Fading from Memory

Follow ups

Mike — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 17:12:00 +1000

The crematorium called Greg this week to ask him what he wanted to do with the ashes. They offered a couple of alternatives: placement behind a brass plaque for $1,000, or scattering in their surrounding gardens for $180. Neither of these options means much to either of us. I asked Greg, 'how much does it cost to give them no answer?'

Ever since I learnt that the residual material can include remnants of the coffin, is often mixed up with ashes from other bodies, and is actually the result of fire plus pulverisation by large steel balls, my interest in ashes has fallen from zero to something less. Sentimentally, I think I would now have preferred a burial, but that is more a throwback to the past, where gravestones were the only record. I am thinking of the interest I've shown recently in the past generations of my own family. Future descendants of dad might have appreciated having a gravestone to search out, but dad is so well documented in many other forms, anyway, that a grave is completely redundant.

A couple of days after the funeral the undertakers called Greg to seek feedback on their services. He told them that we were satisfied, but there was plenty of scope for black humour in that telephone conversation:
- 'we were all waiting at the grave and no-one appeared'
- 'we weren't happy and we'd like our money back now, please'
- 'it wasn't much fun, no-one had a good time; don't your people know any jokes?'
- 'can't wait to do the same with mum'
- 'I would recommend your services to anyone who was dead'
- 'dad appeared very happy with it all'
- 'we are all still in mourning, and you call about this? Where's your sense of decorum?'

That last question reminds me of what we talked about at the time. The call came as we were all at the house. We pondered the question of how long the undertakers wait between funeral and follow-up call. If they think it's a particularly uncaring family, maybe it is only a couple of hours. If there has been prolonged and inconsolable wailing during the service, perhaps they leave it a couple of weeks? Leave it too long and the response might be 'funeral for who?'

We've also received a few cards from people who have found out about dad's death through the grapevine. It's hard to know what to do with them. I put them up for a couple of hours and then took them down again. Now I shall put them in one of the big white trunks - and defer the decision.

It isn't hard to see why primitive people believed in life after death. If one's discrimination between memory, imagination, and experience is less than precise, it is easy to believe that the dead, in the form of dreams, memories, personal or shared, references and representations, are still with us. I suppose we have a kind of half-life after death; we slowly fade away, but never completely.

Clearing up

Mike — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 21:20:00 +1000

As I sit here at the computer, I am surrounded by my parents' papers, lying all over the floor like pack-ice. I have been tip-toeing over the various stacks of paper for a day and a half now. I've made a path through the middle so I can get from the kitchen to the desk. Although I have been filing mum and dad's papers for about two years now, everything needs to be collated and re-examined. Many of their affairs involve money, which they owe to others, which others owe to them, and which they have in several places. Now that dad is dead, several things change - pensions, life insurance, and so on. Other services such as his broadband and gas, telephone and burglar alarm maintenance, are no longer needed.

The picture in my spare room is somewhat similar except that there there are icebergs - four great white plastic trunks which contain a) photographs, b) books and masonic material, c) personal items and mementos, and d) gramaphone records and the x-rays and scans mum and dad have had over the last ten years. I've spent quite a bit of time doing the preliminary sorting of this material but, again, much more is required.

In the boot of my car I now have all of dad's things from the retirement home. That amounted to three big bin-liners full of clothes, a small portable stereo, a clock, a couple of wooden bowls, two framed photographs, and some tapestries that mum made. I drove over to the home this afternoon and picked up all of it. This is the last of several bootloads of stuff I have brought back to my place recently. I shall probably do what I normally do - leave it in the boot for a few days until I am in the mood to sort it out. In this case most of it, the clothing, will simply go into one of those roadside collection points the charities operate. I'l keep the clock since, even though I don't like it particularly, mine has recently begun to lose time. I'll keep the little stereo too.

And, having learnt the lesson of clearing out mum and dad's house, I have started doing the same at my office. there were complete filing cabinet drawers full of reference material I've kept but haven't referred to in eight years. In all, in one day, I filled an entire wheely bin with discarded paper, and rediscovered a few things I had thought were lost. It was, in other words, just like the house clearing.

