I nearly died at Easter! Warning - somewhat revolting!

The night before Good Friday I developed a complete intestinal obstruction caused by a stricture which I've had for about five years - it's a common complication of Crohn's disease. I often get partial obstructions which clear in a few hours, sometimes two or three times a week. They are quite painful but this was something else - the pain was unbelievable! I also started vomiting. I knew it was serious so I dialed 999 and an ambulance arrived within about 20 minutes. This was at 02:00 in the middle of the night. My downstairs neighbour let them in and when they arrived I was sitting on the toilet and vomiting at the same time! I couldn't walk down the stairs and the paramedics refused to carry me down because they said it would be too dangerous so I had to shuffle down four flights of stairs on my bottom! I grabbed my phone before we left.

Once on the ground floor they put me in a wheelchair and took me to the ambulance. They checked me over and took me to A and E at the local Conquest Hospital. I know it well!

Once in A and E the nurses stuck electrodes all over my chest and one leg and hooked me up to an ECG machine. They also put me on a saline drip. All this time I was groaning because of the pain and a lady in the next bed was screaming continuously! They then gave me a dose of Oramorph - liquid morphine squirted into my mouth. It didn't do anything for the pain. A doctor examined me, couldn't hear any bowel sounds with her stethoscope and immediately sent me for an MRI scan. The scan took about 20 minutes. Was taken back to A and E and they injected morphine into me via the drip. That worked and the pain reduced considerably. The screaming lady went for an X-ray. When she returned the immobilisers that held her head and stopped her moving the rest of her body were removed and she stopped screaming - she'd just been uncomfortable!

I was then taken to the surgical admission ward. After about an hour I was transferred to a single room which was very worrying - it reminded me of the room in the same hospital where they put my younger brother when he became critical because of his Crohn's disease. He died that night!

After about 30 minutes the porters returned, apologised, and took me back to the ward! A nasal-gastric tube was put into my stomach via my nose, connected to a bag, and I stopped vomiting. I'd had one a couple of times before, following surgery, so I knew what to expect. They aren't very pleasant.

The following day was something of a blur - I sometimes had to keep pressing my emergency call button when I needed more morphine. No-one came (I had to keep shouting for a nurse) or when they did they weren't qualified to administer it. Sometimes I had to wait for an hour or more in agony. I don't think anyone else on the ward got much sleep!

The following night I started getting the most amazing visual hallucinations from the morphine! The ward was darkened, of course, and a drawn back curtain by the bed opposite resembled a giant figure wrapped in a black shroud. If I looked up at the ceiling I could see random text on it. When I closed my eyes I saw random text scrolling up with brightly coloured characters - a bit like looking at my phone with text scrolling up the screen. I'd often had morphine before following surgery or after an accident when I was knocked down by a taxi while crossing the road, but I've never hallucinated.

Eventually they tried a treatment for the obstruction that I subsequently found had only been approved last year. They removed the bag attached to the NG tube and squirted a large amount of Gastrografin X-ray contrast agent directly into my stomach. It started working after about an hour and I could feel my guts starting to function again! After administering the Gastrografin they forgot to replace the bag draining my stomach via the NG tube and I started vomiting again. The vomiting was so severe that I brought up the tube into my mouth! I pressed the emergency call button. No-one came and I started shouting despite my mouth being full of tube. Eventually someone turned up but I had some problems telling her what was wrong - I had to open my mouth and point to the tubing. They removed the NG tube and were going to insert another one but I told them I didn't feel sick any more.

I then had diarrhoea lasting for a few hours. I had a commode by the bed which was handy.

By then it was Easter Monday. I was allowed to have a cup of tea and asked if I wanted anything to eat. All I could manage was some soup which was the most disgusting-tasting thing I've ever eaten! It was supposed to be chicken, I think. I then had a tub of what was supposed to be yoghurt but tasted very strange. Looking at the label it seemed to be full of chemicals. The tub of jelly I had to follow was equally nasty. Not as bad as the soup but unlike any jelly I've ever eaten. That also was full of chemicals.

After "lunch" they said I could go home and called a taxi for me. My phone still had some charge so I was able to pay via Google Wallet. I didn't have any cash on me and not much in the flat.

If the Gastrografin hadn't worked I'd have required emergency major surgery. I've seen a surgeon at the Conquest a couple of times and we agreed that surgery for my stricture wouldn't be a good option because of my age, 81, and general health. An anaesthetist once put me on an exercise bike while he recorded my heart via lots of electrodes. His spreadsheet calculated that I had something like a 20% chance of dying from a stroke or heart attack in the month following surgery. I had an MRI scan two months ago (no results yet!) and that will show whether I'm suitable for balloon dilation of the stricture.

Just about the worst experience of my life!