(Or “Another Sunday and sweet F.A.”) Last time we reached the end of week eleven and day 77 of this saga. Three more days and we could have gone around the world with Phileas Fogg and might possibly have felt that we’d achieved much more by doing that. Instead the dreary round of waiting for test results and trudging out into the night with my pockets laden with cheese and sweeties trundles on...
FEB 13 2011
Mum rings 8.15AM on Sunday morning to ask whether I’m visiting today, because the GMF has cried off citing his bad back and general unwellness. Mum’s neighbour in the next bed has been told she can return to her nursing home tomorrow, and, as mum quite reasonably asked when something similar was going to be said to her, she was told that her blood is still not balanced and so we start week twelve in much the same situation as we headed into week eleven.
Spent much of the day battling the twin demons of exhaustion and depression and not too successfully, before heading out in the driving rain to sit in traffic for an hour on my way to make an afternoon visit. I stayed just over an hour and kept it friendly. The GMF had briefly popped in with flowers from Church but he was gone before I arrived, and I spent a little time reminiscing over tales of travel and worrying about mum’s much neglected feet. Considering as a diabetic she is supposed to have them examined every month, it seems slightly disturbing to me that she has been in hospital for nearly three months and, despite it being mentioned fairly frequently, they have not been looked at. The standard response is that “Podiatry have no available appointments” apparently, but surely that doesn’t stop somebody just looking, does it? Or indeed booking an appointment...? I had a look and they didn’t look great to me, but then I’m not a medical professional. Anyway, the hour was friendly enough and we parted amicably with me promising to return tomorrow.
Mum leaves a message on the answerphone as we’ve just settled down to eat to the effect that she’s seen a slight but encouraging improvement in some of her more personal problems, which is definitely a cause for some small celebration.
FEB 14 2011
Mum rings just as the toast pops up out of the toaster (her timing is impeccable) to tell me that she’s already been told that she won’t be going home today, although the lady in the next bed is. Mum has already had blood taken away for testing this morning but seems fairly philosophical about the whole matter.
One hour and forty minutes later she rings me and tells me that she might be heading home today and has no recollection whatsoever of her earlier call to me telling me the exact opposite. Apparently the doctor has been round and thinks that she’s pretty much well enough to go and I will be getting my orders from the hospital (no matter what else I might have to do) fairly soon, no doubt. The baton is being handed over to her G.P. apparently, who will have to readmit her if the problems return.
She also mentions a visit “one afternoon recently” by mysterious doctor from the kidney clinic which is the first time she has mentioned this to me, but she might have to attend his out-patient’s clinic.
Sis then rings and tells me that she’s on her way, despite my suggestions that this may well be another false dawn and I’m now incapable of positive thinking any more. “Jumping the gun” is the phrase that most springs to mind here, but she’s got sick of just waiting to come and a nursing sister on the ward has assured her that mum’s release is “imminent”.
Mum rings at lunchtime to tell me that she’s heard nothing else (did we ever really expect that she would?) but the GMF, in his vast experience of these matters, thinks she’ll be released either at teatime or bedtime. Mind you, the GMF is feeling pretty unwell himself today, apparently. Another call from mum at 4.10PM tells me that the Social Services have “just” been informed that mum is ready to go home, and so, as it takes time to get things in place, as expected there is unlikely to be any chance of her going home today. Sis rings not long after that to say she’s now “up north” although it might yet prove to be pointlessly.
I head out alone for another hospital visit and it’s just me and mum alone with her cheese craving until sis “surprisingly” appears about ten minutes later which jollies things along and we have a jokey moment over mum’s memory which is actually quite a light way of addressing a rather serious worry. Things remain happy enough, right until mum tells me that the GMF thinks that I should have “kicked up a fuss” because she hasn’t been sent home yet (in his considered medical opinion, obviously). Whilst I seethe over that, the knife is twisted again because when I tell her not to worry about the food she has in the flat until she’s actually back there, “This is how he is!” my sister gets told. I notice that immediately after this, mum then actually listens to my sister as she tells her precisely the same things that I’ve been saying, so that makes me feel as if whenever I try to be helpful it is just my jaw flapping, but when the GMF and sis speak, they obviously impart great wisdom.
I feel special.
Sis goes off to talk to the same nurse who told her mum would definitely be home tomorrow who now adds (after her 320 mile drive to be here for it) “…or possibly Wednesday.” I leave sis to listen to mum complain about me (“You can bitch about me for five minutes” as I put it in my most eloquent way...) and go to get another TV card, and the rest of the visit is relatively incident free apart from the “don’t bring me a load of fresh fruit” complaint about my planned “on-release” shopping trip for perishables which, on top of my notions of finding some alternative healthier snacking options, doesn’t fill me with confidence that I’m likely to be able to get anything right, no matter what I do.
Sis and I have a quick post-visit car park conference which fills in the details of the “bitching session” i.e. “Why am I like that about the GMF?” (because the sun shines out of his backside whilst I’m all that’s scuzzy in the universe, apparently) and we discuss my fears over possible kitchen fires in the flat and whether I shouldn’t attend tomorrow, release notwithstanding.
I can tell how wound up I still am because I very nearly crash the car as I leave the hospital. When I get home the beloved is annoyed on my behalf - and suggests that I need to come up with more assertive responses to my mother’s “ways” for my future happiness and well-being - and I then ring sis, ostensibly to see that she got into the flat okay, but also for more discussion about our various woes and issues.
Are we about to reach the final chapter of our tedious tale? My sister is now waiting in mum’s flat, and mum is due for an “imminent” release into an unsuspecting world. Can anything possibly still go wrong to stop her from going home? Have we finally reached the beginning of the end of our sorry little saga? Stay tuned!
No comments:
Post a Comment