Monday

No calls overnight from The Home. That had to be a good thing. Right? I’d found it remarkably easy not to worry in spite of the way Mum was last night.

Found another email from my dentist reminding me that it’s way past time to book an appointment. It’s probably worth explaining the significance of that as there’s more to it than meets the eye.

My last visit had been in November and it would’ve made sense to book the next appointment on my way out of that one. But I didn’t. That’s happened before and the reason it happened was because I didn’t feel in sufficient control of my time to commit to doing something that wasn’t consuming me. I think there’s a fair measure of guilt attached to committing to doing something that wasn’t what I thought I was supposed to be doing.

The first time that something would’ve been my job. Last November it would’ve been parental care and support.

The other hidden significance was revealed by getting a second reminder. I’d been unable to pick up my phone and make the call after the first one.

Both of these hidden significances are at or near the top of my list of Mental Health Red Flags. I know from previous run-ins with depression that recognising that is more than half the battle.

Time to do something about it. I just need to work out what.

In the meantime, Lesley made the call for me. She warned me that I was likely to have to wait months for an appointment until she was told there were back-to-back appointments with a hygienist and then Chris this afternoon due to cancellations. Either parents had realised they’d booked something at the start of the school holidays and had gone away instead or I was the beneficiary of the new COVID strain that everyone round here seems to have.

Actually, when I say they were back-to-back, they weren’t quite. There was a five minute gap as I wasn’t due to see Chris until 2:35. Not fixing an appointment for two-thirty is probably a dentist’s idea of a joke. No? Tooth-hurty? Never mind…

Chris has been my dentist for years. He and his team are as good for my mental health as they are for my dental health. As usual, I left feeling less burdened.

 And so, from the dentist, I headed straight to Mum.

I thought I’d go directly to her room to see how she was for myself before I spoke to anyone. She was sleeping peacefully as if nothing had happened.

It looked to me as if Mum had just gone from an Active phase into a Sleepy one. At some stage she’d been active enough to kick her sheet off but by the time I got there she was mostly unresponsive and going deeper. At one point she rubbed her arms as if she was cold. I pulled her sheet up under her chin and over her shoulders.

“Is that better Mum?”

A very weak nod was as lively as she got.

I was about to leave her when there was a knock at the door. The visitor introduced himself as the “Activities Lead”.

I looked him, then at Mum in her full-on Unresponsive hypoactive delirium, then back at him and laughed out loud.

“Activities!!?? Are you sure you’ve come to the right room!?”

He didn’t take offence and stayed to talk for the best part of an hour.

“You won’t get her to take part in any group activity you know. We tried that before she was ill and she flatly refused.”

“That’s OK. Most residents are like that. They just want someone to talk to them or just listen to them talk.”

“Ah, like Audrey and Eleanor. All they want is not to be ignored, to be taken seriously and to be shown a bit of respect.”

“Exactly.”

Whatever the night shift had done to ease Mum’s cough it didn’t warrant a mention in their records. The assumption is that it cleared as spontaneously and mysteriously as it had appeared. My guess is that she came to enough to realise she had to swallow rather than talk.

I felt confident in thinking that Mum would be asleep tomorrow too so providing there are no calls tonight there’ll be no visit tomorrow.

I’ll be taking a Mental Health Day.

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