Sunday, June 2nd, 2013
Ah... Sunday...! The crack of leather on willow, the soft scraping of trowels upon compost, the sun shining in the sky and, yet again, I find myself dragging myself out of the house to make another visit to the hospital.
Mum's mid-morning phone message had bordered upon the tetchy, as I wasn't in a position to make it to the phone before it cut across to the message recording service. It was in three parts: Bring some nail scissors; How enjoyable the HUGE bag of Milky Bar Buttons had been; and, as an afterthought, that she doesn't expect me to bring stuff for her every time...
Oh yeah...? Still, having stopped in at the supermarket on the way, I decided to drive over and pay for car parking, and, after doing this, I concealed another family sized bag of buttons about my person, grabbed mum's clean washing and headed inside for another jolly visit, in which I would briefly serve as a manicurist.
Mum was waiting in her chair (although this would change before I left), and immediately asked if I'd bought her any more sweets. I lied and said that I hadn't, simply because I really need to get across to her how important that it is for her not to splurge on these things. I hid the new bag in her drawer for her to find later on, but this obsession with sweets to help pass the time is a familiar topic from before her stroke and, along with the grumpiness, probably indicates that she's either feeling a lot better, or that another incident might be imminent.
There's a good sign in that she has attempted a crossword from her puzzle book, but more familar old subjects are seeping into the conversation. The fact that I don't buy my beloved jewellery for Christmas is an old one, because "she'll need something to remember me by..." because trinkets are, in her opinion, far more memorable than a few fond memories. We've disagreed about this on several occasions, and will no doubt continue to do so. Her other obsession was about "dying quickly" and that she should not be resuscitated, because, apparently, the fact that my sister and I had to deal with all of this when she was "dying" six weeks ago is something that we might have forgotten the details of...
Still, she seems eager for me to go, not accepting that spending time with her might be as important to me as spending time with anyone else, but, as I consider the possibility that she might be right, and I think about going, we start to have a row. "A MAN!!!" dared to use one of the patient's toilets and she feels almost compelled to interfere and grass him up to the nurses for this blatant breach of "THE RULES!!!" I ask her to just leave well alone, but she refuses and, as we argue about this (because the nurses find this kind of stuff "helpful" apparently...), a full-blown old-style Holmesian row is averted by the arrival of one of mum's church friends and, after exchanging some pleasantries, I leave them to it.
The difficulty that I am left to mull over as I exasperatedly head back towards the car is this: She is either obviously getting better if she's starting to kick off like this or... well, last time the seizures began shortly after she'd fallen out with another patient over some other perceived breach of THE RULES!!!
Here, as they say, we go again, I fear...
Monday, June 3rd, 2013
Monday's call is delayed until well into the afternoon, at about 4.00pm and after mum has had a visitor (huzzah!) and long after the doctor's rounds. Today there was apparently much talk of reintroducing the Warfarin (which apparently started) and pushing more Magnesium, both of which will need to be sorted before mum is finally discharged and sent home because "she doesn't want to find herself being readmitted two days later..." although it does seem to indicate that there is now a possible glint of light at the end of this particular tunnel.
A call to my sister during the evening is interesting, as she had been left a message by mum that she hadn't been able to decipher, and had consequently rung the ward to ask them to keep an eye on her, only to be told that "she's fine" which, as we know, we'd heard before. Interesting, however, that she was having the same "been there before" thoughts that I had, and the symptoms seemed very familiar to her, too...
Tuesday, June 4th, 2013
Apropos of nothing much at all, the talk on Radio Four as I drive into work this morning is all about the problems in the NHS caused by "Bed Blocking..."
After a long, hot and completely stressful day at work and afterwards, I reluctantly drive to the hospital once again having also been in trouble over an "unwise" purchase which had arrived at home today. The car park contained a "gobby" person mouthing off about something or other and did little to lift my spirits.
It turns out to be a long hour, with tales of "upset tummies" and doctor's visits to put in yet another cannula for yet another fluid drip. There was talk of "high doses" of Warfarin finally being started despite mum's lack of real knowledge of the actual dosing levels involved, although she claimed to have world-wide knowledge of the colouring system for these things, and she troubled a passing nurse to give her more answers, although he claimed that the dosage was based upon the bloods he'd taken from her himself.
But it was one of those evenings where mum decided that she knew best about everything (an attitude that I very quickly can get very sick of...) and I ought to have known better and kept my trap shut, even though the menu for tomorrow did actually have her ticking the box marked "cabbage" for once...
My own value as a visitor was quickly put into perspective by tales of the church minister having visited and how he'd said he valued her calls asking about his sick wife. My own home life, and our eating habits seem, apparently, very weird in comparison, apparently, and this critical approach to talking to me does not improve matters when it becomes apparent that the ward are very much preparing her to go home soon and my attempts to discuss methods of managing her problems, her perception of time passing, whether or not what has actually happened to get her admitted these five or six times happened they way I believe they did actually did, and a few other matters, all kinds of explodes in my face in a way that seems to make mum very upset and worried and, whilst I hope that we've cleared the air about it before I go, I suspect that events will be much brooded upon, because sometimes she no longer seems capable of understanding that I'm not necessarily discussing things that are happening right now, but events from the past or even possibly in the future...
So, I suppose that it just turned out to be one of those days in my life when I couldn't get anything right, but at least, when I get home, I discover that other visitors are planning to go and see her over the next couple of days and they'll probably have a better time of it so I don't have to.
Unless they send mum home, of course...
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