The lack of sexual health in Leeds.

Have you ever tried to get a full sexual health screening done? I’m talking swabs, bloods, the works? Well I’ve had most things tested for but to my shame I’ve never had the full screening done to find out whether I have any of those lovely little darlings that sometimes take a piggy back along with you on your sexual exploits.

With all the health problems I have at the moment I thought that now was as good a time as any, especially after my ex and his rather dubious reasonings behind sex, to go and see what (if anything) is going on ‘down there’.

I looked up the Sexual Health Clinics for Leeds and got confused, so asked my nurse yesterday while getting bloods taken…she gave me a lovely list of walk in clinics, their addresses, opening times etc and off I trotted home to have a look.

You know what? Apparently now I’m over 25 I’m not supposed to want testing for these diseases! More than 70% of them were for ’25 and under only’. I’m confused, shouldn’t I be having sex now I’m over 25??

Not so much any more, it’s fighting back but still

Anyway I found one near me that had no such label, it was open this afternoon so off I went to find it (Thank you SatNav on my phone) and embarrassed as hell in I went. Guess what? They don’t take over 25′s any more either!!

Now I’ve been trying to ring the GUM (Genito-Urinary Medicine) clinic for the past couple of days but only ever get an answer message…not even a warning that it is one, just a rambling voice telling me what I already know about their opening times. They don’t even have the decency to answer the phone so I can try to book an appointment. The clinic has walk in sessions but they’re notoriously busy and the web site says to allow 2-3 hours waiting time even if you get there at 8.30am before the place is open as they suggest!

So what am I supposed to do?

I can’t make an appointment because they don’t answer the phone

I won’t be able to sit there for that long waiting with the amount of pain I’m in

I can’t get in to any of the other clinics because I’m too old (there’s another one I’ll try tomorrow but I can’t even ring to check as their phones are only manned in clinic hours)

 

I’m absolutely furious at Leeds Teaching Hospitals right now! I’m furious at Leeds Sexual Health testing services in general.

It’s a major city in this country, filled with people out getting drunk, meeting people and having sex with them pretty much every night of the week. I’d say the majority of the people in this city are over 25 years old and yet we are the ones that are given the least chance to be tested for something that the NHS keeps making adverts to encourage us to do!

A real government funded add campaign about the joys of STI’s

I’m not the only one either, even the receptionist at the clinic I went to today has the same problem and encouraged me pretty vehemently to fill in a feedback form and complain. I did…I ranted and I hope they listen. As soon as I got home I went onto their website, found the ‘Contact us’ section and filled out a form on there too where I had more space to tell them just what I think of their ‘service’ and how annoyed I am at the whole ridiculous situation. I even gave them my email address so that if they have any excuses they want to give me they can try but I will say now that whether it’s financial or resource based I don’t care!

I can only hope this situation is not the same anywhere else, that you can find someone willing to test you for sexually transmitted diseases without having to fight through the miasma I am.

They don’t know who they’re up against on this one, I will fight for those damn tests and win!

 

More questions than answers

I started this yesterday and didn’t know how to proceed without sounding like a whining, paranoid, google obsessed, hypochondriac.

I’ve decided there is no way to avoid most of those but I feel the need to write down my worries so…tough!

Have you ever used google to look up your symptoms? I admit it’s a bad idea in most cases because even the simplest of symptom lists can give you some very scary results. However in some ways my scientific brain just can’t resist the temptation to try and figure out what’s wrong with me myself.

So…I looked the other day at the whole ‘coughing up blood’ thing because well…it was scary and I couldn’t not. Plenty of scary results, most of which I just ignored and when I went to the doctor managed to forget about most of them again.

Yesterday I went in for my blood results from last weeks fasting blood test, nothing to do with the chest infection but I did wonder whether anything would show up. Now most of it was clear, no deficiencies, no diabetes etc..all good so far right?

