I am coming to the end of my four month sabbatical, which was marred only by a little surgical unpleasantness towards the start.
On reviewing myself in the mirror I am now lean, tanned and buffed. I have an ostentatious pale band round my wrist marking my watch strap which serves to highlight my bronzed arms and torso cultivated in the garden (yes we did have a summer this year in June and July, ending just in time for the school holidays). Obviously I completely ignored the advice of my cheery cardiologist to avoid strong sunlight.
I have had to tighten up the old trouser belt a couple of notches. Caffeine and Chardonnay have largely disappeared from my life. I have even started drinking green tea (yuk) although I admit the evidence base for its beneficial claims is a trifle flaky. I now walk the dogs for several miles daily, and the poor mutts struggle to keep up with me as I stride out or even occasionally jog. I feel healthy and appropriately self-righteous.
When I popped into the department the other week all my colleagues were suitably impressed with how fit and un-stressed I seemed, compared to their anaemic pale and haggard looks.
In September I will return to the new fairy-tale world that the NHS has become (turn your back for a few months and see what happens!) with our GP colleagues now firmly in the driving seat. Good luck guys, you will need it!
However there has been one last hurdle to leap before my grand re-entrance. That is the cardiac rehabilitation course. I was strongly advised to take this by my various doctors (what do they know?) so I thought I had better give it a try and started this week.
I turned up wearing my trendy trainers and clad in fashionable sporty gear. I was met at the door by a fat guy wearing baggy track-suit bottoms and a desolate T-shirt. “Are you a new boy?” he asked, “Don’t worry it’s not that bad”. My apprehension was consequently increased.
The gym was remarkably well-equipped; funded by the local League of Fiends. There was a group of about a dozen Georges, Normans and Mabels, all seemingly much older and unhealthier-looking than me. Most of the men had paunches, or that cadaverous emphysematous look. One of the ladies could hardly stand, and was taken home by ambulance at the end of the session. Surely I did not belong among this lot?
I was approached by Top Nurse who greeted me warmly. Like many senior nurses she was charming but beneath the smile I could sense that steely Richard III spirit. I knew she would brook no nonsense. The whole set-up was like circuit training, you did so many minutes on each bit of kit, set at a pre-determined level of intensity. After the time was up an Obergruppenführer blew a whistle and we all had to march around the gym like convicts in a prison yard before being directed to the next apparatus.
I started on the treadmill, but was only allowed to do a couple of minutes at a very gentle stroll to allow me to “warm up”. This was followed by two or three minutes on various other bits of kit, (rowing machines, mini-trampoline etc), closely supervised by Top Nurse, my pulse rate being obsessively recorded at the end of each. I finally graduated back again to the treadmill where I was allowed a magnificent four minutes, marginally faster and on a slight incline. I was deeply chagrined, especially when I noticed that all the others had graduated to much higher levels of intensity than me.
I entered the gym feeling fit and energetic, but departed rather deflated. “How was it?” they asked when I got home. “OK” I muttered, “but I think I will have to lay down for a bit. The dogs will have to wait!”
