Some days you get to just sit back and enjoy life. I feel enormously lucky that I live somewhere I have such easy access to the life enhancing properties of nature.
In the late summer of 2021 the flowers on our terrace were glorious and we were regularly entranced by the gentle hum of the bees that hopped from flower to flower, drinking in all that nectar. Whichever bee was nearest us was called our Pet Bee. Just recalling this, I can feel the heat of the sun on my skin, and feel I’m blinking with the sunlight. And the bees, I can hear the bees, gently buzzing in my background. Such a happy wee sound.
And, we are selling this lovely haven, so if you or someone you know would like this lifestyle for yourself, here’s the details. Mauldslie Kennels, for sale.
I’m nearly at swallow time again, just as the wee darlings prepare to set off for the Southern Hemisphere again.
I didn’t speak to Mum today. I’ve thought long and hard about it, but I have decided that daily contact probably won’t benefit either of us. I don’t really know if it would be good for mum or not, if I knew it was a comfort to her I would do it in a flash. I know that within minutes she has no recollection of my call.
And phone calls with her are generally less positive than visits. And I honestly can’t do them every day. OK I could. But I choose not to.
I know she is well cared for. This used not to be enough, I wanted her also to have some pleasure in her life.. she had a remarkable ability to still find pleasure in her diminishing world, as she became less mobile and increasingly blind. We picked her flowers so she could smell them. We cooked tasty meals packed full of flavours to stimulate her taste buds. I hold on to that moment she smelled the honeysuckle early this summer. She seems unable to find that joy any more.
So. Go out. Smell the flowers. Sow seeds. Grow plants. Feed the birds. Soak up nature. Swim in the sea. Climb trees. Eat plums as you pick them from the tree. Eat whatever takes your fancy. Enjoy every moment while you know how to.
It both breaks my heart and brings me solace to re-visit this post in my memory. Solace, remembering all the joy Mum eked out of her world, and shared with all of us around her. Sadness to recall how distressed and confused Mum could be on a phone call. I continued to call her several times a week, until one day, many months later, I decided not to any more. As much as anything, I needed to wean myself off that regular check in with her once it was no longer nourishing either of us.
But today I urge you all to take every ounce of joy that you can from each hour of each day. I am reminded of the night before I left home to go to University, in London, leaving home for the first time, and at the age of only just 18. I went to say goodbye to my Gran… we chatted and she talked of this and that, I remember not what… and then she paused and looked at me with those pale blue eyes of hers.
As she was holding my eye contact, she said: “Loïs, don’t do anything you’ll regret.”
I gulped. This seemed like an important instruction from Gran, whom I was named after, and adored (but also I did not want to disappoint her in any way). She was my premier matriarch in this matriarchal family.
She continued, “But remember that the only things you regret in life are the opportunities you missed. If it makes you happy(and you’re not hurting anyone else) do it”
Gran was so right.
As you travel through this world, enthusiastically embrace every opportunity and follow your heart.
A young(ish) Gran in a fabulous embroidered cloakMe with Gran, circa 1967
***
I started writing this series of posts here, with Taking Smock of the Situation, an embroidery project I started after I realised Mum might have dementia. There I was, embroidering her old fisherman’s smock with symbols relating to her life; while her memories were slipping away, like me at a party I don’t want to be at.
Before that I blogged about whatever I was cooking and you can find my recipes here.
You were just wondering what 62 freshly laundered hankies would look like, hanging to dry on a whirligig weren’t you?
Well here you are.
This is the ‘mostly white’ collection and it includes some beautifully embroidered hankies, probably first owned by my great grandmother. They are the softest, finest cotton although many are past their prime and will be repurposed – I have a plan!
My plan, involving lavender and embroidery swirled about in my brain for months (and months) as a thing I might be able to do. I was hesitant though. I had forgotten how delicate old hankies can be, the cloth is soft and oh so thin, reminding me of how fragile Mum’s skin had become, how easily it broke if she knocked herself at all.
But, when you have so many hankies, what’s the worst that can happen? You end up with one in the bin because you messed it up? That would hardly be a disaster.
So, in time, I embroidered on a number of hankies, and created bespoke lavender pillows out of them.
