A bump in the night?

Well you hear about little old ladies that have gone doolally and wander around in their night clothes in the early hours of the morning, but little did I know it was going to be me!

I coloured my hair last night ready to see Tom Jones on Friday and then I had a lovely leisurely bath, which quite frankly after the worry I have had over mother and doing battle with doctors on call, who really don't wish to come out, I think I more than richly deserved a bit of pampering. I then settled into watching the film that finished at 1.30am, but as I am a late night owl, it didn't worry me.
I was already in my jimmy jams ready for bed and I knew that my eldest sister was getting mother up in the morning, so I could stay up no problem.

All going well, till I got up to switch off the tv, make my chamomile tea and tidy up before going to bed. I always look over to mother's bungalow before bed, as she does to mine and that's when I spotted lights from my mother's corner of the court.
After looking properly out the window, I could see that my mother's neighbour was still up late again. But as I was tidying up, something else was bothering me. It was a lot lighter over there than just him being up.
I turned my lights off and pressed my nose up against my window and could make out that the brightness belonged to my mother's bungalow... Bugger.
I tried telling myself that she had probably fell asleep in bed with the lights still on, but I wasn't convinced.

I sneaked out my bungalow leaving the door on the latch and walked across the court in my jimmy jams, hoping that no one would see me or that I would scare her neighbour peering through windows at nearly 2am. All I needed was to give him a heart attack.
Strange how you always meet someone, and this time it was a youth running for what seemed his life!
I ignored him and carried on, as he could fend for himself.
My worst scenario was in front of me... my mother slumped in the armchair.

Back to my bungalow to shut my door properly and get more oxygen in case this was going to be a late night.
I let myself in hers and turned off the tv which was on full volume as usual before checking her pulse and luckily, the sudden silence woke her up smiling.
Hell, I thought she was dead.

Although she had no idea of the time or why I was in my night clothes over hers, she was confused but a lot happier than the mornings confusion of when she was found on the floor.
She went happily to the toilet, talking about how the sequins on her new slippers that I had brought her that day were shining and then went off to bed again like a lamb.
At least I knew that I has lost some weight, as my pj bottoms kept slipping down on route from hers to mine!

Today has still been back and forth to her bungalow even though my sister did the breakfast shift. Mother has still got to eat another two meals and although I believe in fairies, I didn't think they were house trained enough to do the cooking for her.
Every time I enter my mother's bungalow, I feel like I've turned into a kamikaze, as I can't afford to catch this cold, so i am really pushing my luck. A cold to me with such a low immunity system is like a rabbit standing in a field of grey hounds, shouting out 'yahoo boys, come and get me!'

My sister was elated that mother has now decided to go into a care home. I couldn't be happy though, as I feel so saddened by mother giving up her independence as I know how hard she has fought for it and what a big deal it will be for her. Looking on the bright side, she won't be lonely as she'll be living with other people, but it's going to be a very sad day.
Plus a main problem that my sister has forgotten, that she is still ill now, so we've still got more caring to do yet.
After all, who will be waiting for the doctor to arrive tomorrow and cooking her three meals again... two guesses? really, as many as that? Durr... me silly.
Still don't they say 'If you want something done, ask a busy person', so I guess in this case it's sad, but if you want a sick person cared for, then ask the one waiting for the lungs transplant.

Still my brother is coming tomorrow, so hopefully he can get her dinner, fingers crossed that he comes at that time.
And me, I'll spend the day sorting out her morning personal care until we can get a home that she likes after waiting for the doctor and before going off to rehab.

Lots of love Debbie x

On your marks...

Blimey O Reilly, if I thought I'd hit the day running yesterday, then today I was on the starting blocks for the 100 metre sprint!
I had my day all planned out, a nice easy girly one of toenails to be painted and then off to the Antiques fair and Art show at Cressing Temple. I thought that if I took my 'go faster' trolley, then I could get some exercise by taking a slow walk around as there are plenty of wooden seats around the site for me to collapse on. And all in a vain hope that I'd loose more than this solitary pound before Monday and get stronger by the day for this transplant.

