Me and My Chicken Legs!

I'm out and discharged from hospital.  I feel really tired and lethargic and can hardly walk due to my wasted leg muscles.  I walk like a badly coordinated 96 year old.  That's not the worst bit, getting up to standing is a swine.  Don't even ask about the worry I had when I sat on the toilet (yes, I thought I was stuck and was going to need help to get up.  I just managed it though.  Not fun).  As soon as I was released I tried to start getting some walking done and to go up the stairs a few times (that's a killer).  Next morning the few scrawny muscles I did have were throbbing and I could hardly move my legs at all.  Standing wasn't only difficult it was bloody painful too.  So, as good as high dose steroids are for somethings, they are bastards when it comes to scoffing muscle tissue.  I now officially have chicken legs (or chicken bone legs to be more precise!)

On the plus side, I now have a stem cell harvest date and a scan date.  Fingers are crossed that the last chemo session (which I found really gruelling, more in another post) seemed to have worked (please, please).  Anyway, I now have to give myself 3 daily injections (yum, yum) in my soft white belly.  1 is called Fragmin and is an anti-coagulant, the other 2 are GCSF which is the drug that makes my poor tortured bone marrow release stem cells.  I have 2 of those because they don't do a single on in a big enough size.  Doh!  

Released into the wild

I got released from hospital last night.
I went in on sunday, to A&E, with a temperature of 39c. I was taken in and a lovely doctor checked me out and put in the usual needle. Blood was taken and I was given IV anti-biotics.
After a few hours, my blood results came back and I was not neutropenic, but I had an infection and they were going to keep me in. After some more loitering, I was taken for a chest x-ray, which came back clean and I then got allocated a bed.
Didn't sleep too well first night and still had a temp the next morning, when woken up at 6 to have blood taken!
Time there pretty much involved: several hospital meals (which actually weren't bad), lots of IV fluids and trips to the bathroom - dragging a top heavy squeaking drip stand which wanted to fall over (had to more or less waltz with it to keep it upright) and taking of more blood.
Finally, after tracking down a doctor, I asked when I could leave (if I hadn't I think I could have just stayed as long as I wanted). They said that they did not know where my infection had come from and probably wouldn't let me go until they did. After a bit of negotiation and several more hours they said I could go but would need to come straight back if I felt unwell again.
I forgot to mention, while I was in hospital my left hand swelled up. Most likely due to the blood clot but it looked like the false hand of that bloke in the comedy bowling movie Kingpin. It looked fake and kind of freaked me out when I saw it out of the corner of my eye!
Anyway, I'm back home now. Just had the nurse over to give me my latest fragmin anti-coagulant injection (ooh, sweet). The one good thing about being in hospital this week was the constant fluid from the drip meant that I havn't had the steroid dry mouth/dying to pee thing going on...oh, until now. Back in a mo.... There, that's better. Need another drink now though.