Joy

I am 59 and my husband who was 62 died 2 months ago and DWP have not contacted me re pension now I'm told they stopped widows pension. Surely not? How much is it and how do I claim it?

I'm on disability does that make a difference?

is now spreading outwards. I noticed the smell first and wondered if it was coming from down below. In the shower the water stung me and I saw there was a redness in the tummy button area and the smell was from there as well. It smells nasty. The raised redness is slowly spreading outwards from haf an inch to an inch and now aiming for 1.5 inches. It's slightly itchy at times but hurts too much to scratch.

Despite the shower it still smells a bit. I dealt with it with sudocrem but it made it worse.

I think it needs drying so have had tissues pushed in and over it and that's not helping either.

What is it? What should I be doing about it? I don't have time to see any doctors this week but want to start treating it.

I swallowed a co-codamol that got stuck in my throat. I choked a long time and then it felt like I inhaled it into my lung instead of my stomach. That was 6 hours ago and I think my lung is trying to get rid of it still with a horrible cough. I was thinking surely the co-codamol will dissolve and go away so this is going to settle down - right? Every now and then it seems to get far enough up that I can taste it again and smell it which is a good sign it is dissolving maybe? The coughing and retching from this is bad enough that my dog is running away to hide from me!

I really don't want to have to go to the hospital and get any nasty tubes stuck in my lung to find it so am looking for reassurance this is going to sort itself out please. My son and his partner are having my granddaughter in the next few days as she is due and her blood pressure is high so possibly being admitted for inducing this afternoon and I have to be around for that.

Thanks

I would like to know what you think is the best small or medium car available for £0 - £500 advance payment and why is it best deal?

My cat is 17 and has been diagnosed with this by the vet. He's lost a huge amount of weight but he still asks for food and eats a little. The vet gave us tablets and renal cat food but he doesn't like it - not his usual stuff! Have given up trying to force tablets down his throat. Vet happy to put him down when I say so but won't come to house to do it - lack of time.

I have chronic stage 3 renal failure myself and am assuming he feels a lot worse than I do? If I could ask him what he wants to do it would be easier. If he eats a bit wanders about sits in the sun, sleeps on my bed, purrs if I pet him doesn't that say he should stay at home with me a bit longer or am I being cruel, is he really suffering, is he in pain?

How long will he go on like this for if we do nothing, is it possible he'll pass away peacefully in his sleep at home? The vet had to take his blood tests from his chest to diagnose either renal failure or diabetes and he was screaming the place down. I don't want to take him back there.

His sister was put down by that vet and she reacted badly to the sedative and cried and pooed herself before he gave her the one to stop her heart. I was in a terrible state after that and can't bear to go through the same thing again with him. It was cruel and not what I'd have wanted to happen.

Has anyone had a cat like this who stayed at home, what was the end like and how long did it take to get to there?

I am disabled and have just received one of these that doesn't seem to be working properly after 3 days. The nurse isn't familiar with the pump and overlay and doesn't want to call an engineer if it's not necessary.

This is a pump that blows air into different chambers in the air bed topper mattress (on top of bed's own mattress) It's got a set routine that it followed for 2 days adn then stopped and has done hardly anything now. The nurse wonders if that was it settling in but the book says 20 minutes to settle in!

There are harder fills at top and edges for pillow and for not being too soft at the edges and then large sausage tunnels where 1 hard 1 soft alternate tunnels for 4 Min's. Then the whole thing is hard for 1 min then the hard/soft ones swap places for 4 Min's then 1 min all full. Then it repeats that order over & over.

Now the entire mattress is softer and doesn't seem to have enough air. The pump is on and working but it's far quieter than before. The shift from hard to soft isn't happening either but the nurse says it is, a bit. This is not the nurses who installed it and they have been taken over by a senior person who keeps saying "do you really want me to send for an engineer if it's working fine?" Obviously not but in my opinion the mattress isn't working properly.

