ADVENTURES IN THE HOSPITAL, AGAIN.

This place, which cannot be knocked down or renovated, is a ghost-ship, and on it drifts, our country embodied, into decay.

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If you can believe it, Charing Cross Hospital is looking worse than I remember it ­- though this winter, there is no festival of the lame, injured and ailing in the courtyard, as there had been last summer when I was in residence here on the eighth floor for three months.

As I queue for the interminable lifts in my electric wheelchair, I see that the place is as run-down as ever. Paintwork is chipped and peeling, windows don’t fit, walls are warped, and furniture is torn apart. The art on the walls, if you can call it art, is an insult. This place, which cannot be knocked down or renovated, is a ghost-ship, and on it drifts, our country embodied, into decay.

Tomorrow morning, under general anaesthetic, I am due to have an operation on my bladder, performed by a specialist urologist. He will insert a tiny camera on the tip of a thick stick into my penis. The bladder will be examined for its capacity, as well as for debris and stones, and given a good washout to prevent blockages in my catheter.

Isabella, my carer and I arrive at the reception area. It turns out that the administrators have never heard of me, or that I require a bed for the night in order to be ready for the operation at 7 a.m am the following morning.

And so we sit in the waiting room for four hours before being admitted into a side room on the ward. Two nurses hoist me into bed and a tired Isabella goes home. My carer gallantly announces that she is going to stay with me. There is no bed for her, and she is not allowed to sleep on the floor in the room, and so sits next to me in straight-backed chair all night, giving me water when required. I tell her that this is beyond the call of duty, but she insists; it is her obligation, to take care of me at all times. I am relieved, fearing to be left alone in this room, given my night terrors.

At midnight, an Indian health care assistant comes into my room wanting to check my blood pressure and other vitals. Annoyed, I tell him that I was just about to fall asleep, and that this procedure had already been done an hour ago. I give him only a minor bollocking but let him have his way.

Little do I know that at three o’clock in the morning, he will show up again, this time with another man. Without knocking, they come into my room, the Indian explaining that he is here to fix the window vent, whatever that is, claiming he has been instructed to do so by the surgeon.

I unleash a tremendous bollocking on both men, despite the many warnings on the walls about abusing the staff and treating them with respect. Not only that, I threaten to set my carer on them, a ferocious, five-foot ball of energy, known from subduing rapists and murderers in her side gig as a prison guard. I inform the men that she will nail their balls to the wall if they don’t clear off immediately: “You’ve done no repairs in ten years and you decide to do them now, in my room, at three in the morning?”

The next day, I am in the operating theatre and the anaesthetist is seeking a vein. When she finds it, and I am being knocked out, I think: “This isn’t so bad. It’s what dying must be like. A kind of rehearsal. A relief after the turbulence of existence.’

The procedure goes according to plan but nonetheless, when I return to my room, I am bleeding heavily into my urine bag and also from my penis. The doctor informs me that the bleeding will stop in a week or so, and the urine will run clear. As for my penis, it is a bit of a bloody mess after having had a black rod stuck down it. Luckily I can’t see it and I hope never to have to look at it again.

My fear was that I would have to spend another night in hospital but the doctor is keen to discharge me. My carer and Isabella pack up everything, dress me, and get me in my wheelchair. I hate to see Isabella doing this - becoming another carer – that is not her work, she is my lover and best friend, and I would like to keep it that way. But we have no choice.

I whizz out of that desolate building into the dark wind and rain onto a crowded 220 bus, heading home.