I’d be interested by other people’s experience. My experience of private medicine (self-funded) is mixed. A wonderful consultant from the NHS ( Kapil Sahnan) did a brilliant job but it looks like the the anaesthetic that helped him do his job knocked out by lazy bowels!
On a Saturday morning I was able to spend time with another NHS consultant – Giorgio Mazzon (who also does private work) getting a schedule for my bladder to share the love as it should. It will take three months to get things sorted and there’s a chance it may not work.
But I feel that in the hands of the NHS I am dealing with people who I feel comfortable and I do not with the private medical firm.
It is extraordinary that neurology can be put to work for urology ; it means that by kidding the bladder that it is a leg muscle, it can stop being the lazy, obese nonsense. Apparently , only a few years ago, I would have been considered as fit only for a lifetime as a catheter.
My ongoing schedule involves a fair amount of work on my part and if you see me walking around in a rather odd way then please recognise the problems those with unusual relations between kidneys, prostate and bladders have with transit!
You may be wondering if I was released from my hospital (UCH) in time to get a proper shot of pot from the Great Escape. The answer is I did and didn’t. It was considered by all parties that I had better go home and cheer on Eamonn O’Connor’s horse at the Lockinge,(Tamfana was unlucky IMO)
2025 Lockinge
I cheered on anyone not American at the PGA. I even got a peak of the qualifying for the Grand Prix but who are those you support, if they bring no memories to you.
People will remain with me
I got most out of Crystal Palace at Wembley My memories will be Eze and Co after they’d scraped a 1-0 victory over Man City. Palace takes me back to weekends in the eighties when I went with Andy Barber (Mercer) who later married my first wife. We got chased by Birmingham fans at Selhurst Park. I cheered them on in 1991 when my support staff were mad Palace fans but couldn’t get Wembley tickets.
My first years in London – times with Sarah Williamson courtesy Abe Bacchus in 1980s, were spent in Brixton. If you put Brixton and Selhurst Park together, you get my memory of South London ( I lived for most of my middle age in posher Clapham but don’t miss it!).
Palace never won much when I went there but yesterday seemed to me a victory for South London, from Brixton to Croydon, Dulwich to Peckham, including the eastern clubs at Millwall and Charlton and the South Western rival at Brentford. The best bit of a good match was what happened afterwards.
People are what matter
My memories of when I was fit seem distant but the reality is it is only 6 months that I got knocked onto my head and lost the connectivity in thinking and speaking that still plagues me. I have a weekly meeting with Greg from Homerton to help me to get my mental fitness back and will be re-training my downstairs with Mr Giorgio Mazzon. My memories of the neurology ward of Kings Hospital Nunhead are fond.
This is how life works for me. The memories of South London , my memories of the National Health Service , the happiness of 40 years knowing the rascal Eamonn O’Connor.
I hope my friends who I hoped to see in Brighton yesterday had a good time and I hope that I will be well enough shortly to be back loving your town and your music!
In the meantime I have this memory
My motivator will be my memories and delivery will be from the NHS.