Unfortunately, though, I was unable to visit mum today. There is yet another outbreak of gastroenteritis at her section, and they are in quarantine. The last time I saw her was the day dad died, 3 September, and I must admit that today I really only wanted to go in out of a sense of duty, and was glad to have a cast iron excuse for not going in.

Excavations

Mike — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 19:41:00 +1000

It is astonishing to think that a week has gone by since the funeral. I have slowly felt things getting back to normal and, just as astonishingly, this has seemed to happen very quickly.

I've been back to work, and meeting friends, only two of whom know about dad's death. I feel no need to tell others about it. In fact, I would rather not endure their awkwardness or sympathies. Instead, I have begun to sort out the loose ends that surround the death.

Derek, who is now back in the UK, has been in touch with the relevant government departments and Rolls Royce to find out what we need to do about dad's pensions. I've provided him with the pension numbers and various other bits of bureaucratic gobbledygook that they need. We still need to organised notarised copies of the powers of attorney and the death certificate.

I also began to go through the boxes of mum and dad's belongings that I brought back to my place. First the files, to make progress on the pensions, then the more personal stuff. I scrubbed one of dad's toolboxes, the plastic one, and used it to replace my old metal cantilevered one, which was rusted the day I bought it, in October 1976, at the start of my Fine Art course.

Next, I began to clean all the old record sleeves. Most of these records are from the World Record Club (NZ). They cover the more popular classics, Tchaikovsky, Beethoven, Bizet and Ravel, and the crooners, Sinatra, Reeves, which were probably mum's choices, and movie themes, My Fair Lady, and comic opera, which could have been dad's. There are also some later ones, Music For Pleasure, bought in the UK I believe, and including Roy Castle and more movie themes, Where Eagles Dare. Still later, records from Turkey and China. There are a few dozen children's stories too, which I've mentioned here before. And one complete surprise - Maxine Nightingale.

I remember listening to nearly al the records I am seeing again today. There were several romantic song collections, featuring fireside sleeve designs, which my mother used to play during the day. I remember thinking, as a young child, that such romantic fireside liaisons would happen to me one day, but the day hasn't arrived yet.

Considering that dad's mother was a piano teacher and mum's father was a church organist, my parents themselves were rather unmusical. The last music I can remember them getting excited about was Jesus Christ Superstar (that was one of mum's obsessions for a while, as was either Godspell or Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat) and ABBA (dad, of course).

I have been writing this during a break from the cleaning work. I shall get back to it now.

And today

Mike — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 21:32:00 +1000

I got up in plenty of time and dressed in black clothes for the funeral. I have so much black, it was not at all a strange thing to do. The day was very bright and sunny, almost blindingly bright, and several people commented on it. How much worse things would have been had it been raining.

Greg had managed to make contact with the minister of mum and dad's church. He remembered them both, and agreed to conduct the service. One of the elders of the church had asked to say a few words about dad (ironically, this is the man who once wiped out all the speed-dial numbers in dadd's phone and left him sithout his lifeline for a couple of days). A half-dozen of the congregation wanted to attend, too. So, there were about twenty of us there altogether.

The crematorium is a big place with four chapels, all operating in parallel. Some thirty funerals were scheduled for today. I was struck by the informality of the gatherings for other funerals; many of them looked like random collections of individuals, with no concession to mourning. This seemed unsatisfactory to me, and I was curiously gratified to see that, with the exception of the old people from the church, our group looked decorous and dignified.

It is always interesting to hear how others see your immediate family. Dad, it seems, was considered a bit of a racontuer, a bit of a maverick, a character, a nice bloke. We heard a little of dad's tales from his operations around Asia - sitting in a Beirut hotel listing to the gunfights taking place outside, being stabbed in the Philippines, having a gun waved at him in some other forlorn corner of the world. We've heard these tales dozens of times and they seem commonplace to us. They are not, however.

A few of Greg's friends were there too - people who I have known for decades, and who knew dad. It is true what they say, that your presence at a funeral is deeply appreciated by those who are closer to the deceased.

For a wake we ferried ourselves back to Greg's place again and spent the next few hours together there. It began sombrely, but slowly warmed up, despite the fact that those who had travelled half-way around the world were slowly winding down with jet-lag. I left in mid afternoon and battled the rush-hour traffic and low sunlight on the way home. I had stayed up late last night. it was time to catch up on sleep. Arriving at 5 pm, I went to bed and slept for three hours.

