Monday

My ability to judge where Mum was in her Sleepy/Active cycle let me down utterly this time around. I’d thought that she was at or near Peak Active Mum yesterday and thought the chances she’d be asleep today were pretty good.

She wasn’t.

Recent cycles have been compressed and a bit jumbled up with characteristics that used to only appear in different distinct phases suddenly appearing together or out of sequence.

I found her laying flat out on her bed, totally immobile, staring at the ceiling and muttering under her breath. My  first impression was that she was completely delirious.

Mum did respond to me greeting her I but had absolutely no confidence that she knew who I was at all.

With me there her muttering got a little louder but it was still entirely indistinct. I was able to work out that she was talking to her Other People though. And there were lots of them – floating around and above both of us.

Occasionally, one of them would float away from us towards the door.

“Where’s he going!?”

“I don’t know Mum, but I wouldn’t worry about it. They know where you are and they’re likely to be back soon. And if they aren’t then they’re big enough and ugly enough to take care of themselves out there.”

“Yeah”

Not so long ago, I’d have been able to understand enough of what Mum was saying to stay in or even lead the conversation. Not today. I couldn’t even tell when she’d asked a question until she’d say “WELL!!??”.

Eventually she got exasperated with my lack of acceptable answers. In the days when I could understand some of what she was saying, this would be the point where she’d say “It’s like I’m talking to meself here”.

My guess is that she said something similar today.

“If I’m getting on your nerves Mum, I can go you know.”

“Yeah”

Mum asked for a cup of tea. It was delivered by a familiar figure. Al had told me that he was transferring from the last home but this was the first time I’d seen him since. I put out my hand to shake his but he came straight in for a hug.

“Al!! Am I pleased to see you!”

“Me too Big Man! How are you?”

I like Al. A lot. He asked how Mum was doing. I explained that the regular weekly pattern hadn’t settled down yet and I was concerned that the longer periods where she was too sleepy to eat or drink weren’t doing her any good.

“Well, she ate a good breakfast and all her lunch and she’s drinking like nobody’s business.”

“She ate lunch!? Wow!”

He told me he’d asked her how Nick was earlier today.

“Well, he comes and goes…” she’d said.

“Who’s that!?” Mum asked.

“It’s Al. He’s brought you a nice cup of tea.”

“Don’t want it”

I dd get her to drink some though and offered to read while I was helping her.

“If you have to”

She didn’t stop talking once while I was reading. It was that sort of visit.

I left her talking to her Other People. At least they were making her laugh. 

Bibliography

Tales from the Parish: 31 humorous short stories about community, family and village life, set in the English countryside

Kindle Edition

by Stefania Hartley

Author’s Note

My Mum is in a nursing home in a small village in the Thames Valley. The photo is not of the home. I used an AI image generator to give the reader some idea of the home she’s in.

All, some or maybe even none (you’ll never know!) of the names have been changed to protect privacy and hide real identities. If you think you recognise someone then let me know and I’ll edit the post or remove it entirely