Author: Jenny’s Brave New World!

My immediate family is very small. My daughter and her husband live in North Yorkshire and lead very busy and fulfilling lives. I have a son, daughter-in-law and two wonderful grandchildren in America. We live in Cheshire, close to my mother. My brother and his family are in Leicestershire and my sister and her family live in Australia.

So this weekend was very special.

On Friday evening my husband and I drove to a pretty village outside Leeds to visit his mother, a 90 years young, stoic woman whose resilience under personal difficulties is a shining example to us all.

Saturday was spent doing odd jobs around my mother-in-law’s house and garden. The extreme dry weather creates its own problems so my husband was in his element pruning trees and shrubs and doing general garden maintenance while I helped with odd jobs inside.

But Sunday was the highlight of the weekend. My son needed to be in the UK on company business so had arranged a flying visit to Yorkshire. I booked a table at a restaurant for Sunday evening and arranged for my daughter to meet us there. Nothing unusual about that other than this brother and sister hadn’t seen each other for 6 years! No historic family fallout, just how life had dictated.

It was heartwarming seeing them together. The waitress did her extra-curricular duty and took photographs. The conversation at our table remained animated and hopefully not too loud. We were the last to leave, gratefully not chastised for keeping staff working late or ‘threatened’ with last orders! The siblings made their way outside, promising to meet up again, definitely before another 6 years!

Skype, WhatsApp, FaceTime, Facebook are all ways of keeping in touch but nothing can make up for face to face contact. I do fervently hope that my son and daughter won’t let so many years come between them before their next meeting and both families can maintain a close, meaningful relationship despite their busy, often frenetic lives.

But Sunday will remain with me for a long time and I am grateful that I have these two wonderful children and their families to enjoy and cherish. And, who knows what might happen in the future? Life is a funny thing! 👠

Yesterday my brother came to visit. He was diagnosed with pneumonia a couple of weeks ago so it was good to see him looking fit and well. We had lunch and then set off to visit my mother.

I had arranged for a carer to accompany us to our usual tearoom. I was surprised when the care manager told me that she would be joining us. Our usual carer had unwittingly suffered severe sunburn and couldn’t wear his uniform.

My brother hadn’t seen Mum for a few months so I wasn’t sure how she would react. I don’t know if she did recognise him because I was concentrating on trying to manoeuvre my husband’s suv 🚙 out of a parking space where the parking aids flashed and bleeped loudly every time I moved! I use this car once a week when I take my mother out because my car only has two seats, so parking this ‘tank’ increases my stress levels significantly!

We didn’t sing to Elvis. Mum sat in the back with my brother. I thought it would be a chance for him to speak to her. Her deterioration has been a lot slower for me because I see her regularly, but for both my brother and sister, her mental decline would have accelerated quite significantly.

What has become the norm, all parking spaces close to the tearoom were filled so I dropped my mother, brother and care manager at the tearoom door and parked at the end of the village. Fitbit approved as I hastily made my way back to the tearoom, arriving hot and bothered and looking forward to a cup of tea and a slice of delicious apple pie!

My brother had never met the care manager. She is very well qualified and so easy to speak to so she was able to allay a number of his concerns. Looking at Mum paging through a magazine, relaxed and happy, resulted in a very enjoyable afternoon.

Driving back to the care home the care manager told Mum that supper would be in half an hour. Mum commented that she was going to do what she wanted to and it wasn’t going to be good! This is Mum asserting her authority and telling the care manager that she wouldn’t be having supper!

My son-in-law is a Psychologist and explained that some dementia patients revert back to an earlier stage in their lives. This makes sense because one resident has a teddy bear that has to be fed and clothed before she lets a carer help her. This teddy has its own drawer and never leaves her side. There is another resident who walks around asking for taxi money to get home to feed her children. So sad. Therefore, I have decided that Mum has reverted back to her rebellious teenage years hence her comment about supper. There are many more amusing examples of her stubbornness and determination!

So another very busy week has flown by and the weekend beckons. How did I ever find the time to work? 👠

On Saturday evening we enjoyed another safari supper. Since 2006 three couples have met every few months to produce either a starter, main course or dessert, cheese and biscuits and all with the accompanying wine. Being good friends has ensured that there is never competitive pressure to try and out-perform so a good time is always had by all! We enjoy and heap praise on exceptional courses but can also commiserate when dishes let us down!

Last Saturday night we had a particularly pleasant evening. The weather was superb so we were able to sit outside on a beautiful, colourful patio filled with exotic flowers and shrubs and baskets overflowing with brightly coloured ‘busy lizzys’.

But it wasn’t only the al fresco dining without heaters or warm jackets, defying the usual English summer evenings, that made this safari supper so special. We have a friend who’s health has been a real concern over the last few years. He is currently awaiting open heart surgery, and this after months of rehabilitation after a bad fall. Yet he is so positive, always with a ready smile and, despite obvious discomfort, spent the evening the ‘life and soul’ of the party. His zest for life and determination to get well after every debilitating illness is very humbling.

