On 22 June 2021 I posted the following:
After several frantic days we have now settled into a new temporary normal.
Mum is still in DGRI, but is getting stronger and each day she seems a wee bit closer to independence and being able to come home. My brother and I each do half day visits so she has company most of the day and over mealtimes – the company is so important to her, as the dementia means she can feel quite lost. And today, although we’re not technically allowed to bring in flowers, we brought one wee sweet smelling rose from her garden. Such power in that wee flower.
And this morning I headed down to the beach with my smock and reminded myself how to do French Knots. The muscle memory was there, and for a while there was just me, and the sea and our memories.
I really appreciate everyone who has sent messages or been in touch or made donations. Thank you a million times. If you want to provide support for people living with dementia click the link.
Being by the sea restored me.
I only have to think of that beach and I am restored. I can smell the briney sea, hear the rhythm of the waves, the birds, and the wind, always a wind down there by the edge of the land.
We were, at this stage, preparing for Mum’s return home, and as well as some gentle crafting by the sea I also had to be home to wait in for the Care Call Engineer, to fit a pressure pad under Mum’s mattress, so we (and the agency) would get an alarm if Mum was out of bed for more than, say, 20 minutes through the night.
It’s just as well it was around midsummer and the days were as long as they were, because there was much to do.
It was a hospital day, so I’d make the one and half hour round trip, and try to spend quality time with Mum; and there was a new role at work that I felt I should apply for – it was a ‘sister’ role to my own, but more focused on one type of fundraising, instead of the role I held which was split across two teams and (to me at least) no longer made much sense. The role had been advertised externally and I had been hesitant to apply – I knew I was not in a particularly good place and feared that I did not have the resources to perform well at interview. If I got this new role, it would be worth it. But if I didn’t, I couldn’t imagine that I would even want to stay in my current role.
Fortunately (in some ways) I’d had to apply for my own job about a year previously, when the fixed term contract was made permanent, so I had some paragraphs I could cut and paste for this new role. But, of course, the application form had been ‘updated’ and there were new questions… ‘What are the challenges of remote working in this role and how would you address them?’ ‘Please give examples of work you have undertaken that demonstrates our Commitments of Communication, Collaboration, Consideration and Change’. I’ll be honest, those commitments had been rolled out some 2 or 3 years previously, with all staff sent a weeny wee leaflet listing the four commitments and what was meant by each one. But since then, I’d seen no mention of them. Ever. So it slightly surprised me that it was something we now recruited against.
In the past I would have told Mum about going for the new role, would have known that she might not have understood why I was so unsure about it, but just having her listen to me, and wishing me luck, and telling me that she would give me the job if she had it within her power. That would have been a comfort, would have given me some of the strength and energy to go for it.
Instead it felt like something I had to do, it was a chore. If I didn’t apply, it demonstrated that I was not interested in progression (I now realise that actually I’m not, and that’s ok). I had been encouraged by my line manager to go for it. I wanted it.
Anyway… I did it. A good friend helped me polish the final application, and edited out ‘some of the snark’, which was definitely necessary. And then, later, she reminded me that I had to submit it by 10pm, or else she would submit it on my behalf. I was relieved to press the send button, and hopeful that I could make positive change to my somewhat unsatisfactory role at work.
But honestly, the only thing I really cared about was getting Mum home.
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If you want to catch up on how we got to this point, this series of posts starts here, with Taking Smock of the Situation.
Shewolfinthevalley 
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