On the first, I embroidered the foxgloves that Mum had painted in Summer 2020 as part of the 100 Days Project; and on the reverse I embroidered a beautiful Mary Oliver quote for my friend Juliet. After that first ultra delicate hankie, I chose a more robust one, and stitched simpler designs – for Mum (Alix), for her sister (Jen) and for Fenella’s mother (Brenda).
Mum loved to hold the lavender pillow to her nose, to breathe in the sweet scent of those lavender flowers. Latterly she couldn’t remember what the smell was, but she knew she liked it. I do wish that I had made the wee outer covers more like a pillow case so they could be thrown in the laundry and washed as they do get a bit icky with bits of food dropped on them! But hey ho, we live and learn.
These lavender pillow hankies were a labour of absolute love and delight – quick wee projects that gave a second life to some old well-loved hankies. There’s another hankie project that you’ll read about in the future, filled with even more love.. but you’ll have to wait for that one.
***
I started writing this series of posts here, with Taking Smock of the Situation, an embroidery project I started after I realised Mum might have dementia. There I was, embroidering her old fisherman’s smock with symbols relating to her life; while her memories were slipping away, like me at a party I don’t want to be at.
Before that I blogged about whatever I was cooking and you can find my recipes here.
Today is the proper start of my week’s holiday. And I started in true style, wapping out my breasts and having them squished until just before I squealed.
Seriously ladies, get your mammaries screened. It was 10 minutes of slight discomfort in a Tesco car park and then the rest of the week can only be an improvement.
This post reminds me that there were many other things going on during That Year.
Content Warning: the rest of this post focuses on gynaecological issues.
In April I had nipped home for a few days so I could have a hysteroscopy under anaesthetic. It was scheduled on the first day that the hospital opened up again for day surgery after Covid restrictions, and it was certainly the first day I had been anywhere where I could overhear conversations … sitting in a room wearing a hospital gown, with the door open to the corridor, I could hear all the NHS staff blethering away to one another, some work conversations and also a long chat between the anaesthetist and a nurse about fasting (it was Ramadan, the anesthetist was fasting, the nurse was not this year). It reminded me of Mum and Dad’s parties when we were little, and we sat at the top of the stairs peeking through the fanlight above the dining room door, and we could hear the gentle hub-bub of party conversations, with occasional laughter, clinking of glasses and general joyousness.
The hysteroscopy included the removal of a number of polyps and also the insertion of a coil, to provide me with a hormone booster, “to control your periods” – the original symptom that had led to this point was 6 weeks of constant very heavy and painful bleeding, which had left me drained and uncomfortable.
It had taken well over a year to get to this point, after several consultations and an attempt to carry out the hysteroscopy without anaesthesia. The consultant had said a hysteroscopy can be ‘quite uncomfortable’ but that if it was too much I’d be able to get it done under general anesthetic instead – I was led to believe that this was incredibly unusual. When it came to it, I screamed like a banshee with the pain, grimacing and saying I could cope with it. Why did I do this, and not just immediately say, “No, this is beyond my pain threshold. Get that fucking thing OUT of me”. Later I read the following guidance: “Some women feel no or only mild pain during a hysteroscopy, but for others the pain can be severe. If you find it too uncomfortable, tell the doctor or nurse. They can stop the procedure at any time.” It made me really angry that women are expected to give it a go, to see if they can cope with the pain; I wonder how many actually experience no pain at all? I suspect this policy is a result of a patriarchal health system. And it is not ok.
Throughout 2021 I was constantly tired, and increasingly unable to think straight (which I put down to tiredness); I would wake in the middle of the night and just not get any more sleep, nothing helped. During the day, out of the blue I would suddenly overheat.
It was clear that my hormones were no longer doing everything my body needed of them.
I didn’t get prescribed HRT patches to properly try to sort out my various symptoms until July 2022. The HRT helped me almost immediately, being able to sleep better was transformative. And that rag bag of seemingly unrelated symptoms, which I put down to ‘life’ eased.
