From ‘Pain in the Arse’ to Peace of Mind - part 1

The time I faked a stomach ache and got an appendectomy for my trouble

By the time that I was 11, my mouth had landed me in more trouble than I could count - and once even led me to a surgeon’s operating table. At school I just couldn’t keep quiet or stop myself from talking back.

“He’s a pain in the arse” was how one teacher described me in one still fresh-in-the-memory end of term report card. I was continually being told to leave the classroom, or hauled up in front of the headmaster. I’m fairly sure that if I hadn’t been somewhat academic and sporty, I would have been booted out.

On one occasion, I couldn’t find my homework and got in a flap about the possibility of being given another detention. Rather than face that prospect, and my parents getting wind of it, I told the teacher that I had a stomach ache. That set off a chain of unfortunate events I could not have foreseen.