March 27th

 Feel not too bad this morning. Not well. Faint tingling in the left hand side of my face and the ghost of tingles up my back. Just a touch of weakness in my legs and a slight shake. But. I think this is probably my best morning so far. It's tricky to tell as it's subtle in its improvement. But again, not wanting to jinx it, I think I am on my way up and out into recovery. Whatever that looks like.

I did a bit of cleaning yesterday. First time in.... 4 months. Hazel noted I was supposed to be resting, I had been told not to push at it. Yeah. 10 minutes later standing in the kitchen she says. You're flagging aren't you. Yes. I'm flagging. I had been standing there feeling it creep up over me and a real need to go sit down. That's because you did too much she says. But I felt kinda ok I said. But yeah. My energy is an issue. And when that fatigue hits my symptoms crank up a notch. Ignore it and I start to feel really ill.

I'm still unable to make it through a 24 hour period without a blip... or three. But the blips are getting less onerous. And lasting a shorter time. Where as at one point my "good moments" were down to 3 hours in an evening and shrinking, the pattern seems to have reversed.

My brain keeps jumping ahead. Ooh I need to get a pot of paint. Ooh I need to fix the ceiling. I have to hold myself back a bit. I split up a cardboard box yesterday for recycling. I found it slightly odd, slightly funny that doing that tired me out. The hell. Splitting a box is now work ? Ok then !

My eyes are starting to feel less tired. The dark circles are... I think... slowly shifting. Holy crap. I've had them for 10 weeks or so.

I'm alive ?

As I get stronger and my mind begins to hum again I repeat debates with myself about my experiences with the NHS. It badly failed me. Offered me arse all help. The emergency care was almost universally excellent - with one bad exception. But nothing is perfect. The local non emergency care provided was typically poor, with a few good exceptions and in some cases downright negligent, dismissive and a cause of mental distress. Also having sat in a hospital for 18 hours over two days, watching shifts change and an entire 12 hour work day, it became apparent where the inefficiencies and problems lay even in day to day stuff. And it's not just about the money. For sure the crappy waiting times and delays are almost certainly down to lack of capacity in covid times and a lack of funding. But there are deeper issues there that have nothing to do with money, or money spent lavishly on the wrong things. The basically privatised local GP setup is a real problem imho. And will only get worse I think as it optimises to be a cash cow and push patient care down to a bare legal requirement minimum. GPs are now run like McDonalds franchises. Supposedly the NHS. But absoutely bullshit. Each one is a private business run for profit with the senior GP partners grabbing the fat. It's about the money. And overtime this will corrupt further and further into the most efficient money making engine it can be. It is human nature. It needs to change or I fear "socialised" healthcare in the UK is doomed. The GPs are effectively already privatised entities, albeit the government pays the bills. And already the poison of having everything valued on money is evident.

Shit. Is what it is. And a problem that few are properly aware of I think. People still think GPs are a core NHS service. The bit about them being privatised franchised businesses run for profit has been kept very quiet.