But back to August 2021…. I was looking forward to a week of nothing, of staying home and sitting on the Terrace sewing or knitting, of trying out some new recipes, and of generally recharging. It felt somehow selfish, but I also knew that I needed to focus on me for a while, to give me the space and time to recharge a wee bit.
As has been said to me so often, you cannot pour from an empty cup.
My cup was empty, time to fill it up.
The next post will go back to Mum-related dementia-inspired content. I make no apology for this diversion to gynaecological topics. Life throws up surprises. So do blogs.
Over the last couple of years all our lives have upended. We live differently to how we used to, and for me the biggest change in my day to day life is that I work remotely, no longer needing to commute into an office in Edinburgh every day.
As ever with change, there are challenges, but also opportunities.
The Captain and I have been planning how to make the most of a challenge which presented itself. Back at the turn of the year we decided that we would put our house on the market in order to buy Mum’s house, thus releasing the equity to pay for her ongoing care. The challenge of funding her ongoing care has transformed into an opportunity.
It’s taken a while to get things into place, but our house goes on the market this week.
We’ve been so very happy here, The Captain since the very start of the new millennium and me about 10 years later. We’ve knocked things down and The Captain has built things up; we’ve discovered the joy of keeping hens; we’ve eaten SO MANY fresh laid eggs; we’ve glugged a few bottles of wine as the sun goes down and we’ve woken to sensational sunrises; we’ve preserved apples, pears, plums, brambles, damsons from our garden and given so many jars of jams and jellies and chutneys away; I’ve knitted enough pairs of socks to survive an arctic winter; we’ve lived through near Arctic winters, and actually summery summers; we’ve survived a pandemic in glorious style; we’ve painted walls (I say ‘we’, but that was entirely The Captain); and painted them again (and again); we’ve spent Christmas Day on the Terrace, with snow falling on the awning; we’ve watched thunder clouds coming in and rainbows landing on the pots of gold in the fields next door; I’ve changed jobs several times, the Captain has retired; we’ve laughed so much (and cried, but much less). This truly has been a home filled with joy and with love.
I visited Mum again this morning. And took her more homemade biscuits. She really does love her biscuits.
I told her (again) that her big sister has moved into a home. Mum seemed to have a flicker of understanding and then told me (again) that she didn’t think she would do that.
Mum had her 90th birthday earlier this year. We were still in lockdown and my brother was with her. No-one else, as we weren’t allowed more people from different households indoors at home. It really was not the greatest way to celebrate all those years. Three weeks later she was diagnosed with mixed dementia. I was surprised and yet not at all surprised by the diagnosis… I pretty much knew she had the early stages of dementia so it was a relief to have it confirmed. But the assessment was done over the phone and as I sat next to mum listening to the call, I felt she was doing so well and worried there might be no diagnosis. But at the end of the call the Dr told mum his diagnosis. The phone was passed to me and he confirmed to me mixed dementia: Alzheimer’s and vascular dementia.
I hadn’t expected this immediate diagnosis, but knew that I was not now going back to my ‘office’ and working straight away. Instead I reassured mum that dementia was just a word, she was still my same mum and I loved her and would keep her safe.
The next morning mum acknowledged she had a touch of the alzheimer’s.. and then seemed to forget about it. Occasionally now I remind her. But mostly I remind her that she is loved, that she is the best mum.
Your bonus today is the River Fleet, and this view feels as familiar to me as the back of my hand so I’m grateful I get to walk across the bridge and see the peaty brown water each time I go to visit mum.
I took a picture of Mum as she was sitting quietly in the sunshine the day before she was diagnosed. Two days after her diagnosis, she was again sitting in the sunshine, and I took another picture of her. These two pictures feel so different to me. In the first she seems carefree, and in the second, there is such a sadness in her far away look. She looks so lost.
And she was, she was beginning to be lost. To everyone, even herself.
***
I started writing this series of posts here, with Taking Smock of the Situation, an embroidery project I started after I realised Mum might have dementia. There I was, embroidering her old fisherman’s smock with symbols relating to her life; while her memories were slipping away, like me at a party I don’t want to be at.
Before that I blogged about whatever I was cooking and you can find my recipes here.
Same with Mum really. An optician came to the home on Friday and I accompanied Mum to her appointment.