Last night

Mike — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 21:16:00 +1000

Last night Greg and I went to the airport to meet Derek and Janet, Rebecca and Connor, who had all flown in from points European on the same flight. Before they emerged from the immigration gates Greg and I had a long talk about dad.

Greg seems to be having a much harder time than I am. He is preoccupied with how we might have done things differently, perhaps even tortured over the question. I eschewed the usual soothing noises, this situation not being one that I feel sits comfortably with me, and probably not with him either. Instead, I simply stated that if I had been blessed with foresight there were two things I would have changed - the medication dad received and the trips to the hospital.

The medication, however, was part and parcel of the deal I thought we made with the home. We knew, I maintain, that any difficulty they had handling dad would be medicated away with sedatives and so on. Although at that stage we were not aware that we should legally have had the opportunity to bless or veto any prescription of any medication, had we done so it is quite possible that the home would respond that without medication they could not cope, nor do their job properly, and that dad must return home. Well, that was a bridge we had already burnt; dad could not return home, so he would have had to come and stay with one of us. None of us wanted that. Perhaps we should have been prepared for it, but if so, why consider the home in the first place?

Dad's hospital treatment was such a rude shock to all of us that we simply had no way to foresee it, and so there is nothing to feel guilty about there either. I think we all thought that hospitals were comfortable caring places, and we have learnt that they are nothing like that. They are more like a mechanic's shop: apply the toolbox, fix the problem and get the job back on the road as soon as you can.

Greg now regrets that he saved so few things of dad's. He mentioned particular items that we saw walking out the door in the hands of strangers, at the garage sale. And yet, Greg had been so uninterested in setting aside these things when I was doing so. I told him that I have quite a few things of dad's, and mum's, here in my spare room, and he is welcome to whatever he wants of them.

When our visitors arrived we drove them home across Sydney, and sat down with Regan and Cassie for a late dinner. The conversation was good - not preoccupied with dad, but not ignoring the subject either, not maudlin, not false, not forced.

I came back to my place later, and arrived at midnight. I feel strangely composed. This week, I have stayed at home, avoided all situations where I might have had to talk to anyone, and Greg and Rachel have respected my wish to be kept out of further funeral arrangements. It has allowed me to think my own thoughts. Frankly, nothing else seems very important. And since I neither want to talk about things that are unimportant, nor talk about my father's death, I have remained silent. Tomorrow is the funeral, so tonight is the last night for dad's body. It seems all quite neatly arranged. I am aware that these feelings can be transient, illusory almost, but it feels pretty certain.

Funeral set

Mike — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 18:09:00 +1000

Id been warned that the necessities of dealing with the funeral come at exactly the time one least wishes to think about such things, and it is so true.

We at least seem not to disagree too much about how the affair should be conducted. When I arrived at Greg's house he told me that he and Rachel would prefer not to have the church service and instead just have the service at the crematorium. I agreed immediately. I look askance at our parent's church. After over two decades of attendance and contribution to it, they have been all but ignored by it. I would be very cynical about anyone from the church who now turned up at the funeral to show how much they cared.

We met with the undertaker, and what ensued was one of the most excruciating meetings I have ever attended. She addressed us in approved deferential tones, and we embarked on the agenda. Details of dad's birth and marriage, ancestors and descendants were divulged, and then the discussion switched to funeral options. This is where it began to get difficult. Greg and I both feel that since dad is gone whatever respects we had to show to him should have, and in fact were, shown in the final few days of his life. The remaining acts now boil down to disposal of the body. I personally feel all questions of music, flowers, decorations, cars, personnel, ashes, public notices, and so on are meaningless except for one redeeming fact: there are people from overseas who are coming all the way here, and for that reason alone we need to have some event to mark the occasion. By that criterion we tried to answer the questions honestly and appropriately, but it still left plenty of room for awkwardness.

For example, simply deciding that there ought to be flowers on the coffin led to the subsidiary questions of how many flowers, what types, what to do with them afterwards, who might want them (we all had to say yes or no to this) and whether if other people would like them how we would go about getting them there.