But then came that little phrase that it’s never good to hear…’Here’s something that’s unusual and I wouldn’t have expected…’ My levels of Serum Albumin are low (the proteins that make up the fluid surrounding blood cells) and my red blood cells are enlarged. Pretty much as soon as I got home I couldn’t resist looking up what they might mean.

The same thing keeps cropping up, with the cough, the albumin, the macrocytosis (big RBC’s) and it says TB. Tuberculosis, consumption, a nasty bacterial infection that caused a lot of deaths before antibiotics were discovered.

I wouldn’t have even thought twice about it except for the fact I never had my TB inoculations as a teenager, one of the few people around without a big dint in my left arm from the injection. Today when I see the nurse to have my blood stolen yet again I’m going to ask her about getting tested for it, if I don’t have it then I want the inoculation! With the paranoia about my health on a high I will mostly also be going to a sexual health clinic for a check up…not that there’s much chance of anything being there but still, I feel the need to check and make sure. That raises a whole load more issues mind you and it will be a toss up whether my anxiety about getting tested outweighs my anxiety about having something.

Okay, time to get ready to see the vampire again..hopefully she manages to find a vein as easily as last time.

Earth Day! Think Green

Reblogged from The Introspective Introvert:

Let everyday forward be Earth Day!

Earth Day 2013...

Mother Earth hear your child, As I sit here on your lap of grass, I listen to the echoes of your voice In my brother, the Wind, As he blows from all corners and directions. The soft and gentle raindrops are the Tears you cry for your children Teach me the Lessons you offer: To nurture my children, as you nurture yours, To learn the Lessons of the Four Kingdoms, that make up this World of Physical Things, and To Learn to Walk the Path chosen so long ago.

Read more… 478 more words

Happy Earth day! I loved this quotation so much I didn't feel the need to write it all up again myself ;)

'Pet therapists' aka 'How Toby saved my life'

Reblogged from scienerf:

• 

I was in a pit of despair, riddled with anxiety and paranoia. My life had been ripped from me by the diagnosis of MS, I knew too much yet nowhere near enough and from the bottom of that pit all I could see was dark clouds and lightning bolts of bad news.

I felt that my world, my life had ended.

Read more… 606 more words

I've been reminded of how much difference a dog can make recently so thought I'd repost this :)

An the results are in!

Those little lab monkeys have done their thing and all my results are back. Guess what! I have a chest infection, shocking really huh. The phlegm, coughing, blood and generally feeling crap wasn’t a dead give away then?

Not my chest but nothing like an x-ray to brighten the page

 

Unfortunately by the sounds of things (from the one side of the phone conversation I could hear at my GPs’ office) it’s not a cut and dry one. There was a patch that wasn’t inflating properly when they took the x-ray but it wasn’t as wide spread as they expect from a chest infection. The GP, a different one again, listened to my chest in a much more thorough way and found a quiet spot so she’s doled out the antibiotics. Here goes a week of popping tablets that will probably give me the squits, shoving my head over a bowl of steaming water and crossing my fingers.

The thing that was a little worrying was the fact the doctor said ‘..and if it’s not better in a couple of weeks we’ll send you off for another chest x-ray’ with a look on her face that was pensive. For someone who is a renowned hypochondriac that was not the best step that GP could have taken!

This was me on Monday when I started coughing up blood and was in agony from pulling a chest muscle (ever tried breathing with a pulled chest muscle??)

Ah well, I’ve started my bacteria killers and just need to remember that although when I am sitting still on the sofa everything seems okay (until the next coughing fit comes on) I am poorly. It’s so easy to forget when the pain killers are working! So easy to get up and think…’Oh that lawn really needs mowing, it’s dry now I’d better get it done’…and head on out in the garden only to find half way through getting the lawnmower out of the shed that I’m out of breath and in pain.

Do I give in?

HA! Of course not, that would be far too sensible.

My lawn is mowed now…I may be dizzy, hurting and still struggling to catch my breath but it’s done. I wish I could carry on and get some more cleaning or gardening done but my body is no longer co-operating.

