Given I have posted about midlife itself, the menopause and midlife health I thought I would follow up with a wonderful story about the joys of all three! Being menopausal and embarking on midlife adventures.
Sitting on a long haul flight to Barbados in March 2022 I’m engrossed in my kindle and the variety of films on offer on my TV unit and all the while my inner uretha is deciding to play silly games. I find my normal one wee, let’s avoid the flight toilet, is disturbed by the need to pee several times. This is a side effect of menopause for some of us ageing women, an inclination to develop more than the average number of infections. Unlike when this happened in my twenties and an easy solution, to avoid the use of condoms, solved the problem, this isn’t going to do the trick this time.
And so I find myself standing in baggage reclaim thinking and hoping that this need to pee doesn’t develop into the now familiar burning sensation when I next visit the loo, hopefully when we finally arrive at our apartment some forty five minutes drive from the airport.
I drink gallons of cold water on arrival, from the freshly filtered jug in the fridge, and take a couple of paracetamols before retiring to bed.
It’s 2.40 in the morning (6.40 UK time) and the need to pee wakes me up which is a double whammy as I know my body is now going to think its time to get up and I won’t be able to get back to sleep. Parking myself on the loo my body then alerts me to the dreaded UTI and I immediately start to think “how on earth am I going to get antibiotics out here?”
I grab some more cold water and another couple of tablets and silently ask for it to just disappear while I sleep a bit more. Morning comes too quickly at 5 am and my first pee of the day doesn’t seem too bad.
We have a planned trip to the nearest large supermarket about thirty minutes drive away and within it’s walls is a pharmacy. I decide to talk to the pharmacist in case I’ve been lulled into a false sense of security and the burning returns. A very no nonsense Bajan lady tells me that I have to go to a doctor if I want antibiotics!
Back in the apartment we make lunch and again there’s the urge to pee and the burn is back. Referring to the guide book, the owners have thankfully supplied us with, I ring the medical centre. They suggest I ring my travel insurance company. This phone call back to the UK takes nearly fifteen minutes and at £2 a minute ( Barbados is not part of our Go Roaming) the bill is already starting to stack up. Finally with a reference number we set off to see a doctor who is based about one block from the supermarket we went to this morning! It’s at this point that I start to appreciate the NHS.
We wait around for a while before seeing a doctor. In the interim I learn my temperature is normal ,along with my pulse, oxygen levels and blood pressure. It’s like they have to do these vital checks not just to satisfy themselves but so we think something is happening. It’s like those queues at theme parks where you wander up and down, around and around to get to the start of the ride and they think by doing this you will be distracted enough not to think you have queued!
I then pee in the pot but its not your normal plastic bottle here in the Caribbean it’s a metal dish like you’d find a pie in at home! Pee duly dispensed we wait for it to be tested and to see a doctor. I manage to read a third of my magazine I brought with me, in case there is a wait, before getting bored and asking if my husband can come in to keep me company. This seems to jog them into action and we finally speak to the doctor who delivers an in depth explanation of their findings -the end result being you have a UTI and a bill for 345 Barbadian dollars which in English is about £140!!!!
What a great start to our holiday!
Luckily, when we returned to the UK, the travel insurance covered the bill for my pee (minus the excess) but the joys of midlife and the menopause still prevail and I now have to ensure I have a supply of antibiotics to take with me on my travels.
A Midlife Adventure 