Jesus may love you, but everyone else thinks you’re an asshole.

I never want to get old. Being old, from all I have seen, really really bites. It’s bad enough to lose your dignity, having to be helped with such small tasks as washing or going to the bathroom, but the thought of losing my grasp on reality scares me, and this recent hospital stay hasn’t helped. I’ve talked about Sweary, the elderly patient who like to slag off the nurses. Well this lady was in her 80’s, blind, partially deaf and going senile to boot.

If you tried talking to her, she would become more coherent the longer you spoke to her, but strangely enough, the nurses really frowned upon you talking, ok shouting, to her in the middle of the night, and unfortunately that was when she was most awake. I never even found out what she was in hospital for, but she made my stay hell.

Her favourite trick, once she’d realised that shouting for a nurse wasn’t going to work, was to sing at full volume and top of her songsheet was the Sunday school classic ‘Jesus Love me’. Well boys and girls, I’m not afraid to admit that at 3.55am, after 47 runthroughs of verse one, the thoughts crossing my mind were far from Christian. Jesus may love her, but I was ready to pop an air bubble in her IV.

Obviously, I didn’t stoop to murder. However, this was my breaking point, and after being denied a sleeping tablet by the nurses, I hid in the bathroom and had myself a damn good cry. The docs had been making a song and dance about me being depressed, but this was the first time I began to think they might be right. I say began, but it didn’t last long. I wasn’t depressed just exhausted and desperately in need of a 12 hour sleep session.

By morning, I really wasn’t feeling much better and keeping cheerful was getting tough. Finally, it was time for rounds again and The Consultant and his minions appeared at the end of my bed. Once again, despite being a mere 3 feet away from me, they jabbered away as if I didn’t exist then turned on the failproof ‘charm’to ask about my mental state that day.

Basically, the underlying message of their visit, was that they had no clue what was wrong with me. They decided to spring me free from my incarceration simply because they didn’t know what else to do. Eight long days of ups and downs, and all for nothing it seemed. They wanted to see if my sleep problems were actually a symptom, or merely a side effect of the hospital circus. It didn’t really matter at the time, all I heard were the magic words.’ You can go home for now’. Thank you god, freedom is mine!