Of course nothing ever goes to plan does it?
My sister was on my door step by 9.30am chewing her nails and my heart sank as I opened the door to her and rightly so. Mother needs help...now.
So a quick oxygen change, finish my drugs and drag on whatever I could all in 5mins flat. Having a lung disease doesn't suit quick exits!

Mother was sitting on her bedroom floor in her night clothes and no teeth in, not knowing whether she was coming or going. I had a sneaky feeling that where she hadn't eaten or drank enough yesterday because she kept falling asleep, that her sugar levels had dropped and so had she.
By the looks of it, she had opened her curtains and come over funny so she had gone to sit down on her bed, which had moved and she had slipped off the bed slowly onto the floor, but all this had happened about 7am and it was now 9.45am.
After trying to get her up and failing miserably, I called in reinforcements in the shape of Julie, who thankfully came immediately and between Julie and I, we got her up, but her legs were like Bambi's and it took quite a few dummy runs to get her to the front room to sit down.
After a quick discussion in the garden between, Julie, Bebe and myself, we decided she needed looking over by a doctor.

Now I know I am getting old when I quote in the 'old days', but it's true.
In the old days you would call your surgery who would give you the doctors name from your surgery who was on call and they would come out.
Now you phone an out of hours centre and you get someone totally random.
I got a grumpy one on the line who said I should have rang 999 first if she had fell after I had explained over and over again that it wasn't an emergency, but she needed a check over as it could be a chest infection or maybe something more sinister.
He was adamant that I should call 999, so that's what I did next.
I called 999 and explained our plight that it wasn't an emergency, but we needed her checked over and the doctor had said to call them.
I was then told that they would get someone from NHS direct to call me. I did get actually get a lot of sense from her and she was very annoyed with the grumpy doctor.
She thought we had two problems, that mother's on going dementia problem was getting worse and but it was probably exaggerated by a chest infection, but although we knew that I should call the grumpy doctor out, mother was in no way entertaining the idea of having a doctor anywhere near her!
In fact mother got very nasty calling me and the nurse on the line an 'inferring cow', and then standing up and marching on the spot as if there was no problem.
I had to make the decision to hold the call to the doctor and see what happens while risking her recovery.
But then if she deteriorates then I would get out the grumpy doctor straight away and face the consequences of either hers or the doctor's wrath and hope that I hadn't killed her in the mean time.
Five visits later and lots of lip biting and hand wringing by me, she has seemed to have turned a corner and hopefully she'll be alright until tomorrow and then we can reevaluate it again then.

Hopefully my family can do the worrying tomorrow as it has scared the pants off of me today and I feel like a wet weekend in Blackpool! Not something I want to repeat again in a hurry, so fingers crossed for tomorrow.
Not sure where this stress figures in the grand plan of looking after myself and keeping myself well?

Lots of love Debbie x

When is a jelly not a jelly?

I hit the floor running today. When I woke up this morning before my alarm went off, I felt serene and refreshed for a change and lay in bed stretching like a contented cat, until I walked past my clock on the hall wall and saw it said 10.38am.
Holy buggery, I must have either forgotten to set my alarm or I had hit it off earlier, but I was meeting a friend at 11.30am and my hair looked like a birds nest on the top of my head, I had sleep marks across my cheeks and all over my body... no; I should say grooves in my face and a white crust down the side of my mouth where I had been dribbling in my sleep.
To say I was rushing around like a headless chicken to look a quarter normal, was understatement.

After meeting my friend, who at one point was my ex boss, I was going on to rehab, so I had to think quickly of what I could wear to both lunch and then do my exercises in and of course my white cut offs and the white long length shorts were both waiting to be ironed.
Gawd damn it!
I actually turned up exactly the same time as my friend, so we were both 10mins late and we had a really lovely lunch... well after I had read and reread each option to see what I was allowed to eat on the menu and she brought me a pressie too... bonus!
She is making jewellery in her spare time as she still works as an adviser at another university, plays bowls, does umpteen courses and travels a lot. And apparently she stays up even later than me and goes to bed around 4am.