You know what between the MS, the muscle pain that might be Fibromyalgia, the chest infection and the mood issues I sometimes feel rather trapped in my own body. The mind wants to do something but the body rebels, the body wants to do something but the mind rebels or best of all…the mind and body know they should be relaxing but the other bits of body are literally aching to get up and move!

I may not have DID but I certainly feel like I have a whole load of different parts of my arguing amongst themselves.

Luckily the post man delivered some presents packages today so I have different films to watch. I seem to have become a little obsessed with Batman recently and am working my way through every film made in the past couple of decades, I forgot how many of them have been made! I think I’m at a low point at the moment though with ‘Batman and Robin’, Arnie really spoils the whole thing to my mind.

I did get 101 Dalmatians the original cartoon through too though so I can sing along to that later if my chest lets me get enough breath to do it

Right I think it’s time for a nap, since I’m having to sleep sitting up on the sofa I’m not managing to get a full nights sleep really so napping is more essential than ever in order to stop me becoming a zombie.

Springtime

Yellow head emerge

bobbing in the wind and sun

signals spring is here

I was so happy to see this little little patch of yellow finally in my garden, so many of my daffodils have been showing promise but none of them have let their petals emerge till today Fingers crossed this means all the others will be bobbing away in the wind soon too!

I’ve had my chest x-ray this morning, I have to wait a few days for the results so they should be through at about the same time as the bloods that were taken last week…I have a funny feeling it is a chest infection and waiting around for them to say I can take antibiotics to help clear it is so frustrating!

Ah well, in the mean time I’ve finally finished my Green Man project!

  I might need to put some form of backing on him so that all the leaves stay flayed out like this, crochet tends to like to curl up when left unattended Knowing me I’ll probably add more to him even though I feel he’s finished at the moment, I’ll decide that he needs something a little extra, but for now he feels done. So the next project…well I’ll have to have a think and have a look to see what I can find inspiration wise. I definitely need something else to do since more muscles have decided to rebel against me. Anybody got any ideas as to what I can knit/crochet? I think the best one that someone suggested so far is to try and do some lace making with a simple scarf, either that or to make a cover for my walking stick to make it look pretty

I must have done something bad recently

I seem to have the worst luck at the moment and I can’t help wondering if this is karma getting back at me. This morning I was coughing a lot as I have been for the past week or so and whilst doing so I managed to pull the muscles all down my right hand side meaning every time I’ve breathed in since then I’ve been in pain. I have been almost in tear unable to take enough of a deep breath in due to the pain that I was scared I might pass out a few times today when the pain killers have been wearing off.

The scary thing is today I have been coughing up blood. I thought it was a one off this morning and tried to ignore it (especially since I couldn’t cough because of the pain after that) but when it happened again this afternoon I decided to go onto NHS Direct online and their symptom checker. If you’ve ever used it you may have found the same as me…they like to refer you to A&E! Or maybe it’s just the problems I’ve tried to consult it on. Anyway they told me to go to A&E or to ring the new 111 number…easy choice for me, I rang the lovely people on 111 and they went through all the issues, referred me to a nurse who decided I would be better off going to my GP.

Strangely I actually managed to get straight in to see a lovely doctor within about an hour, she can’t hear anything wrong with my chest but they have a procedure in place for things like this so I have to get my chest X-rayed just to make sure there’s nothing hiding that she couldn’t hear. I’ll be going in tomorrow when the walk in centre is open again to find out if it’s an infection, a burst blood vessel from all the coughing or something more sinister.

So for now I will be trying to get some sleep…since I can’t lie down I’ll probably be sleeping on the sofa (no change there then) and hoping that my pain killers keep working enough to let me get some rest.

On a positive note it’s been beautifully sunny if very windy today! Toby has been sunbathing lots and I have been watching films and crocheting being unable to enjoy it much but loving seeing the sunlight outside!