The Saga of the Blue Bedding - or how I made Dave blue

If you haven't been following this Saga on that other social media site (as Savannah calls it), you will have missed the latest drama from the wilds of the Norfolk/Suffolk border.

One of the things you might not know, or perhaps may not have taken much notice of, is that during chemotherapy, a patient's immune system is shot to shit (that's a medical term, can you keep up?). This means that even the most ordinary germs can take root and be incredibly debilitating, if not dangerous to the patient. 

You may already be aware that I am not the most avid of housekeepers. In fact, I'd go so far as to say my housekeeping happens on an As & When basis (As the mood takes me, When I feel like it). It's not an exaggeration if I say, hoovering over the autumn happened when Boy did it before he left for university and after two months just before he visited. It's not that the house is dirty, per se, it's tidy enough...you just wouldn't want to quote the two second rule in my kitchen.

All of that has gone by the by. As soon as I knew Dave was coming to stay during his treatment, I bought new, different coloured hand and bath towels. I also thought having some new, less girly bedding would be useful, especially since I knew I'd be changing the bed at least once a week. I had a look around and realised that even on sale, good bedding is quite expensive. Amazon to the rescue. I found two really nice patterns and with the fitted sheets and extra pillowcases, were a third of the price of one set of good bedding. Yeah...

The bedding arrived and I put it on. Dave saw it and said "cool, guy bedding." Then turned out the lights. 

Obviously, it was never going to be the same experience as 300 thread count cotton. It was rough as fuck. In the morning, Dave asked if I wouldn't mind washing the bedding to try to soften it up. This I duly did. Happily, it was less scratchy even if it wasn't soft. 

Tuesday, we went into Norwich before his top-up chemotherapy treatment to pick up a few bits and pieces. We called into Strangers Roastery, when it was pointed out that Dave had blue hair! (I hang my head in shame that I didn't even notice) It wasn't just a little bit blue either. It was a proper blue rinse. Not only was his hair blue, his skin was too. When he had a bath...well...he left a thick blue tidemark. 

Horrified, I  wailed at Z, who promptly leant me two sets of her bedding. For the third day in a row, I stripped and re-made the damned bed. The first night was bliss, the second night after, Dave started scratching. And scratching. In my zeal to get him out of the blue bedding, I didn't stop to think about the fact that Z uses different laundry detergent. Dave can only tolerate a few brands and I had to change mine to his. 

Once again, I stripped the bed and changed the damned sheets, this time to mine. Unfortunately, Dave's rash didn't improve. He was certainly more comfortable, but the rash continued to spread and to itch.

In the meantime, I contacted the purveyor of said blue bedding and complained. They responded straight away by saying they would take back and refund the unopened bedding. They would not refund the blue bedding, oh and no one else had complained about the dye leaking; so there.

Well. Who told them to do that?

You see, I took pictures of Dave's blue rinse and Facebook was all a-buzz with his new look. Quite ridiculous, because I'm the one who wanted blue hair in the first place. Anyway, I responded by sending the picture of the blue rinse and pointed out the bedding was not fit for purpose. Yes, I was made aware (by Pamela) that I could soak the bedding in cold salted water before washing to fix the dye, but frankly I don't have the time, or inclination for that shit. I really don't. After a good 18 hours, the purveyor of the blue bedding came back and said they would give me a full refund, including the cost of returning the unopened bedding. Oh yes, I could keep the blue bedding. It seems I am destined to be stuck with that damn set.

The drugs used in chemotherapy are some of the most poisonous substances known to man (woman and children). As well as the six-sides of A4 paper outlining the side effects, there are a few conditions we were warned that if happened, we were to ring the Acute Oncology Service hotline at once. Do not delay. Do not pass Go, do not collect £200. And rash was one of them. In fairly big letters.

A rash could potentially be a sign that a chemotherapy-related sepsis could be taking root. And as is the case with meningitis, every minute between spotting the rash (see what I did there?) and getting hooked up to hard-core antibiotics, counts. Given Dave wasn't running a fever, we were concerned rather than worried.

As it's impossible to diagnose over the phone, the on-call doctor asked Dave to pop in. Up to Norwich we toddle where the doctor, taking into account Dave's sensitivity to detergents, felt that a good dose of Piriton (anti-histamine) over the weekend would see him right. If it gets worse, we are to hot-foot it back, but the doctor would re-assess the situation on Tuesday, before Dave's D-15 top up.

Needless to say, this has been a little bit of an adventure we could have done without. We had plans for the weekend that have disappeared in a Piriton-induced coma...it makes Dave incredibly sleepy...and well, the added excitement has wiped me out. Chickens are as much as I can deal with right now.