Music: dad's favourite songs are all incredibly inappropriate - ABBA, Boney M, for example. He regularly used to sing 'John Brown's body lies a-mouldering in the grave' and would enjoy listening to Strauss's Death and Transfiguration on Sunday afternoons. Rachel seemed unable to decide, so I went through the astonishingly badly spelt list of musical pieces the undertaker proferred and chose Ave Maria, Nessun Dorma, and Vivaldi's Four Seasons. We are not going to be having hymns.

The most awkward part of the process was deciding the wording of the public notice (since Rachel thought we should have one). The undertaker wanted an adjective to complete the following phrase 'Don Pritchard, ... husband of Irene'. She suggested 'dear' and 'beloved'. Rachel seemed not to like either of these. I suggested 'forgotten' since we had apparently departed from the path of being conformist at this stage, and thought that maybe verity was called for, but we eventually decided on 'dear'. Then we had to think up different adjectives for '... father of' and '... granddad of'. It seemed ludicrous and, having been on the verge of excusing myself and going down the road to have a cup of coffee while the rest of the decisions were made, I had great trouble staying.

It wasn't upsetting. My reaction was one of exasperation and black amusement, I think.

We've settled on Thursday, at 11:45 am. The cremation will take place in North Ryde, at a crematorium I once used to pass every day on the way to work. I have asked that Rachel and Greg handle all the dealings with the minister or the celebrant, whichever is chosen to host the service. I can't offer anything constructive and I feel that the time spent considering the niceties of the event is eating away my time to think about dad. If we really had proper rituals we wouldn't have to go through all this, we would just follow the ritual. Our recent attempts to make funerals 'personal' has created a monster.

Dad will be attended by his four children, his three grandchildren, possibly a friend of Greg's who has known us for about three decades, and whoever is picked up by the public notice. We did not even raise the question of whether mum should come. I ought to contact all the masonic lodges that dad belonged to, but finding the addresses of them all entails going through the huge box of masonic material that I have collected and I am just not sure I want to do that this week.

The arrangements begin

Mike — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 20:36:00 +1000

Since staying up all night with dad I have been sleeping during the day and awake all night. I went to bed at about 8 am this morning and woke at about 4 pm. A hard black thought intruded like a stab in the soft cloudiness of waking: 'my dad is dead'.

I've avoided contact with friends today; only two of them know about the death, one local and one in the USA, and right now I don't want to talk about it, so I won't be telling anyone else soon.

I've just tried to stay quiet. I've talked to all my siblings by phone today, about the schedule, and distributed an email telling most of our cousins about the death - and that is about it. I must say that I want nothing to do with the flood of details that now pop up. None of the questions such as whether to hold a service, when, in what form, and who should be involved has any importance to me. We have at least agreed to schedule the funeral for later rather than sooner. By state law it must not take place more then seven working days after death. That gives us until Friday of next week.

Rachel, Greg and I will assemble at Greg's house at 10:45 tomorrow and then meet the undertakers at 11 am. My main function is to provide the vital statistics necessary for the death certificate.

Aftermath

Mike — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 00:48:00 +1000

Although I needed to sleep quite badly, I instead got ready to go and see dad one last time. I made sure I had breakfast first, then drove up to my office to get the funeral papers. From there I drove across Sydney to the retirement home. noting with some amusement that I took a slightly longer route than I should have. Obviously my mind is not entirely on what I am doing.

I often wondered how I would feel at this time, and now I know. The unexpected aspect is the variability. One moment I feel perfectly composed and practical, and the next I have a lump in my throat and am fighting back tears that I never thought I would shed. I kept saying to myself 'my dad died this morning', but it seemed almost to have no import.

When I got to the retirement village I gave the undertaker's contact details to the manager there, and then said I would like to go and see dad. She left me alone with him. This was my first real experience with a dead body, but it did not seem strange at all. Even the paradoxical facts that dad as we knew him was finally and irreversibly gone, but that everything physical was still there, looking very much as he had looked these last few days, did not seem disturbing. In fact, there was nothing scary about it at all, and I had no qualms about touching the body as if dad were still alive. I even said, aloud in the empty room, 'dad, if you can still hear me, this really is goodbye'. An amazing response for an avowed atheist and philosophical materiallst.

