So it went pretty well :) I only had to wait about 30 minutes, which isn't bad for a busy NHS Outpatient Clinic. And I had a great stroke of luck when I arrived and parked the car. I went to the pay and display to fork out an arm and a leg for the ticket and a chap standing there said "Here, you can have mine, I bought way too much!" Hee! So free parking!
Ahem. Anyway, I met with Dr Quinn. Nice enough guy, knew his stuff. As I feared, he did indeed insist on shoving a camera thingy up me nose and down me throat. The good news was the local anaesthetic stuff really worked - I didn't feel a thing once the lil' tube passed the back of my nasal cavity :) Hurrah! Actually, the anaesthetic was probably the most uncomfortable bit - it gets squirted up your nose and you can feel it going down your throat and it doesn't taste nice. After that, it was a breeze. He had a good look around at my larynx, got me to make various vowel sounds and pronounced that there was no inflammation, hurrah, but a bit of excess mucus was lurking around and, in all probability, I'd just strained my throat when I had the two throat infections.
He's making an appointment with a speech therapist to talk to me about voice use, he's writing a letter for my doctor (which I'll get a copy of) saying I need to rest my voice as much as possible, and I think he said he was going to prescribe a nasal spray, which presumably my doctor will supply as he didn't give me a prescription before I left. He dictated the letter while I was sitting there which was a bit disconcerting, but to be fair, apart from using more technical medical terms, he didn't actually say anything he hadn't already explained to me. Overall, he feels it will clear up gradually - as, in fact, it has been doing - over the next couple of months.
There are some ramifications from this, mind, because a BIG part of my job at HCC is answering the phone. If I was a permanent employee, I wouldn't be worried about saying "Umm, doc says I gotta rest my voice, can I be taken off the phones for a bit?" But I'm a temp. If I say that to them, they would have every right to let me go and get someone else in. Whether they WOULD is another matter but I can't say for sure. And getting another post that doesn't involve the telephone would be tricky, to say the least. However, I pondered this on the drive back. I've got another 3 weeks of relative peace and quiet at work, due to the summer holidays and the absence of phone calls, which can only help. I'm talking hardly at all at work because the office is empty and, apart from muttering at the cat, I don't have occasion to talk at home. So, I think I'll mention it to Simon when I get the letter and say that I'd like to see how things go when the schools are back, and see what he says. *shrugs* They've been pretty good to me, overall, apart from the little matter of not actually taking me on permanently (the bastards), so we'll see.
I treated myself on the way home for being a brave little soldier (shut up): I stopped off at the Marks and Sparks in Stevenage and purchased their Mini-Bites All Butter Flapjack. Gods, this stuff is like crack. Mmmmm! *CHOMP*
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