I went on to rehab, did a quick change in the car park into a cooler top and then I went on to have a really good session. I'm hoping that not only will it make me a lot stronger, but help me lose some lbs, as they don't appear to be dropping off in great quantity as promised at the diet club last Monday and I'm sure I'm not cheating.
Maybe my body is just being a bit reluctant to play ball and it will surprise me on Monday... Err I don't think so, pigs will fly first.

I thought I'd show off my creative talents in the diet cookery department and show to Julie that the food which her daughter and I are both now eating is quite filling and yummy, but I realised later that you really should wear your varifocals when reading a new recipe.
Question; When is a jelly not a jelly?
Answer; When I make it from scratch and misread the amount of gelatin sheets that I should have put in the lemonade and the pimms. As a drink it was very nice and as a set jelly it would have been superb, but as it was, it was a failure as we all know, jellies are not meant to be eaten via a straw!
Ah well my cod in parma ham was very tasty, so can't win them all.

Mother was a bit worrying today, as she kept falling asleep non stop while I was there this afternoon. She wasn't coughing nearly half as much which was good news, but she was very drowsy. I had checked the cough medicine bottle to make sure she hadn't taken too much, but it looked fine.
When I rang her later on, she said that she hadn't eaten the soup or the sandwiches that I had made her as she wasn't hungry and was just on her way to bed.
Hope she will be alright. She sounds better than yesterday, just very sleepy.
Perhaps I should take her a jelly tomorrow?

Lots of love Debbie x

What a difference a day makes

How can two days be so very different?
Yesterday was so hot and today... peeing down with rain non stop doing an impression of stair rods. And to add insult to injury, when I had my rain mac cleaned earlier this year, the miserable lot didn't waterproof it again for me.
I found this out when I was out shopping as within seconds, the pouring rain had gone straight through my mac and I was not a happy bunny.

Julie and I were going to go off to Maldon today, as she hasn't been there for ages and as I'm always singing it's praises and we thought it would be lovely to sit by the water and relax.
Today, we probably would have been the only ones there as it was so foul out there. Why is it that every time that we think we'll go off for the day, it gets cancelled because of the great British weather?

Also poor little Reni was suffering from heatstroke from being out in the sun all day at work yesterday, so I had to go over to their flat with strong painkillers to try and get rid of her splitting headache. She was really suffering bless her with nausea and feeling cold and shivery, so she was trying to sleep in a completely darken flat and was an eye mask on too to block out all light. Thankfully this evening she feeling a little better.
From there I went round to my mother's with her magazines and she has contracted a stinking cold overnight. She had a tickle in her throat yesterday, but today she was coughing her lungs up and unfortunately she wasn't covering her mouth each time.
It's awful having to ask her to cover her mouth each time, as it feels so condescending having to say that to her, but when she coughs, she really goes for it.
I know that I am frightened of being ill yet again, especially as I have tickets to see Tom Jones next Friday, but I booked these tickets at the beginning of the year, so I'd be devastated if I couldn't go. I also have these tests at Broomfield coming up soon too, and I really don't want to have a tube rammed up my nostrils and down my throat if I'm coughing and sneezing non stop!

So I am swallowing echinacea by the handful and eating a spoonful of manuka 10+ honey in the vain hope that I ward it off. And yes I am including my honey as a 'syn' in my diet, but I can't see the echinacea tablets on my 'syn' list, so hopefully I'm ok there!

Lots of love Debbie x

Happy August

Wow it was hot and sticky last night.
I went off to sleep with no problems, but my bursting bladder woke me up at 2.30am and I did struggle at getting back off to sleep again because of the heat. My own fault as I didn't switch the electric fan on, mainly because it had got stuck on full speed and it would have been like sleeping in a wind tunnel, plus I was worried that it would blow up while I was sleeping!
Didn't matter too much though, as I just shut my eyes and pretended I was sleeping in a hotel room in Turkey again and just went through all the fun times that we have had over there. There are so many funny moments, that I fell asleep after just trip two out there.