Walking home on Saturday, still feeling warm and pleasantly replete, I decided to make a concerted effort to take a leaf out of his book. When niggling irritations surface, I’ll replace them with something positive, like not having to get up early for work on Monday!

Alas, not even a minute later, my husband asked if I had the house key. I hadn’t so there ensued half an hour of retracing our steps (Fitbit was in ‘his’ element) and finally and embarrassingly, finding the key buried under a tea towel on the tray I had carried home. Not saying a word, I slunk upstairs, had a bath and went to bed.

Tomorrow is another day 👠

Yesterday brought another new experience. A friend asked me to help serve drinks to local aged, retired and anyone else living on our Park who wanted some company.

Let me explain. I live on a unique housing development, built on the estate of a very rich family dating back to 1784. They owned one of the largest houses in Cheshire. During the Second World War the house and grounds became the property of the British army. It was initially used for transit British troops and then became the base for thousands of Americans prior to the D-Day landings. After the war the huts built in the grounds were used as homes for locals and relatives of serving Polish soldiers.

In the 1970’s the old house and huts were demolished and a parkland residential estate developed. Houses were built around a large social club with swimming pool, squash and tennis courts, function rooms holding all types of exercise classes and two bars. We are governed by strict by-laws when using the club house facilities and sign up to a number of covenants when purchasing a house. This also comes at an annual cost and is monitored by trustees, voted in by the residents. This sounds quite austere but, surprisingly, it does work!

It’s this social club that offers many daily activities, bridge, indoor bowls, and monthly coffee mornings. A boon for those living on their own and another demographic of people to meet and enjoy, 👠

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It started off as a good idea and a ‘bit’ of fun. Having a sedentary job for so many years I was curious to see how long it would take to reach the arbitrary 10,000 steps a day. As I have mentioned in a previous post, housework could add to this daily step count so would serve a useful purpose, but the jury is still out on this!

That was the theory. Alas, in practice, that is not the case.

Fitbit is not human and ‘his’ programme does not allow for having a meal, reading a book, writing my blog, or just sitting! My arm will suddenly vibrate and, what is fast becoming as irritating as nuisance phone calls, a message will flash up on the screen to ‘feed me’.

So this is one annoyance! There is another. I usually achieve the ‘required’ 10,000 steps but if Fitbit shows 9,000 before I have my evening bath, I have been known to run up and down the stairs until I feel the vibrations and get huge praise heaped on me for achieving my daily goal. Self-satisfied, I have my bath and go to bed!

But unfortunately, it gets even worse. If I don’t quite make 15,000 or the amazing and seriously smug zone 20,000 steps, this is when I need to make a stand and fight back!Easier said than done because the applause and vibrations I receive for 20,000 steps is really worth it! So last night saw me running up and down the stairs to reach this very significant goal!

But there Fitbit came into ‘his’ own! I didn’t get any applause when I reached the magical number. Completely exhausted I gave up and sat down. I checked the step total and was horrified to see that I had completed 20,450 steps with no applause and no vibrations. All I got was a warning to recharge the battery!

So hopefully I have learnt my lesson. The total steps I achieve each day will end when I run my bath water. I shall not be dictated to by a mindless robot! I don’t need praise heaped on me for exercising! I won’t be irritated when ‘he’ shouts for food! I’ll treat ‘him’ with the contempt he deserves! 👠

It’s been almost two months since I ‘retired’. I’m still not warming to that word. I remember speaking to a colleague at the beginning of the year when I was thinking of resigning. ‘You mean retiring’ was his immediate response. Being a couple of years younger than me he added another comment which I found really sad. ‘I just can’t face moving into the final stage of my life!’

This ‘final stage’ holds no fear for me. It could easily be the best stage! Hopefully it will be longer than my ‘angst’ ridden teenage years or even the following ten years in an unsuitable marriage.

So, as part of this new and exiting journey, I have decided that I’ll do something that makes me happy every day. This sounds selfish but won’t be at the expense of anyone else. It could be a walk with friends, out for lunch, just being able to enjoy a cup of tea in our Teak House, a thatched wooden circular building at the bottom of the garden. It’s a realistic target and can be easily met with little effort.

The sun is shining today, the ground is wet as we have experienced a typical English summer over the last few days. It has brought immense relief to humans as well as animals and plants!

I’m walking with friends this afternoon and will jog home. Jogging is my personal fight against dementia. There are days when I feel as if my chest will burst just trying to breathe! But the exertion gets the blood pumping up to my brain and my ‘fitbit’ goes into overdrive!

So the walk with friends will make me happy and the run home will give me the satisfaction that I have done something to stave off an awful, debilitating, cruel disease. It’s ‘win’ ‘win’! 👠

After a most enjoyable meal with friends I met 16 years ago at a ‘Management Training Course’ I visited my mother.

