Renovation project - How much does it cost to see a doctor in France?

Renovation project - How much does it cost to see a doctor in France?

We wake up and go to check the new roof on the shed, it is almost waterproof, John needs to add another coat of the specialist water proofer that he has bought, this should be done in dry weather but unfortunately in Brittany during the winter this is not always possible, it is not raining at the moment, but who knows how long this will last.

He covers the roof with the liquid rubber and we cross our fingers for the rest of the day!

Our garden now looks like a bomb site and as it is still dry, John starts to build a fire for all the rotten wood.

It really feels like we have taken a massive step backwards as the garden was looking OK, now it doesn’t, but this is something we have started to get used to now and I am not panicking as much as I used to when this happened, I am also trying not to look at it as I am a big believer in what I can’t see can’t hurt me, so if I can’t see the garden looks like a bomb site then I can picture in my head what I want it to look like.

To avoid the garden I am now sanding the floors in the back bedroom, bathroom and the hallway. This is much easier than the top floor as most of this floor is new.

However it still takes a couple of days to sand all of it and then give it all 3 coats of stain and a couple of coats of varnish, it looks so different once it is finished.

I still have the large window sills to complete but to make life easier I am going to do these once the floors are dry.

But as I am in the bedroom and look out of the window I can see the entire garden, I can see Edith and Amelie (our sheep) who seem to be looking quite surprised at the fact that they can now see me! I never realised that sheep could look surprised, but believe me they do!

It has been more back breaking work for a number of days and on a positive note, and this really keeps me going, I have lost some more weight, I fit into even more of my old clothes, there really is a silver lining to everything (I think the fact that we are also not drinking any wine because of Johns antibiotics may be helping!)

I forgot to say that we had been to the doctors, this was because we couldn’t get into the dentist for Johns abscess, the doctor in our village is fantastic, she is a Romanian woman who speaks fantastic English, and for all the English people out there, you will now feel very jealous, the surgery is open until  7.30 pm and on Saturdays, she also does home visits and when you want an appointment you can often get one on the same day or the following day, we do love the French health system!

We spend a good while with the doctor (appointments can happily last for half an hour!) and she prescribes antibiotics, ibuprofen and paracetemol. There is a sign on her desk with the price for the consultation (23 euro’s) we can now claim this back, once the UK National Insurance sends our S1 forms over. We collect the antibiotics but do not bother with the other medications as we always buy a big supply of these whenever we visit the UK (you really can’t beat the UK pound shops!)

So this is why we have a week with no wine, and to be honest we both feel so much better for it (and no I am not just trying to convince myself!)