After

After the district nurse left ( 2pm ) mum wanted to go out.
So we did. Mum, Rob and myself  dawdled down the sunlit road coming to a halt at the Faith Hope and Charity shop on Ashingdon Road.
After a quick look around mum wanted to leave. (I bought a 50p scarf, very William Morris)
It was obvious the expedition was too much for her. So after a quick nip into the Co-Op for juice and spring onions we went home.
And within minutes she was asleep.

I admire her tenacity but I think she's taking this determination to carry on as normal a tad too far. It simply exhausts her. It defeats her. She hasn't been out of hospital long and there she is out and about wearing a camel coat and no socks.
Her resolve borders on madness.
But I can't deny that it's her madness that's keeping her going

Despite lengthy chats about the wisdom of acceptance we always come to the same conclusion. Namely she will not accept that her life has irrevocably changed. And that for her to go back three years to the time when she was well is impossible.
But my God how this woman fights.
Fights to maintain dignity by refusing help from carers associations. ( " My daughter does things for me" )
Fights to maintain her home which is, I'm relieved to say, a fight she's now almost prepared to give up.. Not though without constant consideration. Her home, she says, is what gives her hope. But even she now realises that the dream of returning is made of dust.

She has, in the past few days, reluctantly and sadly agreed to end her tenancy, but she has said and done this before so I'm taking everything mum says with a pinch of salt.
I can't blame her for wanting to hold on to the home she shared with dad but at the same time clinging to it is holding her back. By hanging on to the keys she's denying herself any hope of starting afresh.
Afresh? Sounds rather silly doesn't it? A terminally ill woman kick starting a brand new life with her daughter and son-in-law in a quaint place she doesn't particularly like and which holds no real interest for her.
I've done my best to make clear to her that life is here. Not the life she wants,  I know, I understand that, but going home, back to London is impossible.
So if she's the sensible woman I think she is, she'll ditch the clanging noise and exorbitant prices of London living and agree to become an all singing, all swearing Essex girl...

As for me. I'm pooped. Exhausted. What's keeping me upright I don't know. From morn till night my life is put away, in a cupboard, and a robotic me dances wearily and tearily to mum's never ending tune.
She can't go to the bathroom now. An indignity too far as far as mum is concerned. An intolerable and expensive round of ladies paper underwear unwrapped and flying over the bed sheets.
It's good I've discovered my businesslike no nonsense side otherwise I'd be clawing the walls.


I've recorded Masterchef because it takes along time to get mum sorted and settled this time of night.
And I'd like to watch it calmly without having to run for the unperfumed washlets every ten minutes!