult to be a habitual patient.

I think though that I may be stuck with the worry that everything was a sign of impending doom afterwards. Having had the shock of being mortal - everyting becomes a worry.

I should think how lucky I am that I work in a place that shows me real life on a daily basis. I think that leveller is going to be a good thing for me. Working for a charity that relieves poverty and distress does mean that no matter how bad you think things are for you, for other people it can be a whole lot worse.

Again, I marvel at my inability to realise how seriously ill I really was, someone did take me to one side and tell me all about my attitude and how it was paying dividends being so positive. I don't feel that at all. But maybe I have built up my own shields and defence mechanisms so well that I project a confident, it will be alright attitude and yet (dear reader) we know that is not the case all the time.

this Hospital stuff really focuses the mind. :-)