My sister and her husband had just spent a couple of weeks in the UK (they live in Australia), and had regularly visited her. I joined them on most of these visits so my mother saw her two daughters together. She recognised both of us but has long forgotten our relationship, just that we are ‘one of us’ as she has told me when questioned in the past.

So I was very surprised when I walked into the care home and my mother rushed over to me, grabbed my hand and told me that she thought I’d gone away and she would never see me again! I have been back to the care home since my sister left so didn’t immediately understand her concern. It was only later, driving home, that I thought about a connection between my sister’s visit and subsequent departure and my mother’s fear of abandonment. Once more, there is no way that this makes any sense, but dementia makes no sense! I can only surmise that her two daughters must have merged into one, and that the one had left.

After a relaxing, wet weekend (yes, I’m still loving this rain!) it’s Monday morning. I used to hate Mondays! Not anymore! Monday is the start of a new week and new choices on how to spend my time. The sun is back and the garden looks beautiful. That’s where I’ll be today. 👠

I have achieved my first goal to work for charities, primarily Alzheimer’s and Dementia. I was going to find a course to give exercise classes to residents in care homes. As luck would have it, a very good friend of mine is an ex PE teacher. She had the same idea when she retired so I supplied the music and yesterday morning my friend gave her first class to my mother and the residents in her care home.

It was a resounding success. My friend was really good, gauging the abilities of the class, most of whom are suffering from dementia and varying physical disabilities. She started with a gentle warm up and I supplied ABBA’s Dancing Queen. ABBA is so popular with all age groups so I uploaded an album onto my iPhone. Gradually, with encouragement and a number of carers joining in, we managed to get most residents doing the gentle moves, albeit some needing more encouragement than others!

And then we have my mother! Physically very well and easily able to perform all the exercises. Instead, she decided to ‘play up’ and refused to participate. Once more, I felt like a mother embarrassed because her child was misbehaving! Nothing I said changed her mind. She called the moves pathetic and sat petulantly staring at my friend, stubborn and immovable!

After the initial embarrassment, I resigned myself, once more, to the changes this awful disease has inflicted on my poor mother. So many times, throughout the last few years, Mum’s erratic, often bizarre behaviour is so out of character and she would be mortified if she knew what she was doing. A proud, restrained and impeccably dressed woman with strict morals is often barely recognisable as the still beautiful, we’ll-dressed (I have made sure of that) person I have now come to know.

But, today the sun is shining. I have ‘booked’ a carer to come with me when I take Mum to her favourite tearoom in a beautiful Cheshire village. Unfortunately I can’t risk taking her out on my own. She is physically very strong and I am unable to restrain her if necessary. But I can still take her out, which is good. We’ll sing to Elvis and I’ll leave Mum feeling happy and relaxed. The best we can expect under these cruel circumstances! 👠

On Monday I had lunch with two ex colleagues, very good friends. One had already left the company and the other still working there.

So it was a mixed dynamic, but very interesting. My two friends are the same age as my daughter. Both have young children so both need a regular income. But, despite the age difference and their different circumstances, all three of us were content, happy and really enjoyed our time together. The sun was shining, holidays were imminent and the summer stretched before us promising days of rest and relaxation and balmy evenings sipping cocktails watching steaks sizzling on the barbecue.

So there I was, listening to my two excited friends, both taking time off in August, one jetting off to Spain and the other to her caravan in Wales. But I was already enjoying a long relaxing summer holiday which had begun on the 8th June and will last as long as this unusually hot and dry summer weather will allow!

I’m meeting another two friends for lunch on Friday. One has recently retired and the other is self employed. Once more the joy of having time during the day to meet friends feels like an indulgent luxury, but I’m worth it! Of course I am! Sometimes I do feel a tiny pang of guilt, but then I move on ….. 👠

Today I went to. my first ever flower show. The weather forecast was good (warm) and my friends were great company. I didn’t have to drive so could sit at the back of the car and relax.

I’ve seen television footage of the Chelsea Flower Show so pictured themed gardens with stunning examples of horticultural skills. I was also looking forward to getting ideas for my own garden and possibly coming home with a few plants to fill gaps left by the current heat wave.

I wasn’t expecting masses of pop-up stores selling food, clothing, gin (not that I mind an occasional gin!), cheeses, garden furniture, wooden chalets, food, drink, the list is endless. There were some excellent school gardens based primarily on artists and a handful of aforesaid themed gardens, but they were few and far between.

There was a large under cover plant stall which housed some amazing examples of perennials, ferns, trees, bulbs, cut flowers etc and these stands were the closest that I got to my vision of a flower show.

But, it was a good day out with friends, albeit a bit too commercialised! I did, however, buy a stunning rose called ‘Nostalgia’ which has a deep red edge to the petals and a cream centre. It also has a deliciously sweet smell which is rare in new hybrid varieties.

It is Thursday afternoon. I didn’t spend the morning sitting at a desk answering emails and peering at a spread sheet through the glare of a computer screen! The outing this morning is not a complaint, just not what I had imagined! But still enjoyable and significantly better than being at work! 👠