2026
I have been having prostate problems for possibly a couple of years now...
Problems that gradually became progressively worse...
It first started impinging on my near-daily longest of walkies, with me having to take a pee about a third of the way round - and then it got worse still, with me having to take two pees - and then, sometime later, I was struggling to get home without embarrassing myself...
Increasingly frequent nightly pees also started imposing itself upon me also, of course...
So, anyway, late on the 25th January I realised that I was hardly able to pee at all - with my bladder, rather inevitably, becoming increasingly full - resulting in me deciding to walk to the A&E Dept of my local hospital inth middle of the night basically (thinking that it may be the least populated time to go) …
So anyway, having arrived at circa 4am, I was basically fast-tracked, so left, to walk back home, at circa 7am...
Twas an interesting experience - for I firstly had some blood taken, and then sometime later had my blood pressure taken - and then sometime later still I had my bladder scanned to see how much fluid (420ml) was in it (a repeating theme that continued during each of my subsequent visits btw) …
And then, soon afterwards, I had a catheter and associated bag fitted - with my bladder rather promptly, and relievedly emptying - Heaven, thought I...
So anyway, over the next couple of days I managed to go for a longest of walkies - as well as going to get some plywood from a local store - and all was feeling rather well in my world once again...
And, within such a time period, I made two separate visits to my local GP practice, in order to make an appointment, based upon the A&E catheter specialist's advice - with the receptionist totally ignoring me onth first occasion - and with her being heard talking to another female inth accompanying open-doored room behind the small reception area, upon the second occasion...
So an appointment was never made - a pressure-mat-activated audio device would have been handy really, wouldn't it - but, hey, such a basic, and seemingly very much needed, device simply wasn't available/in-situ...
So anyway onth 30th January, at around 9pm, I checked my internal, self-made/installed, letter box, as I was awaiting the arrival of a film DVD - only to find a number of letters there - and upon opening them I realised that there was one from the NHS, with a 4 to 6 hour appointment commencing at 8am at a Urinary Unit the next day (at a considerably further away hospital btw) ...
...Thus, effectively only giving me 3 to 5 hrs notice (outside of sleeping hours) …
This came as a complete surprise to me, as the catheter specialist had told me that I would receive such a letter some 10 days later - so anyway, the next day I went tooth supermarket to get my, emergency only, phone topped up - and then, upon returning home, I phoned the given number in order to explain things into, I guess the modern day equivalent to, a digital answer phone, asking them to give me at least a 2 day in advance appointment next time they had a slot free, and left it at that...
So, anyway, onth 3rd February, my catheter stopped working, prompting me to walk to the A&E department and present myself to them at 8pm - initially there was a 6hr average waiting time - something that later increased to 7hrs...
...And then increasing further, to 8hrs inth early hours of the 4th February...
Then at circa 2am i was installed on an examination bed, within a cubicle in another room - the catheter was removed and a new one was unsuccessfully attempted to be fitted by a female nurse - causing a small amount of blood to issue...
And then at circa 7:30am (after having had a number of near snoozes) a female 'urology specialist', who I/we had been waiting for, successfully, and rather painlessly fitted a new catheter...
...Resulting in me starting my walk back home at 08:10am on the 4th February, after having spent over 12 hours there...
So, anyway, at 18:50 on the 5th of February i went to the bathroom, only to find that the catheter has fallen out...
...Upon inspection, it is very obvious to me that said 'urology specialist' simply forgot to pump up the balloon part of the catheter that keeps it securely attached to the inner bottom wall of the bladder - or hardly pumped it up at all, anyway - unless it was simply defective, of course...
Anyway, being no longer able to face the thought of returning to the A&E department straight away, i elected not to drink any more fluids, and simply waited for the next morning to arrive, in order to see if i would receive a more professional service during normal day working hours...
So, for the second consecutive night, i did not sleep in my bed - choosing to snooze repeatedly upon my sofa instead - with frequent toilet visits to force small squirts/drops of urine out of my increasingly full bladder...
And then at circa 7am, on the 6th February, i realised that i had two options available to me - either to call for an ambulance or a taxi - i opted for the taxi...
