When I finally arrived at the hospital (after the damned bus didn’t show up) I felt sick to my stomach, memories of the last time I was here flashing through my head like a ‘Previously on Hospital Visits From Hell’ - the humiliation and the sense of powerlessness.  I felt like running, but the empty waiting room was like a cage keeping me there. I should have taken someone with me - how on earth did I think I was strong enough to face up to a doctor and, yep, I forgot all the research I had done the night before so I wasn’t even armed with knowledge.  I would sit and be lectured to and babble like an idiot.  Why was one type of pill better than the other?  Why was one hormone not to gone near?  Why didn’t I bring my Mac with me?

Right outside the door of the waiting room was a vending machine full of Coke.  That would settle my raging stomach.  That would help.  Should have eaten something before I came out.  I moved to stand up to get caffeine and sugar and that was when the nurse appeared to weigh me (oh fun). And that was today’s first surprise! I have lost 1 and a half stone in 4 months.  Yeah baby! And I have apparently grown an inch as well.  Fun.

She left me in the exam room for a moment and then I was called in to see the Doctor. Second pleasant surprise - he wasn’t the guy I saw last time!  And this one listened!  I now feel a little bit more confident about things if still a little apprehensive about what will happen with the pills.  I have blood tests to make sure they are not turning my body into, I don’t know, slush.  I am starting off slowly… he will not be putting me on the bad hormones that made me crazy…

While I was waiting at the pharmacy drinking a bad bad cappuccino things started to race.  The blood tests will also include Cortizone levels and a glucose test.  More things to google and stress about… but could this be the thing that leads to me being able to ‘get up and go’?

Today was a real step one.

Oh lucky me. Today I got to go to the department of the hospital we all love to go to. The one at Royal Preston Hospital is pink. All the way through - the floor, walls and woodwork - different shades of pink. It’s enough to send you over the road to the Mental Health department - a place I would much rather have been.

The receptionist was austere in her questions and looked at me like I was insane when I couldn’t answer the question about who my doctor is. It’s a difficult question - did she mean the doctor whose patient list I am on currently or the doctor who referred me to Gynae. She said not a word so I just spouted names until she indicated I have passed that challenge.

The waiting room was large and about half full of the variety of life you generlly only find in hospital waiting rooms. There was the traditional screaming baby, a bickering couple, an elderly lady on her own who keeps smiling at you and one ‘poor old dear’ in a wheelchair with a blanket over her knee being looked after by her incredibly loud daughter.

I was 15 minutes early for my appointment so entertained myself with a book (the first time this week I don’t take my MacBook!) and tried to make it look like I wasn’t bothered… My insides were churning the way they always do before any kind of examination.

Half an hour later they called my name and I was shown into a little room with two chairs, a curtain, a bed/trolley and a table full of horrifying torture equipment.

Questions were asked and blood pressure was taken by the nurse who then disappeared and I was alone again. I took the time to notice other things about the room - an emergency button, a thick cotton sheet badly folded, two kinds of bins, 4 sizes of gloves (oh please don’t let my doctor have XL hands) and a lamp angled like that for? Oh.

Then the doctor entered and all my fears and distrust of the medical profession returned as he talked at me and didn’t listen to a word I said and told me that I had been very stupid and made me feel more like crap than I have done in a long time.

That was the de-sensitiser I was looking for.

By the time I was lying back while he tried to find my ‘high cervix’ (which he made sound like I had on purpose) I just wanted to punch him and walk out.

He said one thing which was ‘If I am hurting you, please tell me." and then got on with it. Not even a slight tingle.

He then finished, washed his hands and left. The nurse who was in the room smiled at me in a sympathetic way and then I was alone again.

I was close to tears…

When he came back with the ‘plan’ it was to do more blood tests to confirm his diagnosis of Poly Cystic Ovarian Syndrome. When I tried to tell him that I had already had the tests for it and they came back negative he cut me off. How dare I presume to know more about my own health than him?

I have also got to have a scan and go back to see him in August. Oh and there are some pills too. Which I can’t have until after my scan whenever the hell that is. I told him it has to be first or last as I can’t have any more time off work (I mean work will let me have it but I’m starting to feel a little off about it. After tomorrow it’ll be three times this week. Three. And to be honest if I have to make a choice between job and health it’s job every single time.

He then told me I need to walk for 45 minutes every day to lose weight. Great idea. Seriously it is. Fantastic. I started to tell him about the breathing difficulties I am having and the barrier to exercise that was causing and he started to talk over me again, telling me that he was referring me to a dietician, and that they would be sending me a letter about the problem with my liver (what fucking problem with my liver?!) and that was all.

He left and the nurse returned to make sure I knew what I was doing. I left totally unsure about things, wanting to cry and REALLY not wanting to go back to work.

I am not frantically googling him to make sure he is vaguely qualified or, in fact, human. All evidence on the latter to the contrary.

I really should have gone to the other hospital.