Loosing Track

I have to admit I'm loosing track. I can't remember who I've told what about Mum's progress (or not) and when I was at the Cancer Support Centre yesterday, someone suggested starting a blog. It means that anyone who wants to know can check in online and read about what's been happening. Simple but effective, hopefully. Hope you don't mind, but my normally reliable memory is faltering and this means I keep forgetting who I need to get up to speed on the latest news. Perhaps this will be a solution for my leaking brain.

So somewhere along the line I became the sad person that others can compare themselves to and say "At least I'm not having as bad a time as Kate!". A dead dog, dead Dad, dead cat, Mum with cancer, dog that hated husband and had to be returned and diabetic cat that keeps having hypos later, it turns out Mum's cancer is inoperable. The tumour in the oesophagus is too near to the aorta, making a risky operation nigh on impossible.

Mum has been in hospital for nearly nine weeks. There has been an awful lot of hospital visiting, an awful lot and I am very tired. We await an appointment with the oncologist to see what the plan is next. As Mum said, she will just have to keep going like Dad did, which is a fine sentiment under the circumstances. It is an underestimation to say that Dad engaged with his care when he had cancer, a PE, nephrectomy, subdural haemorrhage and chemo, and was positive throughout.

Today has been spent in a pre-discharge whirlwind of Mum being sent home from hospital. The short version of the day is that first there was going to be care input for her at home, then there wasn't and then there was again. Mum has called me, six, maybe seven times today and even threatened self-discharge (handy). One time she wanted to know if I had a lightbulb, as her bedside lamp wasn't working. I've also spoken to Social Services (twice), someone delivering all the equipment for her house, someone fitting a personal alarm and done an online food shop. Now Mum has her stent in, it was actually tricky trying to work out what she could and couldn't eat. In the end I flipped a bit and told Mum to stop phoning. When I arrived for visiting this evening, the Sister on the ward thought Mum "not being very happy" during the afternoon was hilarious for some reason. Hilarious? Not. Pending all sorts of different assessments, Mum will actually have four visits from care staff a day. Hallelujah!