Today is 9 months since I fell down the stairs and sustained a pretty nasty head injury. I had no idea then that I would be still dealing with the fallout from it so many months later. It’s taken me a while to decide whether to blog about this, and I doubt it’ll benefit anyone other than myself, but maybe that’s the point. Who knows. There’s a fair bit to cover I guess, so I will most likely split this into more than one post. So without further ado…
The Fall: A timeline
I know exactly what time I fell because I was just going downstairs after getting up. It was 7am. I was only wearing a t-shirt and carrying my clothes. My foot slipped on the very first step and off I went. I can’t remember if I fell forward or back, but I did roll as I went down, smacking pretty much every part of my body on the way down. Our stairs are not the ‘straight down’ type. They double back on themselves but without a ‘landing’ at the half way point. If they had been straight, I probably would have come off a lot better. As it was, my progress came to an abrupt halt as I cannoned into the wall at the halfway point. Head first.
Our house is a Victorian stone terrace (built in 1860). Damn, they built these places well. Unfortunately for me, the wall I hit is not a stud/partition wall. It’s stone, and stone walls laugh at squishy human body parts.
I wish I could say that I can’t remember what it felt like, but I can. I remember the moment I hit the wall with absolute clarity. I was facing down, no surprise there I guess, and the top of my head bore the full brunt of the fall. The force went through my entire body like the world’s worst shudder. I’ll never forget that. I righted myself almost immediately, and felt hot blood gushing down my face. I’ve had a head injury before, but it was nothing compared to this.. Think Carrie, but hot, fresh and minus the bucket. Or the telekinesis. The telekinesis would have been so much cooler.
Poor Lewis, I woke him up. Apparently I also woke our neighbours up. I remember begging for help (Lewis claims screaming, we will have to differ on that one). I had no idea what sort of a state I was in, other than I was losing a lot of blood and I was scared. Really scared. Luckily, the ambulance station for Langholm is at the bottom of our road and round the corner so the paramedics were here in just a couple of minutes. Lewis staunched the bleeding with a towel until they took over. I cannot praise Sheila (possibly Shelagh, I’m not sure of Scots spelling) and ‘Big Dave’ highly enough. They calmed me down and patched me up. I’m not sure how long it took to slow the bleeding down enough for me to get in the ambulance, maybe half an hour, possibly 45mins. I had to change my t-shirt as it was drenched, although even my change of clothes ended up covered in blood as well.
My Nemesis, the stairs. And a t-Shirt. TW: The originals are unedited and show blood stains.
Click on an image to view the original.
The Hospital
Sheila and Dave took me to Carlisle as it’s the nearest hospital, despite being over the border in England. Dumfries would’ve taken around an hour to get to so it seemed the better option. And then the problems started. To reiterate, Sheila and Dave were amazing. They looked after me and I have no problems with them, or the Doctor and nurse that treated me at Carlisle (Taz and Brooke).
I’ve had to gauge the timings by text messages or calls that I made that day, so if they are off it’s by minutes, not hours.
08:48: I called Lewis. I would say that we had arrived at Carlisle at that point as he would’ve asked me to let him know when I go there.
09:17: I texted someone I work with to let them know I wouldn’t be about that day due to my accident.
11:47: I called Lewis to let him know I was going in to the hospital
11:55: I texted Lewis to tell him I was going to have staples. Then there’s a pretty long gap as it took a while to get properly stitched/stapled up and released. I eventually left the hospital at 3:30pm.
As you can see there’s a gap of almost exactly 3hrs from arriving at Carlisle to being seen in A&E. That 3hrs was spent entirely in the ambulance, waiting to be told I could go in.
A&E targets are that people should be seen within 4 hours of arriving in the waiting room (‘Fit to Sit’), and this is why I ended up waiting 3hrs in an ambulance that could have been off potentially saving other peoples’ lives. Carlisle A&E would not let me in until I had been designated ‘fit to sit’. Essentially, I had to wait for a (pre)triage in the ambulance before I could go inside and be triaged properly. Even then, it was a case of me stating I was ‘fit to sit’ rather than being assessed as such. The nurse/HA that came to the ambulance was given all the information about my injuries and as I was happy to go in (SO damn happy), I did so.
I was called straight in for triage and I would estimate I spent less than 3-5 minutes in the waiting room before I was sent through to a room to be treated. I have no idea what I looked like at this point. The waiting room was heaving and I was being stared at. A lot.
I’ll go into the treatment in the next post, and yes with photos. If you are at all squeamish I would say do NOT click on the blurred out versions. You will regret it.
For now though, I just want to add. Throughout those 3hrs we spent in the ambulance outside A&E Sheila and Dave were doing their very best to get me in. I could see how frustrating it was for them and the massaging of waiting time figures in this manner is nothing short of disgraceful. Ambulances should not be kept waiting just to avoid potentially spilling over the 4hr waiting time target. I hope that no-one else needed them during those 3hrs. My injury was not life-threatening, I didn’t even seem to be concussed. There is, however, a potential for people out there with life-threatening issues not getting the care they need because paramedics have to babysit their charges outside emergency departments.
That’s it for Part 1. More to follow, if you have the stomach for it.
Not so interesting fact: The day I fell, 22 Nov 2023, was 60 years to the day that John F Kennedy was assasinated.
