The Longest Hour

Not half an hour ago an ambulance took Lib to hospital. She had a bad day yesterday, pain in the lower back and feeling lousy. When I got home from work she said that was the worst she'd felt through all the chemo. Her last chemo dose was last Wednesday.

Still she cooked dinner and ate and watched TV before going to bed early about 9 oclock. I went to bed a couple of hours later, creeping in so as not to wake her. I don't think she was asleep but I lay as still as I could so as not to disturb her by tossing and turning or scratching.

I had trouble getting to sleep myself, and sort of dozed or half slept after a while until Lib turned the light on about 1.30am and rummaged around as she took some medication. She said she had severe pain in the kidney region, intense and throbbing. She was trying to rub her back, and I tried also to give her some relief by massaging but nothing helped. She was grimacing and sighing and almost calling out in pain. I suggested that I take her to hospital such was the state of our alarm. She said no she didn't think she could sit in the car. I said perhaps I should call the ambulance, she said no, the pain might ease as the painkillers worked.

It didn't. It seemed to worsen. She was in agony. About 2am I rang 000 and went through the questionaire process. They said a crew was on the way and told me to ring back if there was any change. By 2.45am no ambulance. Lib's agony continued through all this time. Every few minutes I walked to the top of the drive with a torch to signal the ambulance as it came up the street, then went back to Lib. I rang 000 again, told them I had rang over 40 minutes ago and no show yet. They told me to ring again if there was any change.

About 3.10am as I was coming back from the top of the drive I eventually heard a vehicle in the distance and went back up. I got the driver to back down. It was a tight squeeze, it was a big rig.
They came in and asked Lib a lot of questions and gave her an injection for the pain which they said may or may not work. They told me they'd take her to Casey and left at about 3.45. She was still in great pain. The ambo said it may be kidney or gall stones and unrelated to the cancer and chemo, then again it maybe the chemo.

I made a cup of coffee and write as I'm too agitated to sleep. I'll try to lie down for a few hours then ring the hospital when they've had a chance to find out what the hell. I just hope that the injection worked and Lib's pain eased.

That hour and ten minutes waiting for the ambulance was the longest 70 minutes of my life.