It was just a week since I’d seen her.. and when the carer told her I was there she didn’t think they were telling her the truth (this is a recurring theme). When she saw me she kept asking if really I was Loïs, she didn’t believe it was really me. This was not expressed with any joy, just sorrow that perhaps it was all a con.
The appointment with the optician was hard for me – mum was distressed and tearful and wouldn’t let go of my hands. But shortly afterwards she had forgotten it all. She was still mistrusting and unhappy but pleased that I would come back the next day with biscuits.
I did. And she was much less distraught… I sat and crocheted as we chatted. I’ll drop in and see her this morning before heading back up the road.. I don’t know if she gets much lasting comfort from my visits (other than the full biscuit tin) but I sense she gets some little comfort while I am there.
As I re-read this post I feel that ‘slow progress’ is one of the recurring themes of the last two and a half years.
In ‘Today’ Mary Oliver writes this line:
I hardly move though really I am travelling a terrific distance
And although none of us has moved much in the last two and a half years, we have all travelled such great distances. And this last month Mum has moved less than ever, mostly sleeping, occasionally waking and smiling. But she is surely travelling a terrific distance, and soon will travel to a place unknown. Her slow pace has helped us to adjust to this new destination. She travels with such grace.
***
I started writing this series of posts here, with Taking Smock of the Situation, an embroidery project I started after I realised Mum might have dementia. There I was, embroidering her old fisherman’s smock with symbols relating to her life; while her memories were slipping away, like me at a party I don’t want to be at.
Before that I blogged about whatever I was cooking and you can find my recipes here.
More clothes pegs on a line. They maybe don’t look much like clothes pegs but they are, and I kinda like them. They might make more sense once the swallows are there too.
The bonus picture today is of the Duncan siblings, taken on the steps of Newlands during WW2. They all feature in Mum’s memoirs in different ways, but the biggest character is Newlands itself.. it was given to Norwegians during the war, to use as a hospital, while Gran lived in the Garden Cottage with her daughters, Jen and Mum. But more on that another day.
The Duncan siblings: Arthur, Loïs (my Grandmother), Walter, Lorna and JohnNewlands as a hospital, during the war
Mum was proud of her connections to Norway, first developed on her long journey back to Scotland at the start of WW11. On the ship were only a few passengers, and it seems that they were mostly Norwegian whalers, heading back to Europe to fight. Our Grandmother had a particular and long-lasting friendship with one, Kris Thoresen also known as Big Dog.
And Mum remembered with great fondness the young recuperating Norwegian soldiers who climbed trees with her on the Newlands Estate during the war. When she jumped into a large water tank and cut her foot (almost in half by all accounts!) on a broken jam jar at the bottom of the tank, she was carried up to the Big House which the Norwegians had turned into a hospital during the War, and there the kind Norwegian surgeons sewed her foot back together and the nurses bandaged it up.
In 2017 Mum contributed to a local project, gathering information about the connections between Dumfries and Norway from WW11 and beyond. The project is now all compiled here: Our Norwegian Story. There is oodles of information on the site about the many and varied ways that the Norwegians and the Doonhamers engaged with one another, including a section on Newlands (click through on the locations, and then on Newlands).
There were Royal visits to Newlands, by King Haakon in the 1940s and then King Olav in the 60s. As Mum’s mind started unravelling she became slightly obsessed with King Haakon, and with the plaque he unveiled at Newlands – she would suggest that we went for a visit to see the plaque, because no-one else would know about it any more, only her. There were days I would visit and she would tell me that he was coming to tea the next day, or that he had been there earlier, and now had thrown all his rubbish into that pile ‘there’ (pointing at the corner of the bed, where she regularly claimed there was a rubbish dump).
One of Mum’s other obsessions (for a while) was biscuits. She LOVED to have biscuits in her tin. And as fast as I could bake, and fill up that tin, they would all be eaten again.
And then I found a recipe for King Haakon biscuits! The joy! Of course I made a batch and took them to Mum, who declared that they had probably been made specially by the cook at Newlands, and that cook got the recipe from the King. I took that as praise indeed for my biscuits.
