I left my polyp in C Block, Airedale (Eat your polyp out, Tony Bennett!)
by Ian Gray
I’ve always been a tad squeamish. A few bloody episodes are indelibly etched in my mind. I recall, as a child, unwisely trying to open an incalcitrant kitchen window, ending up painfully paneless and being whisked off to hospital with the resulting ghastly gash. Or was it just a nasty nick? Memory may magnify.
Once, emerging from the sea at Bridlington, à la James Bond, but too callow for Ursula Andress, I was alerted by a paddler to my gory foot, rent by broken glass, benumbed by the icy waters. With quivering voice, I hailed Dad, who carried my inert body to the First Aid post. The attendant assured me I would live but advised me not to go too near the lions at the circus that evening. How can one joke in the face of such adversity? With high-powered binoculars you can still discern the once livid scar seventy years later.
As an odd-job man (HoHo!) in a German children’s home in my gap-year, I was given the task of scything a small field of grass but only succeeded, during the sharpening process, in scything my right fore-finger, which was tended to by a most unsympathetic undenazified starched matron, who delightedly saw, in my whimperings, proof that the result of the war must have been a ghastly mistake and at least worthy of a replay or a penalty shoot-out.
As a student, volunteered into the college rugger team, I suffered, oh how I suffered, a broken wrist after ten minutes of my second match. I should have quit while I was losing. When the doctor told me what the procedure was, I fainted, thereby saving the cost of the anaesthetic. I must recommend it to the NHS. Up the gruesomeness of what’s in store, until the patient keels over of his own accord.
When my dear pregnant wife suggested I should go for a test to determine my blood-group, I dutifully complied and, after having my thumb mercilessly speared, was about to stride to the exit in manly fashion, when dizziness forced me to stagger back to the welcoming arms of a sweet nurse and cuppa. I had to miss the birth itself as they had decorators in. It was claimed there wasn’t enough room for extra bodies, though Margaret tells me they weren’t actually painting the ceiling above her as she delivered.
However, I did fail to miss the birth of our second child. This time, there was no way out but I was assured that, if I averted my gaze at the appropriate time and concentrated solely on the gas-air apparatus I was given to operate, I should survive the experience. I thought it foolhardy to give me control of any technical equipment. This, in itself, almost made me pass out, but, with a little patronising guidance, I managed to fulfil my role and felt quite proud of my part in the proceedings. Nothing to it. What’s all the fuss about? Biting onto bits of wood? Screaming and yelling? Then I saw the placenta. Good job the gas-air tackle was at hand.
At a Primary School Sports Day, our daughter fell and banged her head. No doubt as a punishment for some perceived misdemeanour, I was deputed to take her to hospital for a check-up. Holding Hannah’s comforting hand, I made it through reception, managed to speak coherently to a nurse and groggily took a seat as the room started to whirl. The nurse hadn’t noticed my plight. Too concerned with my daughter, no doubt. When she left us momentarily, I quickly got my head down between my knees and recovered sufficient equilibrium before she returned. I left the building with body and pride just about intact. Oh yes, Hannah was OK too.
Some years later, in my position as Examinations Manager in a large Comprehensive, I could cope with the mental demands of an exacting job, involving huge exam entries, multifarious room changes and invigilation schedules. Indeed, so much so, that a young colleague at the time, back in the 1980s, one Andy Davidson, now Settle Cricket Club Chairman, recently invited me to take the post of Settle CC’s Fixtures Secretary, primarily to avoid clashes of games involving our fourteen teams.
I mention this ‘organisational knack’ only to contrast it with one tiny, but potentially life-threatening incident in my school office, when, in trying to extract some examination papers from a filing-cabinet, I caught my finger in the drawer mechanism and ripped the nail horrendously. I needed to be in an exam room soon afterwards but suddenly got the cold sweats and had to appeal to Nursey next door for a plaster and, more importantly, some tender loving care and a lie-down. If Andy, a strong rugby and cricket man, reads this, I’ll probably get the sack. I doubt if he’d want such a wimp in the club.
So, with this somewhat less than impressive record of valour in the face of ruddy gore, especially my gore, I recently faced, with some trepidation, the prospect of having a polyp removed from where the sun don’t shine. A doctor at Townhead mentioned a Colin Oskopi, who sounded alien and was said to shove things up people’s bottoms. Now, I’ve nothing whatsoever against foreigners. I’m an EU man to the core, indeed to my very polyp, as was, and two of my best friends are genuinely brown and French to boot, but I was slightly perturbed by being sent to Westcliffe Health Initiatives near Bradford. The word ‘Initiatives’ smelled of guinea-pigs. I feel more comfortable with tried and tested clinical methods.
However, my fears were totally unfounded and the NHS staff, both there and later at Airedale Hospital, were wonderfully empathetic and efficient. I can’t speak highly enough of them. I even got a photo for my album or annals. Good old Mr Attlee! The beginning was Nye! His baby is the same age as me and still going, if not so strongly as in days of gore….yore, due to all the extra pressures in our ageing, polyp-ridden society.
When my family learned of my impending medical treatment, they were understandably concerned. Would I succumb out of sheer terror? Would I have a heart attack on the way to the hospital? Should they start thinking about my obituary? My foibles, real as they are, can be a trifle exaggerated by my wife and offspring, even in the field of DIY, so I determined to put on my bravest face and tough it out. I even convinced MYSELF that this was possible and actually watched the fortunately bloodless removal of my polyp on a monitor with the aid of a mere couple of gulps of gas and air, when the procedure, never painful, became ‘uncomfortable’.
My unexpected courage was rewarded, after a foodless twenty-four hours, with the most delicious cup of tea and slices of toast imaginable, though I wouldn’t go as far as to say that it made it all worthwhile and I wouldn’t recommend any unnecessary depolyping just for the sake of the post-op grub in the recovery room. It turned out that my polyp never meant me any real harm. I wanted it as a souvenir. I thought I might pickle it in formaldehyde, à la Damien Hirst, and sell it to a gullible Saatchi or embalm and mount it on the mantelpiece, but it was despatched to the laboratory and its benignity confirmed. Now it’s been judged innocent, I feel quite guilty at having it cut off in its prime and owe it a posthumous pardon.
It’s a happy outcome and I can make light of the whole business but I know that many are not so fortunate and I wish them well with their treatment. One day science will beat the big C. It just seems a long time coming.
