Categories: uncategorized
Date: 23 March 2006 16:30:21
Goodness, almost two weeks since last I blogged. I hope you'll forgive me - it's rather hard to blog when you're horizontal and I have certainly been pretty horizontal for a week out of the last two. Acute sinusitis is such a delight, especially when it sets off the lingering remnants of glandular fever. I became very attached to my bucket and my bed - and very very grateful to my sister J and my friend M who came racing to the rescue in looking after the Smudgelets and my Dad. When I said I could do with a lay in, that was not quite what I had in mind.
Life with the Sudgelets has been rather up and down just lately, sickness aside - hence the other reason for bloglessness. I am beginning to get the impression that the coming year or so is going to be rather demanding on my patience, tolerance, strength etc as Dad gets weaker (not such good news today from the hospital) and as my eldest hits the teenage years... indeed I think a phone call to renew his counselling might not go amiss. I could do with a slightly longer tether, I think, as this last fortnight I have got rather close to the end of mine as far as my pubescent emotionally-immature teenager is concerned. Last night he broke down and promised to turn over a new leaf and I'm trying frantically to believe him.... but have a sneaking suspicion it's simply because I said that if I didn't see a massive improvement in his behaviour, he wouldn't be going on the school trip to Wight Water or to the rather swish dinner-dance the school holds for its leavers at the end of next term.
On the plus side, my fantastic brother has offered not only to lend me the money to have the repairs done to my home but also to come down for the week and do them. J has agreed to take the boys out of the way for the week and a pricing session at B&Q shows the jobs to be doable for far less money than I have been quoted for the door alone. We are taking the risk and replacing all the internal doors as well as the front door - and even risking glass in two of the doors - instead of just replacing the ones which Tiddles generally doesn't take his wrath out on. Fingers crossed. Actually, toes crossed, legs crossed, eyes crossed, too! With redecorating the hall and kitchen and having new carpet put down in the hall, I won't know myself in two months' time. Shame he can't do the jobs until after my visitors have been for Palm Sunday weekend's Wightmeet. (By the way, we have three cabins on a houseboat seeking occupants for that weekend if anyone fancies joining us. See the Wightmeet thread on Ship of Fools for the plans for the weekend!) In the meantime people will just have to take us as they find us - which is in total chaos!
Dad's latest blood tests aren't too good. They show the cancer is not responding to the hormone treatment any more and is growing fast. The radiotherapy hasn't worked too well either, which means that future radiotherapy won't be likely to be any more successful. Dad doesn't know either fact and is just pleased that the doctor said he didn't think it worth taking Dad over to Southampton for more radiotherapy if increasing his painkillers would do the trick. So the painkillers are to be increased as Dad's pain is getting worse. I'm having to be a bit more sensible and painstaking (no pun intended) when doing his care too, as apparently he has picked up some MRSA - not a dangerous amount but sufficient for me to have to be even more scrupulous with handwashing etc. My sister M is here for the weekend and the two of us took him out to the Lavender Farm for tea, but were given a bit of a shock when he tried a tester for lavender handcream and was so overwhelmed by the aroma that he almost passed out. Good job we happened to be standing either side of him at the time and could grab on fast, though we had a close shave when his walking stick flew from his grasp and landed with a bang on the nearby glass cabinet. They say lavender is supposed to be relaxing but that was ridiculous!!!
Still, a bit of a break this weekend. M is here looking after Dad. My friend M and I are going out for the evening tomorrow. Smudgelet is stopping overnight at my friend's house after Cubs tomorrow night and going straight from there to a Cubs Skills Day all day on Saturday. And Tiddles has Music Centre rehearsals all day until the evening, when they're both taking part in a concert which we're hopefully taking Dad to see. And tonight? Well, tonight I have the exciting prospect of finding my MOT certificate so I can tax the car. Now where on earth did I put that for safe keeping a year ago????