I gave them my "Rehabilitation's just a word" speech, and told them "just to go ahead and stamp their form" but stopped short of calling them "sonny".

As the day wore on yesterday rumour was in the air that I was on my way out. First the pharmacist popped in to see what drugs I already had at home so that they would not have to give me a completely new batch when I left. Then the nurse that runs the day room where I had my Chemotherapy popped in to say what good news it was that I was going, but still at that point my doctors had not said that I was going home.

My release had been rumoured over the previous few days but there had been nothing confirmed and sometimes hospital administration can move pretty slowly so I was not going to get my hopes up. Having spent just over a week running endless tests on my blood whilst filling me with antibiotics the medical team working with me had succeeded in removing all of the symptoms that I had come in with but, much to their disappointment, had failed to isolate the cause.

I am pretty sure that, determined as they are, if they could they would have kept me forever until they finally, finally, put a name to what ever it is that was in me. HCL patients quite commonly get fevers and infections post-Chemo that often go undiscovered and I am pretty certain my team would like to have been able to say they had found what was eating me and maybe point the way for future investigations. This time though it was not to be.

Although I have been allowed out, I am not in the clear just yet.

Physically I feel fine although I have become far to used to frequent napping and need to wean myself off of that particular luxury. I do not ache and I can breathe normally. There is however a 'marker' in blood tests that can show whether the body is succumbing to infection. CRP or C-reactive Protein is made in the liver and its level in the blood rises in response to inflammation mainly at the site of infection. The normal level for CRP is "up to 10" my level is currently 116.

The argument is then that there is still a significant source of infection in me and there is a strong possibility that, now I am off of the intravenous antibiotics and bumming around at home, it will slowly cause me to exhibit more symptoms to the point where I have to readmit myself to hospital. At which time they will culture everything and begin treatment once they have put a name to my pain.

There is the more optimistic possibility that my CRP will continue to drop. That no infection will rear its ugly head, and that given a week or so I will feel more confident that I am not going to relapse and I'll start looking forward to things rather than dreaming of blood tests, hospital food, and cannulas in my arm.

I need this infection not to happen again as time is now very tight. Fourteen days from today I am going to be a father and I would dearly like to be welcoming my offspring into the world as a normal human being rather than a fellow inpatient.

We cannot have all three of us in hospital pj's at the same time. That would just look silly. Although if it happens I will post a photo.