Fifty

But not quite as I had planned!

This week I am celebrating the publication of my fiftieth newsletter and a whole year of writing here on Substack. A year ago when I wrote that times were changing as I made the move to abandon my old blog and newsletter and instead start writing here, I wasn’t sure how long I would continue or what the future would hold, but if I could sum up my year of writing it would be as follows:

·      After a whole year I know that it definitely feels good to be writing regularly again.

·      What feels even better is to know that you are reading. I had missed that connection with readers, and I love that you are here.

·      I have discovered that I enjoy writing about all sorts of things, not only my art but about artists, exhibitions, places I have visited, knitting, sewing, gardening, my allotment, and cooking amongst many other things. Life really!

·      From week to week I mostly have no idea what I will write about, but trust that something will occur to me before the week is up.

·      I’m not entirely sure where all this is heading but while I’m still enjoying the writing process I will carry on.

Enjoying early morning walks

In the past year I have only missed writing for two weeks and both of those times were planned. Once when we were away on holiday in September, and I also took a short break over Christmas. Last week I almost missed writing again when we were thrust into a family emergency. Two days before my Mum was due to have a pacemaker fitted she collapsed with a heart attack, which ironically would probably not have happened if she had had the pacemaker. I found her semi-conscious collapsed on the floor, cold, distressed and confused. After nearly 24 hours in A & E resus, she was moved to a cardiac ward where she stayed for five days waiting for her condition to stabilise. She was then moved to a ward for elderly patients and today as I write she is finally having her pacemaker fitted. Sadly all the moving about (six different beds in as many days), being constantly questioned and never by the same person has left her very confused and her cognitive decline has been marked, apparently not unusual in elderly patients following a hospital stay. But despite the cheerful doctor telling me this morning she could probably go home tomorrow*, it is abundantly clear that home is the last place where she is going to be safe and so in between daily hospital visiting we have also been looking at care options. And when I haven’t been doing that, it feels like I am constantly updating all the friends and relatives who understandably want to know how she is getting on.  Meanwhile the dog still needs walking, meals still need to be made, we had to find time to vote, we even managed to celebrate my birthday and life goes on. Sadly with all the rain, my beautiful allotment plot now looks like a jungle, but I know I can’t do everything. It has been quite the week. I wasn’t prepared for just how exhausted I would feel, physically as well as emotionally.

Produce from my allotment jungle!

Whilst Mum has had some moments of being terribly sad, which has been heart breaking as we held hands and cried, we have also managed to laugh quite a bit this week… and cringe too when she told one humourless consultant she would kick her up the bum if she hurt her leg again. On the positive side, it has prompted the decision to move Mum to full time care which she has needed, but over which we have been dithering, for quite some time. It has been one of the most difficult things I have had to do but I take comfort from the fact that she seems happy with this decision. I take comfort too that she has absolutely no memory of collapsing, lying on the floor for hours nor our blue light trip in an ambulance just over a week ago.

So last week I didn’t think I could write at all, because even if I could find the time I was emotionally spent. Then I thought maybe I should at least pen a few lines to explain why I wasn’t putting out my usual newsletter. But when I sat down to write I found that instead I was writing about church kneelers and canvas work embroidery. And the process of writing and thinking about something else totally unconnected to anything I was going through, proved to be an excellent distraction and in many ways cathartic in what was a very difficult week. Yet another reason to keep on writing.

*Update

Mum’s pacemaker was successfully fitted, and she is well, however what followed was a complete fiasco. I can honestly say that pretty much every health professional who has dealt with Mum over the past ten days has been wonderful, with the exception maybe of the aforementioned consultant. But despite the care given to Mum by individuals, the admin around her discharge has been totally inept. You really couldn’t make it up!

The morning following her operation, a doctor said she could be discharged that afternoon, so calls were made, and things put in place so she could be transferred to the care home. I was told I could go home, and I would be called when she was ready. By 4.30 I hadn’t heard anything, so I called the ward to discover the morning doctor had failed to communicate with anyone else and a different doctor had only just authorised her discharge. They were now waiting for her medication. A couple more phone calls later and I was told they would have her medication by 6 pm and we could collect her between 6.30 and 7. We waited until 7 just to be sure, only to arrive and be told her medication still hadn’t appeared and there was no one in the pharmacy, but we could get mum dressed ready to leave. Another hour or so later when there was still no sign of meds, a nurse called the care home to see if they would take her without them. Understandably they said no, so the nurse passed them to me hoping I would convince them… no way, they were right she couldn’t leave hospital without them. When the medication eventually arrived (having been sent to the wrong ward) it was too late for her to be admitted to the home but by now the nurses wanted her to go as everything was in place for her discharge. When I refused to take her there was a conflab (four nurses huddled round a laptop) and a matron was called, who blatantly lied to try and get us to take her by telling us the care home were going charge us for that night. (They weren’t and they didn’t) I don’t think she expected me to say that I didn’t care about the money it was only Mum’s welfare that was important… I got Mum back into a nightie ready for bed and we left.

This morning they couldn’t wait for us to take her, papers were signed and ready and all her belongings stuffed into a plastic bag, while Mum was still sitting there in her nightie and hospital socks! Whilst getting her dressed ready to leave I noticed there was no dressing on her wound despite being told the dressing needed to stay in place for seven days. I suspect Mum removed it although she denies this, however the nurse on duty this morning thought it was okay for her to leave with a raw undressed wound. When I showed him the paperwork he agreed it needed to be covered and went off to find a new dressing. Twenty minutes later we were still waiting. I could have driven off to Boots the Chemist and bought another dressing quicker! Eventually we left, fresh dressing in place and Mum has been settled into her new room in her new home just in time for fish and chips for lunch… her favourite. Although not before we discovered on her discharge papers, that my name was down as Jennifer and my Dad was listed as her next of kin along with my phone number, despite him having died twelve years ago, and Mum had someone else’s discharge papers in with her own. Goodness knows how long that poor lady will have to wait before they let her go home! I know our NHS is critically underfunded, but lack of money does not explain the inefficiency and incompetence in administration that we have experienced over the past 24 hours.

Mum settling into her new home

Rant over… Mum is well, seems happy and settled and hopefully our life can also settle back to some sort of normality. I might just need a nap first though! Rest assured I will be back next week and no, I haven’t a clue what I will be writing about, but I trust the process and know that something will occur to me. However I do have a little favour to ask before I go. If you enjoy reading my weekly thoughts and musings can you just press on the little heart below this essay? You don’t have to leave a comment or send me an email (although I really do like it when you do) just press ‘like’ because it would be totally brilliant to get 50 likes for my 50^th post. Thank you!

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