no rest for the wicked :-)

Lets start from the beginning! The flight was long but good. Arrived in Delhi at 2.00am, got our bags went straight through and looked around for a familiar face holding a piece of paper with my name on it, but no one was there..mmm...ok, lets go outside and look, nope one one there either, went back inside, scratched my head and thought i didn't bring the address or contact number, Gaye suggested we go to the Cathay office and look for a phone book, we went up the lift and into the office, unfortunately no such thing as a phone book existed. So down stairs we went and thought we'd just get a taxi, but then a light bulb went off in my head 'we're in India Claire, running on Indian time!!" so I asked Gaye to go back inside for one more look, while she did this i text my sister in Perth got her out of bed to google the hospital for an address and phone number. While she was doing this for me Gaye found Opie!!! Yeah! I need to adjust to Indian time, we got in the taxi and headed off to the hospital.


Arrived and went up to our room, same room as last time, it was stinking hot as the airconditioning wasn't on. We tried to put it on but it wasn't working, Gaye asked the wardboy but it still wasn't working, so for that night we slept in the opposite room. By this time it was 4.30am, we were both exhausted Before going to bed I asked the wardboy to hunt down my toilet frame that I'd left from last visit, crossing my fingers, he thankfully returned with it, looking a little worse for wear from being on the roof, but hey who cares its here!


I woke the next morning by the sound of banging in our room next door, I thought to myself 'they are fixing the airconditioning' if all else fails just give it a good bash!! Gaye and I started to get up at 11.00am. A nurse came to take blood from me but I was still dehydrated, they struggled and could only get 2mls. Then a new female Dr came to visit me and did a assessment after that I got up and had to be at physio at 12pm, it was 11.50 now. I had a drink of water, brushed my hair and Gaye gave me a few hand fulls of fruit and nut mix.

They had to take blood again the next day, this time I drank plenty of water, ate 2 fantails (medicinal purposes only!!) and they sat a hot water bottle on my hands, they finally got 5mls of blood from me and I only ended up with 2 bruises.

It was lovely to see Shivani's big smile, everyone was so welcoming, I felt like a celebrity! I went through my physio routine and explained what I have been doing in Perth. Shivani was happy with my progress but knew I was tired, I had my injection of stemcells and went back to my room just after 1.00pm to eat lunch and be back to physio at 2pm for walking. Gaye put on my new foot supports and shoes to walk in. Shivani gave me a walking frame with out wheels because I had to push it which is harder and works my shoulders too. Even though I was tired I managed to walk quite well. Thursday night I had my injections in each calf muscles.


I slept quite well on Thursday night, we managed to get the adjoining room where Gaye is sleeping which is giving us much more space so we're not falling over each other. Back down to physio on Friday, more energy today. What I've noticed so far is that I have slightly more strength in my shoulders, legs and face. At home I was standing and doing my arm exercises so Shivani has Incorporated this so I do new arm exercises standing and its working well. I'm not so fearful standing. There is one thing that is weaker though and I was feeling quite stressed about this before I left. About 4 weeks before arriving here I noticed my right hand was aching then it started to become weaker. Firstly my middle finger then it slowly moved out to my pointer and ring finger, my thumb and pinky seem to be ok. Shivani confirmed my fear it was weaker and in my right wrist a bit too. My heart sank, I'm so pissed off (sorry to offend but its how I was feeling) I had a cry, processed it logically (if thats possible) and then pulled myself together. I was in two minds to share this with you, but I have to be honest about my treatment, its not all going to be smooth sailing.


Dr Geeta came to see me with Dr Ashish, Dr Sudeep and a nurse. I talked to her about it and this time she has decided that my procedure will be a Cordula block injection in my neck, I will still have injections daily and Iv's. I wanted to have a better understanding of how they treat the Indian patients. Its basically the same but our treatment is more intense but they also need to have 3-4 months break between treatments, so its not like they are getting injections everyday all the time. However I did leave my return too long, it was 8 months, I won't leave it so long next time.

Today is saturday and we don't have physio in the afternoon so Shivani decided to extend my morning session. I did an hour of physio then had my injection then went back to do more arm exercises standing and walking, it was full on.
I've met lots of lovely people so far a guy here from Perth, one from Melbourne and a guy from Brisbane who's here for his second round of treatment. Geeta has set up a common room for patients to hang out at so we'll go down stairs tonight to meet everyone, share stories and support those here for the first time who resemble a deer in headlights! Its definitely overwhelming for first timers.

Until next time....Nameste