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Having taken up Tai-Chi as the inevitable next step after receiving promotional material from SAGA about stair lifts and cheap life insurance, I had just about got the hang of it after a couple of weeks.
I arrived at class, late and flustered and, as I scurried in, distractedly noted that it seemed to have doubled in number of participants. I scooted into my normal safe space in the middle as they warmed up and prepared to follow my usual method of making it up and copying my neighbour when in doubt.
The first two forms went perfectly and then the class turned right in unison. As I rotated I was confronted with a wall of eyes watching me. With mounting panic, it dawned on me that the extra people were new attendees who had come to watch an established class to see how it should be done. I found myself alone, at the front of the remaining class with everyone else, including the instructor, seamlessly Tai-Chi-ing behind me.
Eeek.

Cartoonishly entertaining morning.
Woken at 0200 by distressed daughter climbing into bed with me. She’d heard a scrabbling noise, switched on her phone torch and come face to face with a teeny tiny mouse on her bed, looking at her. She scarpered, shutting the door behind her. I was a bit sleepy and didn’t really register her story until I woke at 7am.
Then spent the next two hours systematically dismantling her room (including bed and chest of drawers) in an effort to humanely capture the little blighter and search for any nest/mousehole hidden under the piles of teenage detritus which had accumulated in all corners and under every possible free space.
Eventually after a prolonged and predictable Tom and Jerry chase, I ended up (sorry folks) resorting to that well recognised, but usually only inadvertently utilised, small domestic mammal trap otherwise known as a Dyson.
Very effective, if you must know.

People watching at Mum and Dad’s care home. A selection of bodies, some robust and still with youthful vigour, others variously faded, with the whisper of their previous selves. A few cheerfully rude, wonderfully naughty and flirty nonagenarian men. Stooped and meandering ladies with the bits of themselves they can see in the mirror carefully groomed, wonkily lipsticked and powdered, but the hair on the backs of their heads conducting a rebellious, anti-gravity experiment. Glimpses of their previous pride, beauty and vanity as they shuffle forwards in their heels, clutching their matching handbags and patting down their coiffure.
I followed Mum and Dad down to supper as she held on to the the back of his electric wheelchair and he guided her down the corridor, gently and repeatedly ricocheting his wheels off doorways, bits of furniture and other residents.
Now sitting in my brother’s back garden with a chilled glass of rose contemplating the long haul back home with the truck packed full of stuff, some sentimental and much wanted, some useless garbage and many, many memories from my folks’, now sold and cleared, house.

Last full day here and Dad looking much better. Still a way to go and not quite sorted yet.

Things I have discovered over the last two weeks:

Parenting ones parents is rewarding.

Dementia, once the fear and anger have dissipated, offers enormous capacity for joy, fun and hilarity – and breathtaking rudeness/vulgarity (causing much of the above) whilst wearing a very innocent expression.

One can deal with the same question every five minutes if you have had experience with a toddler.

Frail, elderly people need regular naps and snacks otherwise they get crotchety.

It is possible to maintain their dignity with a little care and compassion but extremely easy to reduce them to an object of nuisance. They notice both and care a lot about this.

One does need a break, and catching up with an old school friend to reminisce is perfect. It is inadvisable (although great fun) to go on a massive bender with another old friend and suffer a two day hangover.

Wish I could stay longer.

During the Olympics:

Multiple cumulative and unrelenting events of the day have left me sad, emotional, frustrated, thankful and eventually knackered. Most of today was spent grappling with various aspects of NHS primary and secondary care for two elderly and increasingly frail individuals. I shaved, groomed and fed my Dad and witnessed him being subjected to numerous necessary indignities, having to restrain the urge to get in there and take over when the lovely but inexperienced junior doctor tried and failed to cannulate a vein which I was itching to have a go at. Corralled, organised, fed, circularly conversed with and taxied my Mum – briefly losing her when I nipped out for a sanity restoring walk down the river bank and returned to find all the doors open and an empty house. She eventually emerged from the opposite direction clutching the inevitable bunch of flowers that she had half-inched from someone else’s garden to put in yet another vase in the living room. Now both of us are drinking sherry, eating chocolate and watching fetchingly muscly men in tiny pants hurling themselves off a diving board.

Whilst Dad is in hospital, took Mum to the local Horticultural gardens. The morning went like this: 30 mins post breakfast “I’m feeling a little light headed. Have I had lunch yet? Ooh, look – ice cream.” 10 mins after ice cream “My sugar’s getting low. I need chocolate now”. 10 mins after chocolate “I really need a sit down, a good lunch and mind you get me a chocolate cake”. On being presented with lunch “Good lord, I’ll never eat all that! I won’t need anything else today. You’ll have to eat that cake”. 10 minutes after polishing off lunch and walking again “I feel a little light headed – have I had lunch?” And repeat. 😍

Day 3 of operation Mum/Dad support mission. Attempting to declutter house of 60+ years of Magpie hoarding prior to planned move into more suitable retirement accommodation. One befuddled and resistant 87 year old “helping” and the other slowly recovering in hospital. Developing a strategy of cunning diversion and subterfuge in order to remove unnecessary “stuff”. Circular and repetitive conversation, occasional rewarding and nostalgic discoveries, some hilarious, some mortifying. Girls enjoying the ritual embarrassment of those awful photos of the 70s and 80s.
Time for gin.

The story of our journey as a family with elderly and increasingly frail parents.

I have concluded that looking after two octogenarians with limited mobility and cognition is like looking after two toddlers (help with dressing, washing, toileting, explaining life in general) without the constant fear that one might put a finger in a plug socket and with the bonus that you can give them sherry at 7pm.