Kicking Myself (not literally)

On Thursday morning I had been due to attend a face-to-face appointment at my surgery, which I'd booked approximately 3 weeks ago. As seems to be par for the course these days, I had spent Wednesday night unable to sleep, mainly due to menopausal symptoms (hot flushes and sweats) keeping me awake. I could remember looking at the time on my clock, aware that I would soon need to start getting ready for my appointment. 

Much to my horror, I then realise that it's several hours later and I've missed my surgery appointment, which had actually been to discuss getting started on HRT. Lack of sleep had clearly caught up with me. I felt so annoyed with myself and frustrated that I would have to go through the process of booking another appointment. This then resulted in a tension headache.

A while later, I then discovered that there had been a phone call from my surgery while I had been asleep. The phone had been all of about a foot away from me, but I had obviously been in such a deep sleep that I had been oblivious to the sound of it ringing. Anyway, as if I wasn't already feeling bad enough about having missed my appointment, I later discovered that my surgery had e-mailed me too, with what can best be described as a politely worded telling off. It was fair enough.

Parents
  • I'm sorry to hear you missed your appointment. I hope you can get your next one quickly. I wish doctor's surgeries were more organised and sent a lot of reminders out the day before and on the day of appointments. Mine don't even send reminders but the local hospital call, text and email reminders for me the day before and then on the morning the next day. I wish everywhere did that as I know how stressful it can be after if you miss one. I hope your tension headache is better now. 

Reply
  • I'm sorry to hear you missed your appointment. I hope you can get your next one quickly. I wish doctor's surgeries were more organised and sent a lot of reminders out the day before and on the day of appointments. Mine don't even send reminders but the local hospital call, text and email reminders for me the day before and then on the morning the next day. I wish everywhere did that as I know how stressful it can be after if you miss one. I hope your tension headache is better now. 

Children
  • Although I cannot deny that I am rather keen to get started on HRT a.s.a.p, it won't be the end of the world if I end up having to wait a few more weeks. Had I foreseen that I would fall asleep, I would have made a point of canceling the appointment, so that it could have been offered to someone else. As for the tension headache, it had thankfully eased off within a couple of hours.

    I think some surgeries are better organised than others, but I think most (if not all) are of the view that it's the patient's responsibility to remember appointments. Don't quote me on that though as there may be some that make exceptions.