French Lesson

Events have moved on since we last blogged. Three days after arriving home from hospital, I had a phone call arranging for me to go in on Sunday10th for a 'pacemaker' (or at least that's what we call it in the UK). On the Monday I had the thing fitted (DAI, or in english, an Internal Automatic Defibrillator) which I subsequently found out was there to shock the heart if it starts to beat very rapidly! Further developments will now wait till the beginning of October after I've got over the fitting of the DAI and the chemotherapy medication is out of my body.

Whilst I was in hospital I was sharing a bedroom with an old gentleman of 88 who unfortunately was very confused in addition to a severe shortness of breath (cardiac insufficiency). The main problem was shown during the nights when he didn't know where he was, wanted to get out of bed, wanted to go home, looked for his suitcase, etc. I'm sure you've got the picture. Added to this, when he finally did go to sleep (with the aid of a sleeping pill) he snored extremely loudly!!! So, I had a couple of very disturbed nights. Sue collected me yesterday afternoon (Wednesday) and I slept like a log last night.

Although we've lived here in France for nearly five years now, we still struggle with the language from time to time. especially those words which look the same as a word in English but which mean something else. The morning after my operation, the orderlies (two young girls) asked me to get out of bed into a chair. They were talking of 'faire la toilet' and that I would have more movement. My initial reaction was that they wanted be to sit in a chair so that I could use a bedpan as it would be easier to have a bowel movement. It was only afterward, when they had washed me, that I began to realise that 'faire la toilet' doesn't mean go to the toilet, but to wash, brush teeth etc!!! Also, in the chair I would be able to move easier. A strange french lesson.