Friday

Lesley’s dad looked a lot better today than he looked yesterday. He’s still taking the paracetamol though.

“Are you in pain Dad?

“Not now. But I was earlier”

The positives we can take are that he isn’t taking them unnecessarily just as part of a new routine and he’s still able to manage the pain with paracetamol. But it does mean that he’s waking up in pain more often than not now and it may be as often as nearly every day.

It’s hard to tell how often he’s in pain.

If he thinks the person asking will worry about him being in pain then he’ll say he’s fine.

If he thinks the pain isn’t any worse than the day before then he’ll say he’s fine.

If he thinks the person asking might say he needs to be whisked off to hospital to be prodded, poked and generally messed about with or, even worse, kept in, then he’ll say he’s fine.

The palliative care team have said that as the pain gets worse he’ll need help getting through the night because the pain will disturb him. He’ll have to remember – or be reminded – to take a painkiller before he goes to bed. We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it.

When I got to Mum I found her to be more awake than she was yesterday but not as awake as I’d expected.

I told her about my day. How we walked The Dog early because it was going to get so hot. How The Dog’s behaviour has suddenly taken another huge step forward and she’s become far less reactive to strangers – in fact she’s going up to them expecting a treat, a cuddle or both. How the key is her taking a cue from us – if we stand and talk to anybody while we’re out then The Dog assumes that they’re Friendlies and not Hostiles and she treats them accordingly. How prior to this The Dog treated everyone as a probable Hostile and lunged at them. How the new Friendlies who knew The Dog when we first got her are flattered and delighted to be treated as Friendlies. And how Lesley went to do a supermarket shop and one of the bottles of milk had a faulty seal. She got home to find two pints of milk sloshing around in the boot of the car.

“Obviously, I had to clean up the mess!”

“But it wasn’t your fault”

“No Mum, I know it wasn’t. But in our house there are Blue Jobs and there are Pink Jobs and cleaning a car is a Blue Job.”

Fortunately, the interior of the boot on Lesley’s car is all removeable so I was able to take it out, wash it and hose it down. It would all be dry in a couple of hours in this heat.

There weren’t many drinks in the queue on Mum’s table. Just a couple of tired looking milkshakes that had been there long enough to start to separate. I asked if she wanted a fresh drink and she said she wouldn’t mind. I got her to drink a whole cup of apple juice with no effort whatsoever. She was gasping and possibly a little dehydrated because she perked up very slightly after having a drink.

She asked if I had any stories to read but that was really all she said apart from calling out for Uncle Tony when her stomach pains started. That’s normal for Mum on the first day of a cycle when she’s eaten ‘properly’. It told me she didn’t eat anything substantial yesterday. If that was the case then the last day she would have eaten anything substantial was Monday. That’s not good.

As I read to her she drifted in and out of sleep. In comparison to yesterday she was less uncomfortable and less uncooperative but still just as unhappy. The aura of quiet resignation to how she was and where she was was strong today.

While I had been in the kitchen organising Mum’s drink, Eleanor had been there asking about food for her Little Ones.

“I know your Little Ones aren’t getting enough to eat Eleanor but what do you think of the grub here?”

“Oh, I don’t eat anything. I’ve got no appetite.”

“Take a few turns round the garden. The fresh air and the exercise will soon get you feeling hungry”

“No. Not interested”

Her confusion was quite bad today. She was in transit between the kitchen and the new lounge and back again the whole time I was talking to Mum. She did the trip so often she became disoriented. She lost track of where she was, where she needed to go, where her soft toys – her Little Ones – were, where to get help and she had become separated from her walking frame. All she was certain of was that she needed to get out and get home. Between chapters, I popped out into the corridor.

“Are you alright Eleanor? Where’s your frame gone?”

“I don’t know. I just want to get out. And The Babies haven’t had anything to eat yet. They’re starving!”

“OK. Well, first things first. Let’s get you safe. I’ll find your frame and then we can work out what to do next.”

A carer emerged from the lounge with her frame and watched the conversation.

“Right. That’s that sorted. What’s next?”

“My babies. I don’t know where they’ve gone.”

“Aren’t they in your room?”

We were standing outside her room. She’d passed it each time she’d gone between the kitchen and the lounge.

“Isn’t that them in there?”

“Yeah. Some of them”

“I think there’s something else missing”

“What’s that?”

“Your smile”

She turned her head away to hide her face.

“Have you found it?”

She nodded.

“That’s good.”

“Help me out of here. I want to go home.”

“There’s no point asking me about how to get out of here. I’ve got no idea. I’m as daft as a brush me.”

“Are you!? So am I!”

“Anyway, I think you need to rest first. You’ve been on your feet a long time now. Shall we find you a seat somewhere?”

We got Eleanor into the lounge and in doing so I had to walk past Audrey. She completely blanked me. Didn’t seem to know who I was at all.

Had the hot weather left them all a bit dehydrated and confused?

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