From the OraHorse's mouth - things I was trying to type while in hospital

Power to the people

Here are some unedited (bar some unbearable spelling mistakes) bits-and-bobs that I wrote whilst still in hospital, trying to get this blog on the road. I apologise for nothing.

I'm just sitting here writing at the moment. No one's really told me how the operation went, which is slightly disconcerting. I can feel a massive lump on my head and individual stitches scratching on my fingers. It itches like nothing on earth. Like my head's an STI-ridden testicle sack. 

They've taken the thing that was allowing the blood and liquid to come out of my skull out too. That was weird, having that in there. Like a massive glass bottle of blood-coloured Ribena being sucked out of my head via a tube. Ribrainer.

All in all, I'm happy I've got it (touch wood) removed, I just wish they'd let me in on what's going on at the moment, even if they feel by doing so they may worry me or make me aware that they don't really know what's going on either.

My headaches are coming much more under control now, and I appear to be getting my appetite back a bit.
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Helen and Emma have been here nearly every day, as has Jono. I've been getting more and more energy every day so it means my posing for photos is improving.

I had a royal visit from Princess DiEmma.

And I proved once and for all that my pyjama modelling career is far from over...

Magnum (white chocolate)

Charlie and Boxy swung by too, which was brilliant but scary - I thought they were going to jump on me or something. As it was they brought me a book and spoke wise words about resting up. I underestimate those crazy bastards.

I have an inbox full of wonderful messages from my friends and family and even work people that send their best wishes - I feel very lucky indeed.

I'm now just looking forward to getting home. Sitting out in the back garden.

I'm looking forward to feeling normal again, if that's possible.

I want to kick a ball, have a smoke, maybe even drink a beer - although that's the subject of much contention at the moment. With myself. No one else could give a monkey's. I'm just scared of beer. Literally frightened of alcohol.
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It's day five after the operation, and there is talk of getting me home to rest. This is exciting, as the company I'm keeping at the hospital is arduous.

The nurses and other staff are all lovely, even the moody lady who steams the food. I've accomplished my mission Helen - I didn't just make her smile, she's my mate - she brings me extra coffee!

It's just (most of) the other people on the ward.

Particularly someone who is called Sharia, who, amusingly, seems to think there's a different set of rules for him and thus he can do whatever he wants. 

He spent the entire day yesterday talking to his brothers about what sounded pretty much like several cases of insurance fraud. I couldn't care less that he's ripping things off, I just want the cunt to stop shouting. 

Then last night he insisted on watching the Spice Girls in the Olympics closing ceremony with the sound full-fucking-blast. He then fell asleep immediately, burping and farting until he started snoring.

The snoring was so bad I requested to be moved into a different ward. Luckily the nice big burly nurse found me some earplugs, but they seemed to intensify the feeling of pressure in my head, which made sleeping nigh on impossible. I felt as though my brain was going to pop out my eyes.

There is a man that I feel very sorry for, as he's obviously in a great deal of pain, but he also refuses to help himself. When the nurses try to help him he whines like a dog. He also hiccups bile all the time which is one of the worst noises ever.
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This bloke (in the video below) came in at two o'clock last night and just hasn't stopped. I know I should feel sorry for him, but I don't. He says he knows who he is, where he is and that he's not in pain. So why the fuck are you shouting, John?

I'm worried that my sense of sympathy is disappearing, replaced by homicidal thoughts. I'm going to smother him.

I need to get out of here. 

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I go home tomorrow. Thank fuck. Otherwise I'm going to kill a man. 

No history of tongue biting or incontinence

In writing this, I'm going to try to write about my experiences of epilepsy, both physical and mental, and - to the best of my ability - how it's affected those around me.

Perhaps, boring as a linear narrative can be, it will be best to start at the beginning. Especially considering how close to the end I am now. Figuratively speaking.

At about half three in the morning of 8 February 2011, I had my first epileptic seizure.

Except, I didn't. Or, rather, it wasn't my first. I'd been having them for years.

What I hadn't realised is that all of those times that I'd had a beer, or a cigarette, or a beer and a cigarette, and I'd felt that funny feeling of butterflies in my stomach and an incredible sense of déjà vu, they'd been epileptic seizures.

(The medical terms vary for what I was experiencing, but my favourite is 'absence seizure', as it's the closest description of what happens. I'm there physically, and I know where I am mentally and even that it's happening, but I can't do much about it.)

Before my first full 'complex' seizure, in 2011, I'd considered these little episodes as some weird tic, a not-particularly-unpleasant reaction to a momentary break in mental solidity.

Rather than react in any sensible manner and go and see a doctor after it had happened for the hundredth time, I'd come up with random reasons as to why it was happening myself...

Perhaps it was a case of a lack of oxygen to my brain when I smoked, I'd think. Maybe it was just the first sign that I was getting drunk. They always seemed to happen on Friday evenings halfway through my first pint, and I'd often not eaten properly to get that week's work done, so perhaps it was just a bit of light-headedness...

The point was, they were over quickly, actually felt quite nice - if slightly disorientating - and didn't stop me from doing what I wanted to do. Namely drinking and smoking.

They became regular enough that I told people about them, and started to point it out when they were actually happening. 

Thus my flatmate Jono, as one would, created a fictional character called Miso Soupy who he said would 'transport' (the word he actually used isn't suitable for this blog - I wouldn't write 'raped') me into the future - referring to the fact that I'd told him about the overwhelming sense of déjà vu that accompanied them.

He would dance around me, singing his patented Miso Soupy theme song, skipping and dancing to the tune of much-loved 80s hip-hop trio Salt N Pepa's hit 'Push It'. Which probably didn't help my bizarre sense of displacement, come to think of it.

In the summer of 2008, my beloved girlfriend Helen took me away for a year's backpacking around the globe.

I have distinct memories of when these little lapses in awareness - or, at that time, what I thought were moments of hyper-awareness - occurred. 

India, New Zealand, Chile and Brazil all stick out in my memory. When I think about it, they happened in all of the other countries we graced as well. 

I can picture exactly where we were, exactly what I was smoking and/or drinking, and my amused excitement at telling Helen that Miso Soupy was following me around the globe.

When I look back now, I thank goodness that they were just that; little, insignificant misadventures into the realms of semi-consciousness. 

If I had slipped into full seizures in a desert in Jaisalmer, trekking on Fox Glacier, fidgeting on a bus in Pucon or twatting about in the waves of Rio, I'm not entirely sure I'd be about now, regaling this half-baked story to a fictional audience of millions.

I was, in short, very lucky that my first experience of full 'tonic clonic' seizure, where one loses consciousness and the muscles spasm rhythmically - what most people would picture when they think of epileptic 'fits' - was in bed, next to my partner and lady-knight in shining armour Helen, relatively safe and sound, in north London.

This is not the first thing I've felt lucky about - for example, I'm an incredibly gifted individual who was most certainly at the front of the queue when Jehovah was handing out rugged good looks - and I'm certain it won't be the last.

Still, I think it's important that I start this story with a thank you to two ladies.

Helen, and Luck.

This is Helen. She is pretty.