This started of as the second post of the day, but I fell asleep around 11pm and so this is now the first post of the next day, written just before leaving for work. It may be a bit rushed. It is also the second successive post featuring me being punctured. It’s a wonder I haven’t deflated.
I failed the blood test. My INR went up despite my dose going down. My dosage has been cut down yet again, but the trouble is that once you start losing it, it can take ages to get things back on an even keel. After a couple of years of good results, I have now gone haywire. They say it is due to lockdown, but a friend who had been on Warfarin tells me that it has always been a feature of his dosage – you get up to widely spaced tests, enjoy a year or two of stability then suddenly it all goes wild,
A few years ago I had an accusing phone call from a student nurse who had been given the job of ringing people and discussing their test records with them. Mine was about 75% – a sign that I wasn’t taking the Warfarin regularly, I was told. I pointed out that my record over the last 12 months was actually 100% and that all the bad results came in the first few months as the “highly trained” nursing staff failed to get the dosage right. There was a pause. Then she agreed with me and rang off. I don’t mind being accused of medical delinquency, because I am an appalling patient and very bad at remembering pills. However, I can analyse stats.
Falling asleep at 11pm could have been a side-effect of my vaccination yesterday, but it’s also consistent with my normal routine, as regular readers will know. I also have a slightly sore arm, but it’s only sore when I catch it on a door frame, as I managed to do last night and again this morning. It is also a possible side effect of the vaccination. Or possibly just consistent with being stabbed in the arm with a needle. I didn’t even bleed from the injection site, which always seems to scare them due to my Warfarin.
For the purposes of posterity (I’m thinking of that future PHD student reading my blog as valuable historic document) I’ve had no side effects from the demon vaccine apart from a little soreness in the arm, and that is consistent with being stabbed in the arm by a needle. As far as I can tell, I have had nothing that can be attributed to the vaccine, but nobody interviews people like me for the paper – they just want stories about pain and death and misery. That’s why I chose the title for today.
Good to see you happy. Actually they do stab with the vaccines – I understand that in the early days vets were recruited for the job – perhaps that dictated your choice of your illustration.
Good to hear you are fully vaccinated now. I was a bit tired for a week after the second vaccine, and a touch sore, but that did not last long.
In general I think the vaccine has been great, but good news doesn’t sell news. It may have killed a few people, which is a tragedy for their families, but every year people die from things that don’t affect the rest of us – peanuts and falling coconuts, for instance.
It can only be onwards and upwards now for that Nottingham man. I am sorry that no one asked you for a vox pop, you just have to make do with the readers of your post.
The readers of my posts are enough for me. Onwards and Upwards was our school motto. 🙂
A fairly safe bet as much young people will go onwards and grow upwards. Achievable goals are desirable.
A lesson on goal setting and planning would have been helpful. I didn’t think about all that until far too late…
Glad there were no bad effects from the vaccine. Do hope you can get the other problem sorted out.
It’s all going well at the moment. 🙂
Oh yes, good historical info has been provided.
🙂
I’m just imagining phd students reading through blogs for nuggets of autobiographical gold…
Just imagine… 🙂
😉
I’m glad you’ve had no side effects from the vaccination.
Soreness at the injection site is probably par for the course, as you say. And not to diminish your suffering – can soreness truly be classed a side effect? It’s like saying a side effect of picking a spot is a scab. ‘Consequence’ seems to be a more realistic description.
It can be anything you like. Due to the flexibility of the English language it is both fair and accurate to say that the side effects are of no consequence. 🙂
Indeed!