I established she's not seen one of them before and there are no other patients in the surgery that have one she can go and check on to see if it's the same as mine. The point of the mattress is to avoid pressure sores and I don't see how that is going to work if the mattress is stationery doing nothing 24/7. However I do admit it is quiet comfy now being partly deflated and squidgy and so soft to lie on! That's not the objective though.

Does anyone have one or has had one or knows some one who has? If you are a nurse or OT maybe you know something about these gadgets.

Please help.

I am a wheelchair user driving a WAV Kangoo with eletric ramps and doors and I hate the car to bits. I hate it's looks the way it drives the van type appearance. I want another car but what I need is a car with a huge whole back door openbing sidewise and then a low sill to the ground. I drove along and spotted one but can't remember what car and model it was. The alternative is a store box on top of the roof for the chair that picks up the chair but I really need a power chair. I'd be using a long folding ramp to run the wheelchair up at the rear end and fit it in (or get a trailer but where do I park?) Somewhere out there is a car waiting for me I need you guys to tell me what it is!

Thanks

We've all seen the Your Tube video of a coke bottle when a mint is added and it blows up. If someone drank some coke then ate a mint would it not upset the person? Would their be any explosion internally or any other damage? I'm trying to stop my son from doing this just in case it does lead to an internal explosion!

Thanks for any help you can provide.

can any one please clarify the difference beteeen diet coke and zero coke?

Why is it that when a patient needs help, asks for help and asks for admission to hospital or an increase in medication, they get virtually no response and definitely no support, small increase in meds (not as high as a previous prescription level) No offer of hospital at all for a break from these huge problems going on that are making me ill. Despite my best friend saying I should be in hospital!

BUT....

A few years back the same psych insisted I was ill despite my telling him I really wasn't, I didn't want to be in hospital, so I got Sectioned twice and forced to have several medications with horrid side effects. Refused freedom and basic human rights in a horrible building with terrible facilities for weeks.

WHY?

IS this some weird game they play so they take everything we say and then assume the opposite! Where do they get this treatment ideas from , did they all get the same uni lecture that tells them to oppose any or every suggestion from the patient and always do the direct opposite of what they want?

Withdraw support???!!! What the heck is that all about, what do they think will happen. Why do they do the opposite? Maybe they do want us to end it and get us off the books. It's a very bad show and totally unhelpful. It leaves patients feeling they have no control of their condition and no confidence in the psych in any direction. Are we being punished for daring to be ill again when on their medications?

This was decent psych I've seen for 8-9 years and he's usually good but I will have trouble trusting him for anything from here on. Am considering not going back after this stab in the back.

At times like this you begin to wonder who you can trust with anything. If I see them again it will probably be a silent head down meeting and what's the point going if that's the case.

What would you do? I have schizoaffective disorder (or not as the case may be)

Had a wonderful dentist for 35 years till he retired have now seen 3 different ones and it's all going wrong. I've got all my real teeth on bottom set and the top each side is a mirror image of the opposite side with 2 crowns a bridge and 2 crowns then 1 each real tooth at back. These works cost me £300 and £325 being top costs for any nhs set of treatment a good few years ago now. They were done a year or 2 after each other. The right side has broken the crowns and bridge off and real tooth needs new filling. The nhs paid about £3000 for my dental work and I can't cope with a denture - I tried and was allergic to stuff had a mouth full of ulcers and threw up for 2 weeks non stop. Am happy to pay £300+ or what ever the top nhs charge is now for fixing this again but nhs say no they want to remove the teeth and leave me with nothing or a denture. What a total waste of the nhs money for the original work surely? The dentist says it would need implants and they can't do that on nhs - which I knew and a private dentist wants £4000 for all this plus additional cosmetic stuff and I can't afford that. How can I get an nhs dentist to make a case for the nhs to fix this properly? I can't accept this is the end of the road and I'll have a top right hand side with no teeth at all I'm only 56 not 96! I'm getting ill with 3 abscesses now and worrying all night about how to cope. Please can anyone help me.