Please Will Someone Just Listen

By Joan Sandilands

Please Listen to Us was written after hearing about so many survivors who had all experienced the deaf-ear syndrome not just from family and friends but from the professionals who should have picked up much earlier the symptoms and the desperate pleas of help and dealt with it.
Support has always been minimalistic and still is, there is no monitoring or reassurance or screening for the survivors, and we are made to feel like we are hypochondriacs to say the least.
We owe this to the families of the people who have died through lack of actions, who cannot voice what we have experienced firsthand, and Im here to share my journey.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris UK
• Release date: Mar 1, 2016
• ISBN: 9781514449127

Joan Sandilands

Joan Sandilands was born in Sunderland in 1949, which provided me with endurance to achieve many things in life. Coming from a very poor background with dysfunctional family relationships and on the whole not a happy childhood but an opening to lifes pitfalls, moved to beautiful Durham in 1976, where my home is now. I was encouraged by Catherine Cookson in the 1980s to publish some of my work but never actually got around to doing this until personal circumstances inspired me to write this book. I had three children and was divorced in the 1990s, but this led to a very troubled life where I was always seeking solace by working round the clock to make ends meet, taking on two or three jobs to fund and to devote myself in my spare time to India, rescuing kids from slums or off the streets and finding them shelters, from which I gained many friends. This was my saving grace in my very lonely life to feel I had a use and a purpose.

Book preview

PLEASE WILL SOMEONE

JUST LISTEN

On behalf of

Deep Vein Thrombosis

and

Pulmonary Embolism Survivors

A true journey which resulted in Bilateral Pulmonary Embolisms

JOAN SANDILANDS

Copyright © 2016 by Joan Sandilands.

ISBN:                Softcover                                978-1-5144-4913-4

                          eBook                                     978-1-5144-4912-7

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Rev. date: 06/22/2016

Xlibris

800-056-3182

www.Xlibrispublishing.co.uk

735515

CONTENTS

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

This is about a true journey which probably represents a lot of DVT and Pulmonary Embolism Survivors.

We need to be heard

We need support

We need to be Listened to

All identities have been changed not particularly that I want to protect them but because for me this is showing courteousness and respect.

Written by Joan Sandilands

I

dedicate this book to Dr Ray who worked at University Hospital North Durham on New Years Eve 2014/2015

Without him I would have been a star in the sky

He was the only person over the horrendous five months that

Listened to me

My eternal thanks to the Coronary Care Unit Staff in University Hospital North Durham for restoring my faith in humanity who worked round the clock to care and saved my life.

The nurses working there are akin to Florence Nightingales Standards a dedicated vocation not just a paypacket at the end of their shift, thank you so much.

A special thank you to family and friends who tirelessly listened to me.

CHAPTER 1

It was a lovely sunny Autumn August day in 2014 and my furry friends (my German shepherd and Pyrenean sheepdog) were chomping at the bit with excitement for their daily walk. The dogs jumping wildly round while I was trying to put my boots on ready to walk through the mounds of colourful leaves in our beautiful woodland walk which led to open spaces for dogs to run free.

Car ready and the car boot was open and in they both jumped overexcited as usual and off we went…..approaching the venue which is virtually ten minutes away from home the dogs sense we are near the venue and are even more excited and a little vocal but hey this is their pleasure and free time, no one around to disturb so they are allowed to sing their joyous deafening barks.

Parked up and out we go, first a small decline and through the woods and a little way into a small ascent with views to die for, little did I know I was to nearly actually die on this walk which I will explain a little later.

The ascent was a little troublesome in the fact that my breathing was laboured and my whole legs went sort of tight, however I still plodded on thinking this is all because I had suddenly become unfit.

Walking in the open flat space was great …breathing fine ..legs loosened up, we were off 3 laps at 20 minutes each lap and I felt good.

Time to go home, walking back through the woodlands and up to the first ascent of the walk, breathing laboured again and again legs went tight, remembering some tips on my long distance walking with the ramblers…walk backwards for a few steps to regain breathing pattern, look at the view and this helped.

Back to car all is well breathing fine, legs back to normal and home.

*     *     *

Next day continued with my daily routine then it was time to take dogs out, I decide to do the same walk and exactly the same thing happened with my breathing, again short of breathe and my legs tightened up in the same area at the smallish ascents….strange

Back home I decided to go onto the Internet and Googled the symptoms (not sure if Googling for information is a good or a bad thing for putting the fear of