Mother and I went off to Maldon again today as it was silly to stay and eat indoors. The place was heaving with families picnicking, splashing about in the water park, crabbing in the boating lake, messing about on the water or just walking up and down the prom taking in the beautiful weather.
We sat for ages, mother in the car with all the doors and windows open and myself in my deckchair next to her open door, just reading and eating. Of course I was eating healthy stuff being the good girl that I am!
Mother kept trying to use her dementia as an excuse for nicking my brand new 'Hello' magazine that had arrived just as I was about to pick her up... Ha not buying into that one mother, you wryly old bird you!
I did go for a stroll down the prom and back on my own, trusting in my 'go faster' walker today and only had to sit down once on the way back, so I am doing more exercising so I must be getting stronger.
Plus I thought it might stop my calves from totalling seizing up from the exercises on Monday, and it seemed to work.

Tonight was a really lovely evening and only goes to show that I do talk sense sometimes.
I said to Rosemary when she was at her leaving do and fretting about not seeing her work friends anymore, that the ones that you want to see, you will see and you'll be able to spend quality time with them rather than a rushed snippet here and there at work.
Tonight was a prime example, as I got to have a meal with one of these lovely ladies who I used to work with and was on sick leave when I left and we spent three hours happily chatting the night away.
The food was good too and I only cheated a little bit on my dessert!

Driving home was a bit like driving through the film set of 'The Hound of the Baskervilles.' As where it had been raining hard while we were eating, the steam was rising off the roads and was quite misty in places. Thank goodness I didn't break down.
I was a bit of a bull in a china shop getting out of the hotel car park though as the barrier wouldn't lift up, so I drove over the kerb instead to get out. Unfortunately it was rather higher than I thought, so hopefully no damage done to my car, but I did take it very carefully.
And there was me bragging about how patient and composed that I had become since being ill... obviously still got a little way to go!

Lots of love Debbie x

Chef wanted

I had my first challenge of sticking to the Slimming World diet today, as I had friends around for a meal tonight.
I searched through the books for quick ideas, as I'm not yet prepared of what foods come under which category, what has to be weighed etc and I did come unstuck with some of my 'syns'.
i.e the small bit of french bread and the sparkling elderflower to drink with my meal.
One of the two friends round tonight is easy and will eat whatever you put in front of her and seem to enjoy it, but the other is so damn fussy. So I ended up making a salad nicoise for the undemanding friend and myself as that was all 'free food' and chicken and chips for the other.
I have to admit, I was eyeing up the chips at one point and I never even want to eat chips at home as a rule!
But we all had the special diet Eton Mess for dessert and I did feel quite full at the end of the meal. Now however my tummy is rumbling.
I'm already scouring the books to see what I can eat for tomorrow... I may eat the book as well by the time I go to bed!
I can see myself turning into a diet bore if I'm not careful.

It's exceptionally hot out there tonight, so we were able to eat Al fresco, but I still have all my windows and doors open so it's cooler before bed time and it's gone 11pm.
I do have my electric fan at the ready in the bedroom in case I can't cool down enough to sleep. I had to use it when having my physio this afternoon. Being beaten up for postural drainage in this weather is not for the faint hearted believe you me!
I have slept better since I stopped taking the statins. Hopefully this new diet will bring my cholesterol down naturally and I won't get told off.
If I can get it down below my 5.1 through diet alone, then excellent. I always used to be a 3 when slimmer, so lets hope with a bit of perseverance, I'll get it down to that again.
Low cholesterol and a cute bod... whoa hoo... bring on the men!

I have a feeling that my calves are going to seize up tomorrow from my heel raises and squats yesterday, as although fine today, they have been twanging a bit tonight. I'll have to limber up before going back to rehab on Friday, especially after giving it the large to my fellow male inmates yesterday.
Lordy I am such a opinionated woman, why don't I learn to button at times?

