The end of an era

One of the biggest issues that has come to the fore over the last 18 months since my father died has been the situation myself and my siblings have found ourselves in with regard to our mother.

It very quickly became apparent that aside from her obvious and expected grief my mother was suffering some significant memory issues and that they needed to be addressed sooner rather than later. Prior to his death I suspect my dad had been acting in part as her memory and whilst we were aware that she was getting a little forgetful, we really had no idea just how affected she was until she no longer had my dad for support.

During the period between then and now we have dealt with the medical aspects. Sometimes (actually most times) it has been something of an uphill struggle, both in dealing with 'the system' and in knowing how best to effect the necessary changes required. I don't think it's appropriate or fair to go into too much detail but suffice to say she can be pretty stubborn and frustrating when her back's against the wall... as I'm sure we can all be at times of difficulty. Knowing that however hasn't made it any less harrowing or stressful to deal with!

The single biggest issue has been her housing situation. For the last eighteen months she has been rattling around in what has been our family home for the last forty five years, like a very small ball bearing in a rather large biscuit tin and even had I been able to stay with her indefinitely, it is way too big a property for anything less than a family and not one were an octogenarian can reasonably be considered safe. Two flights of stairs, a massive garden, yada, yada.

And so, it is thus that last weekend, after much ado (we couldn't sell the house within the required period) we moved her into a beautiful,private, brand new, purpose built retirement apartment, closer to town, all high end mod cons and safe for her. She is perfectly able to cope day to day with living in the practical sense but emotionally we have yet to see what happens. It was her decision to move in as much as she felt that it was the 'wise' thing to do but leaving her home has been a whole lot less easy emotionally, as one might expect.

Time will tell but early indications are that it may be a long and somewhat pot-hole filled road to get to a point where we are happy that she is happy, or at least as happy as can be expected under the circumstances.

For me it feels like the end of an era, the home that was our family home since I was five years old, whilst we still own it temporarily, has gone in every sense that matters. It's just bricks and mortar now, empty of people, of family life, of the laughter and traumas of day to day life and of the warmth and feeling of safety my parents created there. Closing the door for the last time at the weekend felt like closing a door finally on that part of our lives.

So much has changed since my dad became ill but we will always have the memories.

Rising damp!

After something of an even more prolonged absence than usual I have finally made it back here in an effort to update and to detail some of what has kept me from blogging much lately. My random missives on Facebook have caused some questions and concerns from some of you kind people and so I thought it was time I pulled my finger out and posted something at least!

This is gonna be a long one, be warned!

My current situation goes back a fair way, in fact all the way back to my fathers death in November 2009. I still, for the sake of my families privacy, can't go into great detail but suffice to say that since then my mother has struggled to come to term with her loss and also with significant memory issues which only became apparent once my father had died.

To say it has been a nightmare for both her and myself would be something of an understatement, I think I can safely say it has been pretty much the hardest thing I have had to cope with in my life and despite support from my siblings, as the one living here all the time for me it has been a constant internal battle of emotions, and patience and at times a complete feeling of frustration and exasperation and of feeling I was becoming completely overwhelmed by it all. My stress levels have been through the roof and if anyone had told me that once we lost my dad I would have to deal with this situation immediately afterwards I think I would have run screaming into the hills there and then.

And it continues, thought after almost a year of doctors and appointments a few months back we at last got some answers and a little help with a way forward. Day to day little has changed but being armed with more information instead of trying to deal with it all 'blind' makes it a little easier. There have been times though when I really felt so 'up against it' that I couldn't see a way to cope any longer. On many of those occasions I wished I could blog the details just to vent but I couldn't and still can't but I can now at least share a little of it and of how it affects me. That is not to underestimate the impact on my mother herself or on my other family members but this is my blog and hence it's my thoughts and feelings that are here.

So, where does that bring me too now?

Well, the current state of play is this: it has been decided that my mother will cope better in a different and smaller house for various reasons and so our family home, of over 45 years, has been put on the market to enable her to move to a lovely new retirement apartment nearby. She will move just as soon as the building is completed which is projected to be May/June and whether this house sells by then is not relevant, if it doesn't we have made other arrangements.

And that leaves me with something of a dilemma. Yes, when the going has got tough over the last 18 months sometimes all I have wished for was to be able to move out and escape the problems here, I have been desperate for some privacy and peace and quiet at times but the reality of achieving that is a whole other thing now I have to!

My problem is this. I earn little above minimum wage, we live near London and prices to rent even a small studio apartment are hideous (upwards of £600pcm...including absolutely nothing). I have viewed a few but those one would like to live in I just can't consider financially and even those that could never be classed as a remotely 'bijou residence' seem to be out of my league.

Plan B, much though it's not a route I wish to go, is to rent a room. It's hardly where I anticipated my life would be at my age, I hate the idea of living like a student in one room and sharing amenities with strangers..... I feel like it will be my own personal version of 'Rising damp' (that reference may be lost on non-UK readers) but even that is proving difficult to achieve! It seems very few people want someone of my age to house/flat share which is kind of understandable, when I was student age I doubt I would have wanted to share with someone of my current age. it would have felt like sharing with a parent!

So, I am a little stuck. This seems to be the story of my life, it feels like I just launch from one crisis to the next sometimes and I keep wading through them in the hope there will be a period eventually of some degree of simplicity in my life...but there never seems to be.

So there you have it, a not so brief update on what is and what has been going on in gemmak's-ville. Don't ask me where I will be in three months time because right now I haven't go the vaguest bloody idea.

Just call me Miss Jones!

New year...new me!

Well then, my first resolution of the year appears to have failed already...that I will blog more doesn't seem to have happened but I am here now and at least it's still the first week of the new year! There is hope!

So...resolutions, I don't usually do them, I see them as another way to set oneself up to fail but this time, whilst it's not quite a resolution I have promised myself I will do my level best to make some changes.

This is all pretty easy to type here but I am well aware that the doing it will require more than a little determination to see it through and that it will be all too easy to lose sight of the goal but I am determined and I am writing the goal here so I can't forget....because you lot hopefully won't let me.

The goal; Well I have spent the better part of the last two years feeling like I have been trying to keep everyone happy but me, putting the needs of others before myself and more importantly letting circumstances and situations run my life for me. Maybe that had to be for a time and I just had to live like that but the time has come where I have to become more proactive and make the changes I need happen.

It's going to take diplomacy - not my forte - it's going to take balls - I'm scared to death - and it's going to take time and strength but I'm going to do it, come hell or high water this year I need to put me first some of the time and begin to make life what I want it to be....or at least make steps in the right direction.

No doubt I will fall by the wayside here and there and no doubt I will lose sight of my goal from time to time but by this time next year some significant things will have changed in gemmak's-ville.

You have my permission to nag me and kick my ass should you see me losing my direction along the way...in fact, please do!

HAPPY NEW YEAR guys :)