The urology awareness month of black and white photos is going so well. Too well in fact.

I have an alter ego on twitter. JacqsJ.  She is a teacher and fairly sensible tweets emanate from her about research, evidence-based practice and a few personal comments mainly to D to cheer his half marathon success or some-such.

Then there is the other me on Twitter . BoariJ. Boari is the flap of bladder that was constructed twice to try to join up to my right kidney. Not for the squeamish . BoariJ tries to raise awareness, cheer the success of incredibly brilliant clinicians and patients, who despite all odds seem to be so positive so forward looking and taking the twitteri by storm.  Some of the consultants I know tweet,  support each other and ponder weird blurry images of god knows what bit of the urinary tract.

They are fascinating and actually give a rare glimpse into how the other half work. I rarely comment. It is mainly medico technical stuff but every so often I think…hey there are patients out here …we could talk together actually. One day maybe we will.

Then suddenly these worlds collide. By an inadvertent slip of the twit the Teacher Jacq starts rabbiting on about bladder-up policy and  mid -stream urine samples, dipsticks and antibiotics and then BoariJ starts cheering the ResearchEd  feed from New York rah rah down with top down Govist policies, bottom up is best, OfSted be dammed…. blah blah… lets DO educational research…(not many teachers do)!

It all gets a bit muddled and then my 83 year old mother decides to step in. Not one to be left behind by technology she embraces Facebook and Twitter . The grandchildren have implored her not to like or comment any of their posts.

I had not mentioned BoariJ to my mum, but after she left some likes and comments I realised that was not a secret. I do not think she reads this blog, but you never know….anyhow…I told her to ignore all the urology awareness stuff.

It’s my story in photos. I carefully explained. It is all stuff you already know. Its for awareness. Not for you.

In any case she is meant to be squeamish or at least she used to be. As children we had to summon my Dad from work, for the inevitable A&E visits of broken limbs and stitches. The uninjured had to feed smelling salts and whisky to my mother !

Anyhow after a torrent of texts ( yes she loves texts too), today, I had to assure her I was not in hospital. I was not about to have major spinal surgery. I am at home. Carefully avoiding to tell her, I just could not…of the latest infection which I cannot bloody shift. But if I told her that, she’d be planning my brain surgery!

For goodness sake I said when I rang her mobile, not landline!

You know perfectly well I had spinal surgery several times but several years ago. Why else would I have (permanently)  lent Dad my special shower stool, perching chair, loo seat bottom raiser thingy etc etc….

Ah yes she replied. You are quite right.

Arghhhh.

I think I will have to come up with another name…..

Meanwhile I was asked this week why I do not tell the wider family every time I am in hospital . There is a good reason for that. Only D and the children ever know of appointments. I usually go to these on my own. Else no one else would have time to go to work either! Then, if I am unexpectedly admitted. They are the first to know. They are the ones to pick up my pj’s ,toothbrush and knickers.  Even if they do sometimes leave them on a train or a plane they still come to visit and giggle with me.

If it is a planned admission. I tell more of the wider family and definitely my friends. The latter are brilliant at visiting, spreading laughter and Jo Malone and grapes. The former tend to be a bit squeamish and I would be so worried about them falling unconscious if they felt guilt tripped into visiting, so I don’t encourage that! Don’t visit if you are going to faint. Don’t feel you have to look sad and sympathetic. Just bloody laugh and joke and read your book if I am asleep. Those are the best visitors. The exception is my brother in Canada. He is the one with the benefit of being very squeamish, therefore understanding the siblings and parents, the time delay across the world and the magical ability to communicate fast to whoever, whenever I send him another message. It was he, you may remember, who released us from the MK hospital secure corridor. No phone signal, only wifi signal ..so we texted him, he rang the security team to get us out!!