Lots of love Debbie x

Ms Angry from Silver End debates

Lordy, lordy I have been to Slimming World and I am confused with what I'm allowed to eat and what are syns, greens or reds?!
I'm sure it will be easy once I get the hang of it, but just reading the guide book which explains things, makes me feel hungry and I know for certain that I have just ate 6 syns in the shape of a chocolate mint crunchy bar!
The ladies there all seemed a happy bunch and weren't trying to eat each others legs off while sitting listening to the talk, but did look very excited at the bowl of fruit which was the prize for the biggest weight loss.
And there seemed to be a lot of women zooming into the hall, getting weighed and zooming out again. Were they busy or hadn't done very well?
I think I really need to sit down and read whats what so I can give this my best shot.
What worries me, is that the ladies who stayed had to announce what they think they were going to loose the following week. I wonder if I can just do half a pound a week?!
Ok so you can keep tabs on me;
Starting weight 11st 11lb 1/2oz ...target weight chosen by me 10st 2lb... measurements tonight 41" chest 42" waist and 45" hips... so lets watch and see how this pans out.

I also started back at rehab today and already my legs feel a bit on the stiff side. I think I was showing off as there are quite a few whining men there this time and as I was only one of two women there again, I thought I'd show them what wimps they sounded.
I'm hoping that the rehab along with my extra walking will help shift some weight too as well as upping my strength for the oncoming months.
So far Greta and Ann have stinking colds, so I want and need to keep fit, so I don't go down with what they have.

Now I will apologise in advance to my friends who are smokers for my next rant.
Driving to the hospital today to pick up my monthly drugs, I was listening on BB2 to the Jeremy Vine show. I don't actually like his debate show, I have to be honest and some of the viewers who phone in with their views get right up my nose.
And today was no different and as normal I ended up yelling at the radio as driving along to Broomfield.
Today's discussion was about Michael Douglas smoking again after he has just kicked throat cancer, not that you ever truly kick cancer, it's always looming in the background.
Now I don't know whether he is smoking again or not so I can't comment on him, but the knob heads that phoned in...well a different matter!
The excuses that people gave to exonerate themselves for carrying on smoking while being treated for cancer were unbelievable.
It is an addiction yes, an addiction is only a tough habit and habits can be broken if you try bloody hard. It may seem too hard I know, but surely if you have been told that you could die from something, is it not worth trying harder to break that habit?
After all you are fighting for your life here.
I last smoked over twenty five years ago and yes I did enjoy it. I was what can be described as an on/off smoker who would give up as and when. Eleven years was my longest 'off' time before this last time of giving up.
I gave up on the day I got engaged and restarted the day Oliver started school. The last time was it though, I knew then I would never ever start smoking again, as my sons were so proud of me for kicking the habit and so was I.
I gave up by going cold turkey when I was getting over a heavy cold. They tasted rank and I just thought then, 'Why was I doing this?'
I was also a trained smoking cessation counsellor at the university and helped quite a few students and staff to give up and stay a non smoker while they were at uni at least.
The knob heads who were calling in, all mentioned that they were under stress and that was why they had to carry on smoking.
Maybe the patients who can't have a certain drug because it's deemed too expensive, because money was being wasted on people that wouldn't help themselves by stopping smoking, might be stressed too?
Maybe then the callers should pay something back towards the costs of all their NHS treatment if they have so little disregard for their bodies? That money could be well spent on people who would jump through hoops to be given the chance to carry on living?
Yes the same goes for fat people, which is why I am trying hard to lose weight. I am taking responsibility.
These callers are probably the same people who sit moaning in the waiting rooms about the length of time they had been kept waiting for their appointments. Tough... are you paying private for it? No? Well shut up moaning then. Some of you are there because you have abused your bodies and are still abusing them by lightening up as soon as you get outside.
I hate the fact that people think my disease is smoking related. I also hate the fact that the disease was accelerated by breathing in secondary smoke when working at a pub. What we secondary smokers breathe in is pure nicotine, where what the smoker breathes in, is filtered.
I suffered because of their choice to smoke.
I know I sound bitter, but I am. I am trying so hard to stay alive and to stay well enough to have this transplant, see my grandchildren be born, grow old with my friends etc and these callers were trying hard to excuse themselves because they were stressed.
Yeah right. I'm bloody stressed too.

Rant over. It's safe to come out from cover now.

Lots of love Debbie x