The biscuit recipe actually came from the WI Biscuit book, which is an absolute must for anyone who vaguely likes making biscuits.
And now I have a batch of the biscuit dough in the fridge, ready to be cut into slices and baked, so soon the kitchen will smell deliciously of sweet baking.
Do let me know if you make King Haakon biscuits. Or if you want the recipe for the Cardamom Cookies, which are sensationally good. One of these days I’ll get back to writing up more recipes again.
***
I started writing this series of posts here, with Taking Smock of the Situation, an embroidery project I started after I realised Mum might have dementia. There I was, embroidering her old fisherman’s smock with symbols relating to her life; while her memories were slipping away, like me at a party I don’t want to be at.
Before that I blogged about whatever I was cooking and you can find my recipes here.
Back in early December I was lucky enough to spend 3 days at Melville Castle on a writing retreat, with fellow Bold Scribes. Bold is a remarkable organisation, which has helped me not only survive the last couple of years, but to begin to flourish in new ways.
Without Bold there might not be regular(ish) blog posts; and there certainly wouldn’t have been such a positive attitude to Mum’s ability to continue to live her best life, when by most measures her life was diminishing.
Our final assignment on this retreat was to write a letter to someone, about dementia. My initial thought was to write to my nephew, telling him that I want him to read my memoirs to me when I have dementia. But it just wasn’t working for me. The words just faltered and stuck in the pen, refusing to go down on to the page.
So instead I wrote to Mum.
I wrote to her as she was when she was my age. You can read the letter below.
Dear Mum
This is me, your daughter Loïs, but I am now 57 years old… and I have travelled back in time to talk to 57 year old you.
Don’t ask how, or why, just bear with me.
I know at this stage this seems almost impossible to believe, but shortly after your 90th birthday you will be diagnosed with mixed dementia (Alzheimers and vascular, if you’re interested). And I am writing to tell you that it is going to be ok. You will be alright.
As James and I have said to you so many times this last year – you don’t need to worry, we are here to do your worrying for you these days. I know, I know, 57 year old you doesn’t do much worrying.. but 90 year old you found lots to worry about. I think it was that you could no longer always make sense of what was going on in the world.
I don’t know how much you know about dementia, perhaps not much more than I did last year before your diagnosis.
So what are the key things to tell you? There is so much to say, but actually I wonder how much of it really matters? What I have learned through your dementia is that all that really matters in the end is love. And you know, Mum, that although we haven’t always voiced it, that you are so very loved by all of us.
I’m going to assume that my two big fears about you having ‘a touch of Alzheimers’ as you put it the day after your diagnosis are the same as your two fears. Because I know how much we think alike.
My greatest fear was that you would no longer recognise me. Me! Your favourite daughter! And yes, I know that I am your only daughter, but it’s become one of our wee jokes – I call you my favourite Mum, and you call me your favourite daughter. Yup, I know, it’s not really that funny, but when you’re 90 it will become more amusing, trust me on this. And let’s put that fear to one side – you continue to know me, and if you don’t know who I am, I now know that you will always at least understand that I am someone who loves you and keeps you safe.
And my other fear is that you will change temperament, that you will no longer maintain your composure, that you will lose that ability you have to be firm but kind, so very kind, and always always fair. What if your dementia alters your personality, such that you are constantly angry, that you shout and swear and hit out at people, either physically or verbally? I don’t know how I would cope with that.
Perhaps you are worrying about what you will lose… what bits of you will be lost to all of us (your easy conversation, your stories, your memories, your ability to draw with such ease, how you can make a feast for a table full of family from what appears to be frugal scraps in the fridge). And yes, all of that will go. But none of that is really you. It’s just stuff you do. You are still there.
And I can confirm that 91 year old you with relatively advanced dementia is the concentrated essence of who you are.
Never have you been more loved.
But one thing – look after your teeth.
All my love
Loïs, your favourite daughter
***
You can read more about my relationship with Mum and her dementia starting here, with Taking Smock of the Situation, an embroidery project I started after I realised Mum might have dementia. There I was, embroidering her old fisherman’s smock with symbols relating to her life; while her memories were slipping away, like me at a party I don’t want to be at.
Shewolfinthevalley 