So, currently we are all self-isolating. I was fortunate enough to have to self-isolate myself before. I wrote this last year for university and thought now was the perfect time to share it to remind myself and others that it's perfectly okay to do ABSOLUTELY NOTHING. I am lucky enough to be working from home right now but apart from that, being productive is extremely hard and I should be using this time to write but I've forgotten what normal life is like. I will mention that I am exercising though because it's very important for mental health... and have also succumbed to Disney+ so will be okay on the binge watching front! *Also would like to confirm that although I thought self-isolation for two weeks was pretty easy, this is much, much worse and I look forward to being able to go out and see the people I love but we can all get through this!*
Everyone always needs a bit of time to themselves, don’t they? A bit of time where they could do or try anything they wanted to without worries of work. In August 2016 I managed to find two weeks where I could have some time to myself. Unfortunately, this wasn’t out of choice. This was because I was having radioactive iodine to get rid of my thyroid as I was overactive. My mum and I joked about it and about having so much time to myself as I had to have two weeks not seeing anybody because I would be radioactive. I listed all the things I was going to do during these two weeks of not seeing anybody: learn to play piano; learn Italian; learn sign language; make some Youtube videos; do some writing; lose weight and watch Orange is the New Black. I was ready and excited.
I was slightly less excited at the meeting with the doctor before the radioactive iodine. This meeting was to test how I reacted to it, and to be given the facts about what I was supposed to do. It started quite well, as the nurses struggled to find a vein to inject me, trying both arms, both hands, and eventually going back to the first arm they began with. So, four holes in me later, I was ready to have the scan to check how I’d reacted to it. Unfortunately, I get incredibly claustrophobic, so I had a panic attack while the scanner was over my body. Next up the doctor told me that when it was official ‘Radioactive Day’, all I would have to do was pop a pill, and then make sure I got home and away from people before an hour was up. My home, which was an hour away from the hospital.
When we did go in for the radioactive iodine, I took the pill and was issued with instructions to drink as much water as is humanly possible to get the radioactive iodine out of my system quicker, and to flush the toilet twice every time I went, not to go near anybody for two weeks, and to stay away from children and pregnant women for three weeks, which was slightly difficult as we were going to Cornwall just after the two weeks were up, so our journey up there consisted of me running away from children at service stations.
So, after a fast drive home from my mum, there I was back at home, which is my grandad’s second flat, across a corridor from his flat. She waved at me from his door and bought me some food and left it outside my door. Apart from a few corridor waves and FaceTimes from my parents, I was on my own. I was also terrified about what the side effects were going to be, as the doctor had issued me a yellow card and told me to call if I got ill. I spent the next few days drinking water but nowhere near the amount I should have been, I had tummy aches, and a couple of nosebleeds, but the biggest side effect was tiredness. I was doing something that was quite stressful and scary, and honestly, despite having two weeks doing nothing, I didn’t actually have the time to learn to play piano, or sign language or Italian, or make any Youtube videos. I tried to do a bit of writing, but honestly, I was not inspired at all by my predicament, and the last thing I wanted to do was exercise. So, you know what I did while I had two weeks all by myself? I watched Orange is the New Black.
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| This time I will learn to play the piano! And also stare at this picture of people going out to eat and wonder what normal life was like. |
