I know, oh I know. I haven’t been on here like I should have been, right? I genuinely meant to post on Saturday. I really did. But hear me out, I’ve got a good excuse.

Last week Georgia started, which was brilliant. Such a huge moment and one I was so excited about. But alongside all the excitement, I also seemed to become completely overwhelmed by everything. And when I say overwhelmed, I mean I made a much bigger deal out of things than I probably needed to. Yes, I’m admitting it, I was being a bit of a drama queen.

I don’t know what was going on with me. It was like my head had completely taken over, and you know when your thoughts are in control, it’s never a good thing. I didn’t feel calm. I didn’t feel grounded. I didn’t feel in control. I felt like the complete opposite.

Looking back now, I almost feel like the universe stepped in and said, “Sarah, come on. You need to slow down. You need to get some perspective.” And apparently, the way it decided to do that was by putting me back in hospital. Yep. Hospital again.

Here’s what happened. I’d had a few meetings during the week. On Wednesday, I suddenly got really hot during one of them. I had to put the fan on me throughout the meeting because I was so hot. My clients were absolutely fine and I didn’t think anything of it. I just assumed it was because I’d had a hot coffee and maybe the room was warm.

Then Thursday came around. To be fair, I had quite a few things going on with work and I thought maybe I was just stressed. Looking back, I think I probably made everything feel much bigger in my head than it actually was. Don’t get me wrong, things were happening, but my brain had decided everything was a crisis. I didn’t think there was anything physically wrong with me. I just thought I was losing my mind. Then later that afternoon I got a fever. Not just a little fever, but one of those fevers where you know something isn’t quite right. Then the pain started getting worse. 

The next day, I called 111 and managed to get a GP appointment. Sitting there listening to the doctor, everything felt strangely familiar, almost like déjà vu. The GP was amazing. She was kind, reassuring and really tried to get me seen by the surgical team, but unfortunately she couldn’t get hold of them. So, with a letter explaining what was happening, I headed to A&E.

I waited a couple of hours for blood tests and, almost immediately after, they found me a bed upstairs in the hospital. I had a CT scan that evening and the next morning I was taken in for surgery under general anaesthetic. And yes, this is the NHS I'm talking about.

The speed at which everything happened was pretty incredible. One minute I was sitting there feeling awful and the next I was surrounded by people who knew exactly what they were doing and were looking after me. After surgery, I was moved to a post op ward, which felt like being in a private hospital. It was air conditioned, quiet and there were only three of us in there.

After the general anaesthetic, they gave me something for the pain. I’m pretty sure it was fentanyl because when the nurse told me, I remember saying, “Wait, fentanyl?” She just nodded and said, “Yes, fentanyl.” So there it was, my first introduction to fentanyl, which probably explains why I spent the rest of the day completely out of it and sleeping.

The next day I started feeling a little more human. I was functioning again and that’s when I started chatting to my new roommate, Gwen. Gwen's 82 years old, has severe arthritis and had just had her kidney removed. Naturally, I asked her if she only needed one kidney now. Which, when I think about it, was probably a fairly obvious question considering she only had one kidney left. She laughed and explained that the other kidney grows bigger and compensates. 

She was funny. I can’t even remember exactly what she was saying now, but she kept making me laugh, even though laughing hurt. She kept apologising for making me laugh, but then she would also say it was good for me. I think she was secretly trying to make me smile. We started talking about her life and that’s when she told me her story.

At 53 years old, Gwen got divorced and was left with nothing. She was at rock bottom. She got a council house and had friends and family who rallied around her, but she still had to rebuild her life. At 54, she decided to learn how to use a computer. She started with free classes because she was completely computer illiterate. Then she went on to do higher level classes and paid for a secretarial course.

She told me about sitting in classrooms where some people were refreshing their skills while she was learning everything from scratch. She typed with two fingers, but she persevered. She completed a two year course while working and eventually got a job in an office. She stayed with that company for 15 years.

The amazing thing was that she ended up teaching her boss how to use spreadsheets and improving the way they worked. At 54, she started again. She didn’t decide it was too late, and she didn’t let fear hold her back. She simply kept moving forward. Her attitude was so positive and inspiring and I felt lucky to be sharing a room with her.

On Sunday morning, the consultant came to see me. She told me the abscess was quite bad and that I would need further operations. I wasn’t expecting it. I think because I felt like I’d recovered much quicker than the last time, I had convinced myself everything was okay.

I went to the bathroom and came back to the room. Gwen looked at me and asked, “Are you okay?” And that’s when I started crying. I know. It sounds silly. I blame the medication. But sometimes you just reach a point where everything catches up with you.

I felt silly because I thought I was crying over nothing, but Gwen didn’t make me feel silly. She got up from her chair, even though she was in pain herself, walked over to me and gave me a hug. Her dressing gown was so warm and fluffy and she just held me. It was exactly what I needed. She told me to stay positive.

Not long after, the nurse came in. Gwen and I couldn’t pronounce her name because it was quite long, so we called her Su. Su came over and started talking to me, and then I started crying again. You know when you start crying and then suddenly you can’t stop? That was me.

I told her I think I was upset because I hadn’t realised how serious it was. I felt silly for getting emotional. But instead of brushing it off, Su sat beside me and said, “Let me tell you a story.” She told me about when she was pregnant with her daughter, who was born prematurely. She told me about the fear, the uncertainty and the moment her baby was born and stopped breathing.

Su had lost her own mum a few years earlier, when her mum was only in her early 50s. She said she wasn’t particularly religious, but in that moment she prayed. She asked God and her mum for help. She said, “If I don’t ask for anything else, please help me this one time.” She was willing to give anything for her daughter to live. Then she heard her baby cry. And in that moment everything changed. The pain disappeared. The fear disappeared. She was just grateful.

She told me those moments make you stronger and that whenever life feels difficult, she thinks back to that moment and remembers what she overcame. And something about that story resonated with me. I stopped crying. I felt calmer. I felt okay.

This whole experience has made me think about how much the people around us matter. Because life is always going to throw things at us. There will always be moments where we feel overwhelmed, scared, sad or like we don’t know what to do next. But having kind people around you changes everything.

The people who make you laugh when you don’t feel like laughing. The people who sit beside you when you’re struggling. The people who share their stories to remind you that you’re stronger than you think. Those people are priceless.

Gwen didn’t know me before we ended up sharing a hospital room. Su didn’t know me before she sat beside me and told me her story. But both of them gave me something that I needed at that exact moment. Hope. Perspective. Kindness.

Maybe the universe didn’t send me back to hospital just to slow me down. Maybe it sent me there to remind me that we are never meant to do everything alone. Sometimes the biggest lessons come from the most unexpected places. And sometimes the people who enter your life for just a moment can leave a mark that lasts forever. 🩷