Got to hospital at 8am. Early start, heavy eyes, that familiar knot in your stomach. We saw the surgeon and were told they wanted to rule out digestive issues. An endoscopy was booked for today. Relief. Mentally braced. Ready to get it over with.

Then came the update. No spaces. Not today. Tomorrow instead.

Cue my daughter, already exhausted and in pain, breaking down. Stress, fear, hunger, all bubbling over at once.

Enter New Girl on the Block — music blaring earlier like we were all invited to her personal playlist. She’d apparently been playing it during the night too and woke another patient. But when my daughter quietly cried, she snapped and told her to “shut the f* up.”**

That was it. Argument in the ward. Nurses stepping in. My daughter in tears. Tension everywhere. And then she topped it off by loudly slagging my daughter off on the phone, making sure everyone could hear.

We spoke to the matron. Calm, firm, absolutely done. A complaint was made. And somehow, a miracle, they found a slot for the endoscopy that same day. I’m fairly sure three other patients were sacrificed in the process.

They even said they might be able to remove stones during the procedure. The dream scenario. One go. One fix. My daughter consented to everything. Brave face on. Hope back in the room.

The endoscopy happened.

They found nothing.

The endoscopy itself took about 10 minutes. Ten minutes. My daughter had her throat sprayed with something to numb the pain, the camera went down, and she was even able to watch the whole thing on the screen, which feels both fascinating and mildly traumatic.

The verdict was that her stomach was clear. Answers were still very thin on the ground.

The surgeon did not come back afterwards. Just gone. Like a medical ghost.

Then, because apparently this made sense, they gave my daughter a potato to eat. A plain, innocent looking potato. Within minutes she was screaming in pain, exhausted, overwhelmed, and completely drained both physically and emotionally.

So yes, the procedure was quick. The aftermath was brutal.

Hospital logic is a thing I may never fully understand.

I was feeling exhausted it was around 5pm.

I genuinely thought I might sleep. Head on pillow. Eye mask on (mask). Bluetooth headphones in. Relaxing music. Drifting.

Until the lady two bays away had five children come to visit, including a set of twins about 18 months old who began screeching like sirens. I think they were missing their mum, which is heartbreaking, but my nervous system simply gave up.

As if on cue, the smell arrived. The lady opposite was having curry for dinner. Again.

So I am awake again, music playing. Curry in my nostrils. Toddlers screaming. Sanity slipping.

Not with drama. Not with chaos. Just slowly. Relentlessly. In a hospital ward that never sleeps.

Hospital life really is something else entirely.