Practicality and a bit of Depression

The last four months has seen me persuading the eleventh doctor that I had asked about my mother’s leg to put her into hospital for a much-needed urgent scan, persuading a consultant to scan her because they had decided not to bother after an intestinal bleed, persuading the GP that she did not need four medications and re-formulating her diet to ensure that she would not require further interference, which at this point means that anyone prescribing to her is likely to put her at risk.

We have always followed a policy of ‘the less medications the better’ as my parents were brought up pre-antibiotics, when two of our family doctors were also trained homeopaths who in their later careers still avoided prescribing antibiotics.

Our lives are no longer private.  From a peaceful existence in which we made our own decisions and managed despite the lack of help from so-called-professionals, we are now at the mercy of people who did a course a couple of decades ago and think they know how we should live.  It is frankly a miracle that my mother made it to 90, I am considered so incompetent.

In any case, I can no longer sew in the same room as her, for fear of being accused of making a mess or neglecting her by not standing over her bed.  I cannot leave the room when the nurses appear to give her a five minute injection.  If anything changes overnight I am responsible for it, and if anything improves I am obviously nothing to do with it.  As you can imagine this is intensely annoying.

In the meantime, the longest meeting in history is still being held about my mother.  The system is such that ten people that do not know my mother and who could care even less sit and try to make decisions based upon no relevant information.  I have to tolerate endless visits from people I do not wish to see, and if I try to input any relevant information it is to be used against me, as per the policies of the social work department.  It is not helpful, and it is not very pleasant.

So, as you can imagine, I cannot get much work done at the moment, and since my mother is at risk, I have had to take on some more conventional work in case I end up having to pay for the house.  I am behind with some administrative tasks due to threats made by the ‘professionals’ and I cannot really do anything without someone else knowing about it, which I object to.

Taking care of other people involves giving up control over your life in order to improve somebody else’s.  When you are able to make some decisions this is tolerable, but when these decisions are put in the hands of a random stranger, life becomes less bearable.  I have managed to prevent some of the worst implications of the intrusion into our life, but inevitably something has to suffer.

Particularly with sewing and textile work there is no point in even starting if you are in any way stressed.  Since she came home I have been unable to get to the studio, as I am now keeping it firmly locked, unable to work with chemicals, in case it affects her, and unable to sew because I am so tense that nothing will sculpt correctly.  So, I have taken a sub-contract with Microsoft which does not involve the same level of dexterity.  This is depressing in the extreme, as it means that all future project completions are on hold.

I can only hope that the misery of having to do this will spur me on to finish the games and get them out.  As all the work I did on my own health is now effectively being used on my mother I cannot really afford to keep working on me.  I am very tired, to the point of sleeping if I lie down at all, and I am experiencing headaches and sore limbs because I no longer have any freedom at all.  The room I used to sit in and sew with my mother is now devoted to medical equipment, and so you really want to avoid it if you can.

Even this has been used as a weapon, they tried to insist that I put the furniture back in it before the equipment arrived.  They prevented me from getting her out of bed, and every time any progress is mentioned, somebody has a negative comment to make about it.  Depressing in the extreme.

As my birthday is coming up it is time to take stock, and as such I find I have not done as much as I wanted to do this year.  There are at least three books on hold, two games, the collection for Boris, and the courses I was doing in an effort to create something much bigger for Wolfe.  Nothing is as it should be.

So, my conclusion is to work for a few months, put some money aside to render us a bit safer, and if I am still well enough after that I will recommence what I was doing.  Who knows, perhaps being bored out of my mind doing a job I don’t want to fund our lives despite the interference of a bunch of bitching strangers will spur me on to achieve more in terms of the courses.  Who cares about my health anyway?  After my mother dies nobody.  Nobody considers the loss of control involved in caring for other people, and nobody points it out.  It is a blame game, in which the carer always finishes last.