This is the tenth part of a guest serial, in 760 words.

My sleeping pattern was still erratic so I kept waking up during the night. At one point, I woke up and looked at the chair beside my bed. From what I could make out, it looked like someone had unpacked all of my clothes and just dumped them on the chair. But then, the ‘pile’ started to shuffle.

“Mum?”, I whispered.

She turned to face me and could see from my expression that I was confused as to why she was sleeping next to my bed, she said, “I’ll explain in the morning”.

I was able to sleep a bit better knowing Mum was beside me.

Mum had to go to the main reception, near the hospital entrance to see if they could help her find somewhere to stay. She didn’t have time to explain what had happened before she went so, I had to wait until she came back. In the meantime, I was waiting to be taken, by a porter, to have eye tests.

A woman stood at the end of my bed put her arms up as if to say, “well?”, I asked her to use the whiteboard as I can’t hear. She wrote, “What do you want?”. I thought, “Erm… hold on. I didn’t know this woman, she had nothing with her, no trolley or papers with her, I had no idea who she was”. So, I said, “Sorry, what do you mean?”. She got angry and quickly wrote, “BREAKFAST!!”. I thought, “Wow, I’ve not been here for 12 hours and I’m already being treated like crap!”

It really annoyed me how she just assumed I knew who she was and what her job was!

After taking a deep breath, I politely said, “2 slices of toast with just butter, please’. Then she went. I thought, “Can I go home already?!”. She came back 45 minutes later with a plate that, apparently, had ‘toast’ on it. It looked green! I reluctantly took a bite and I couldn’t even chew it, inedible was an understatement!

Thankfully, a porter soon came to collect me. A few lifts later and I was taken into a room with a lady welcoming me in. She really took my hearing difficulties on board and took her time to help me understand. There were so many different tests done during the next 2 hours. Some were simple but the rest were draining. By the time we had finished, I was nodding off in my wheelchair.

I didn’t have to wait too long before Mum came to meet me. She took me back to the ward because all I wanted to do was sleep. Mum ordered me tomato soup for lunch and when it arrived, it turned my stomach. It smelled vile! Crisps it was again for lunch.

Mum eventually told me what happened the night before. There was someone who kept knocking on her door, in the early hours of the morning and it frightened her. She didn’t feel safe there so she got a taxi back to the hospital, she then explained what had happened at the hotel and the nurse let her stay beside me. Reception couldn’t find any hotel nearby, at short notice so they allowed her to stay for as long as I was there.

I hated knowing I couldn’t protect her and reassure her that everything was OK.

By Tuesday evening, Mum wanted to stay with me for the rest of the week, so Ewan stayed at home.

I told Mum about what happened with breakfast, she only went to Gregg’s to get me a couple of sausage rolls! I scoffed one and a half because I was bloody hungry! That’s what I had for breakfast each morning that week, except for Friday as I was sick of them by then. I avoided the hospital food; I don’t know what oil they used but it just made everything sickly.

Wednesday morning, I had to have nerve tests (again, I can’t remember the names). I was connected to all these different wires, and then the consultant would place this object against my skin which would cause an electric shock. Some I could feel, some I couldn’t feel.

And before you wonder, yes, I did say to the man that I was having a shocking time.

He didn’t laugh so that kind of ruined the atmosphere…

Depending on the different areas of my body, that he tested, some areas would affect my eyes and they would start shaking really fast. It felt bizarre as I had no control over it. After all that was done, he went to get another consultant to see if any more tests needed doing.

About 10 minutes later, he came back with a man. They were talking with Mum and I kept nodding off.

The other consultant wanted to do a blood test, I thought, “But I had one 2 days ago!”. They could sense my irritation. Good! They spoke with Mum for a few more minutes, then she turned to me and said, “They need to do a blood test from your leg”

“My what now?”. “Is that even normal?