3 weeks later it was the October break and I was looking forward to getting away. We were headed to St. Andrews for a few days to let my sister get to an open day at St. Andrews University. I had planned to go to the University open day but I wasn’t feeling good. I was feeling very tired and I wasn’t able to do much so my dad and I just stayed in and let my mum and my sister go along. Later on that day we tried to go out to meet them at Starbucks but I didn’t last very long and within half an hour we had to go back.

That night I beganto get a dull headache. I took some painkillers and went to bed but by themorning the headache had become much worse. We had to cut the holiday short andhead straight to the hospital. I was very disappointed. I could not believe it.When we arrived at the hospital the surgeon tapped the shunt. To do that theyinsert a needle through the skin into the reservoir in the shunt valve. Theythen let the cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) drip through the needle into a tube. Ifthe flow of CSF is poor then it could mean that the shunt is blocked or thatthe shunt valve isn’t working properly for some reason. If the surgeon gets theneedle into the valve then its not too sore but if they get it wrong it can bevery painful! This time it looked like the shunt was working but the pressureswere low so I was admitted for overnight observation by the surgeons.

 Next day it was decided that I could go home for the weekend but I had to come back in on Monday afternoon to get ready for pressure monitoring. On Tuesday morning I had to have a small operation to get a special bolt fitted into my head that would attach to the pressure monitor. I was out for about an hour and the wound was sore but not too bad. The pressure monitor was on for 48 hours and during that time I was wired up to a computer that took the readings. Any time I changed position or went to the toilet it had to be recorded on the computer. It’s a bit of a pain because I have to stay in bed while this is going on.

After a few days of monitoring the results showed low pressure readings. The surgeons decided to change my programmable shunt valve to a fixed Miethka valve to see if that would work better for me. On Friday we waited for the operation to happen but the surgeons were very busy so in the end we had to wait until the next day. I had been fasting from 2am so I was very hungry by the time they made that decision at 5pm. On Saturday morning I was taken for my operation at 10am. They gave me the sleepy gas and I was asleep within a few minutes. The operation seemed to go well. It took me a few days to recover enough to be discharged like it always does and then I was out of there! The car journey home is difficult but I am always so relieved to get to my happy place – home!

I am now have 3allergies:

Vancomycin – anantibiotic used during an operation. It gave me a rash.

Atracurium and Chlorhexidine – I don’t know what happened with those during the operation. I was sleeping. Sorry!

I now have toremember all of these whenever I am asked about allergies at hospital which isn’t easy.