One of the Lucky Ones

It came as quite a shock.

At my wife’s insistence, returning from a work trip abroad and home finally for Christmas, I’d popped into our local GP surgery for some tests.

It was probably nothing, but needed looking into, she said reassuringly.

“I’m older than you and you’re not keeping up with me...Something’s not right, you’re s’posed to be my younger model, full of beans!”

Sure, I’d been exhausted for months. But I’d put that down to my busy work schedule, regular international business trips and simply, a poor diet on the road and not enough regular sleep.

The day after Boxing Day, the surgery had called asking me to come in again, URGENTLY.

So, later that day I found myself chatting with my GP about the test results.

“Very, very interesting…”, he mused.

“How do you mean, ‘interesting’?” I queried.

“Looks like you have something very special. They’ll be keen to see you at hospital to run some more tests…”

“That doesn’t sound good, what do you mean?” I asked, trying not to sound paniced.

My GP leant across his desk and smiled gently.

“I think you’ve got haemochromatosis. It’s affected your liver, which is badly swollen…”

“Haemo, chroma what?!” I blurted, slumping back in the chair.

“We’ll arrange a genetic test with the hospital. They’ll explain things more.”

He tried to be reassuring but strangely I wasn’t reassured.

“Sounds serious - can it be treated?” I pleaded.

“Yes, treatment is quite medieval but usually works. Just takes a lot of leeches…”