So, back to A&E for the third time, i find that there are few people waiting, and that the average waiting time is only two hours - and two hours later i get a new catheter successfully fitted by a very nice and highly proficient female nurse with a very pleasant Irish lilt to her voice - then I returned home via taxi...
On the 7th February, the catheter is still working - however the discolouration of the urine tells me that there is still blood issuing from my urethra/bladder (as well as a certain amount of 'detritus') - though not enough to form a blockage through coagulation, once again...
And so said catheter, rather relievedly, continued working until the 14 Feb 2026 - whereby I was back at the A&E Dept at 07:30 to have my latest blocked catheter replaced with a new one, once again - all done by 11:20 am, whereupon i walked my way back home, rather gingerly/carefully, inth slow lane (my BP was a rather high 197/119 btw - possibly elevated due to me having had a cup of coffee on each of the previous 3 days - and also, possibly due to the 'Black Russian' I had slowly consumed the night before) …
So, having now been advised to drink more fluids, said catheter continued performing adequately for the next 10 days - with me only needing to successfully unblock it on only one occasion during such a time period - for I was simply not in any way wishing to return to the A&E Dept, yet again, if I could possibly help it...
So anyway, then came the day of my 8am Urology Unit appointment - with me having bought myself a bedside alarm clock in order to be up at 6am - and with me having booked a taxi the night before for a 7:15am arrival...
So, after having registered my presence at 7:45am, I then found myself sitting within the very much smaller waiting room of the Urology Unit/Dept at 8am...
And what seemed like a fairly short time afterwards I was called into one of the adjacent cubicles by the chief female nurse - whereby we discussed both my condition and the options available to me - including having some blood taken in order for a PSI test to be undertaken...
And then I was directed to the small waiting room, next to the room where some of my blood would be taken - an adjacent room which I was called into a very short time later - whereby two female nurses were waiting to deal with me...
...With one of the two being a trainee Islamic nurse who was instructed to take some blood under the direction of the more senior and more qualified 2nd nurse - she did a really good job - and so I had no hesitation in awarding her 10 out of 10 for her efforts...
...Both were very nice people indeed...
So then i returned to the Urology waiting room, before sometime later having my fitted catheter very expertly and quickly removed by the equally very nice said chief urology nurse - before then being instructed to drink about a litre of fluids, whilst waiting inth small adjacent room once again...
Upon this occasion i decided to bring my small Kindle Reader with me - rather than my more upmarket Kindle Scribe, dahlings - and so spent most of my waiting times reading about John Lennon's childhood (right up until he first met that somewhat younger posh kid, called Paul McCartney, actually) ...
Anyway, durinth day my bladder was scanned a couple of times to see how quickly it was filling up - which was seemingly very slowly indeed, actually - something that was put down to me being dehydrated...
...For they were wanting to see if i could now pee without a new catheter being fitted - which, in the event, I couldn't - other than very small amounts indeed (a within-waiting-room running water feature could possible assist others to pee more readily, one supposes) ...
Then, at around 4:30pm, a new catheter was very expertly fitted by said very nice chief nurse - but with a 'tap' rather than a bag being fitted to said catheter, as per my request, this time - after which I elected to walk my way back home, rather gingerly as it happens...
So, the 4 to 6hr appointment turned out to be a, comparatively very pleasant, 8.5 hour one in all - with another, 6 week later, appointment having been arranged - and the promise of a delivery of some night bags etc having been given to me also...
So, what was the difference between the A&E Dept and the Urology Unit Dept, you may well ask...
Well, there was a massive difference - with the Urology Dept seeming to be a comparatively very luxurious/upmarket experience indeed - compared to the sometimes massively bottle-necked, slow-lane experience of said (seemingly comparatively authoritarian) A&E Dept, for sure...
So what is the moral of the story, you may further ask - with the answer being, most definitely don't leave it until you can hardly pee before getting your prostate problems checked out - and that's a definite, okay...
So I now wait for my 2nd Urology Dept appointment - and hopefully the latest, most recently, fitted catheter will continue functioning for the duration - without me having to go back to the A&E Dept in the interim...
Meaning that at least one addendum will definitely/inevitably follow sometime later...