Dad's face was already looking slightly yellower, and his skin had that waxy pallor that I have read about so many times. His eyes were still half open, and his mouth agape, just as he had been all night. And now, I recalled that for a long time this morning, in the hours just before he died, there had been a tear on his face, just less than an inch from the corner of his left eye. I'd seen it there and attributed it to a purely physiological reaction, the eye protecting itself while not being able to benefit from frequent blinking. Now I wonder about that tear, and I wonder just what he knew about his situation in the last few hours. Was he aware of his own imminent death, and was he holding it back to spare us, or was he simply intent on not dying with someone watching him? Was he still able to hear and think, and know that he couldn't answer, and impotently burn against the frustration of this? We will never know and it is pointless to speculate.

Afterwards, I went to see mum. Although the residents in her section were involved in a communal activity, mum was sitting alone, at a table, with half a glass of orange juice in front of her. She looked terribly weary. I said to her: 'you look as if you've been up all night, too, mum.'

She smiled and mumbled a few things to me. I felt so sad for her; unable to appreciate her loss after all these years, blissfully ignorant of the loss, in just the last few months, of her best friend Ruth, her husband of 65 years, her house and all her belongings.

I got up after just five minutes and said goodbye to her. I don't think we should even try to start telling her what has happened.

Next, I went to mum and dad's house, and collected the mail. It made me realise we have a significant mopping-up operation ahead of us now: informing organisations that dad has died, and so on.

And after that I headed home, stopping on the way to buy milk and bread, and indulging myself with an ice-cream, which I ate sitting in the car in the car park. Feeling that after all that has happened, I just wanted to indulge myself with a simple trivial pleasure.

It was mid-afternoon when I got home. I finally went to bed for a few hours, to awake later feeling strangely dislocated, in a kind of limbo. I've been busying myself with small tasks that can be done on the computer, such as writing this entry and sending the recent photographs to those to whom they will mean the most.

It appears very likely that all of Derek's family, currently in Moscow, Munich and England will be flying out here over the weekend for the funeral which we anticipate will be held early next week.

Overnight vigil

Mike — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 11:59:00 +1000

21:15 I arrived. Flute music was playing on the radio. Dad's breathing was rapid and rasping (46 breaths per minute). His eyes were open.
21:36 Breathing 46/min. Blinking maybe once per minute. He groaned.
22:30 Two nurses came in to turn dad and swab his mouth. I saw that the discolouration of his legs went 2/3 of the way up his shins.
22:40 Breathing getting harder.
23:10 Breathing 46/min.
23:18 I wonder how long he can keep this hard breathing up. It is as if he has finished a long-distance race, but cannot ever recover like a runner would. Every few minutes his breath catches and he takes a bigger one.
23:35 I had a snack.
23:55 A nurse moistened dad's mouth with the swab and applied lip balm.
00:15 I took a short video of dad, using my phone.
00:20 I got a small reaction out of dad when I spoke to him. His pupils appeared very dilated, so I switched the light off again, since he was staring right at it.
00:25 The nurses came in to turn, swab, and apply balm. I asked why dad's tongue looked so scabby. One of the nurses said that it is just because of the way he is breathing, which dries out his mouth - and hence the swabs. When he was turned, dad's breathing suddenly went very quiet, almost silent. One of the nurses and I both looked sharply at dad to see whether he had stopped.
00:40 I had some more coffee.
00:49 47/min.
00:58 I did some stretching.
01:03 Dad groaned.
01:06 I reminded dad of the week I stayed with him at his flat in Virginia Water, in maybe 1980 or 1981. It was a good week.
01:17 A nurse came in to swab. Dad wanted to swallow some of the water, so she gave him a little more, but not enough to choke on.
01:57 50/min.
02:00 I had a snack.
02:07 50/min.
02:18 50/min.
02:25 The nurses came in to turn, swab and apply balm. One of them massaged his feet.
02:33-03:35 I read my novel.
03:37 44/min.
04:10 I sent an email to a friend.
04:12 I put the heater on.
04:18 The nurses came in to turn, swab and apply balm. Dad's breathing went very quiet again.
04:28 I drank some coffee.
05:05 A nurse came in to swab and balm.
05:10 Dad groaned.
05:18 I did some stretching.
05:22 I had a snack and started to read again.
06:00 A nurse came in to swab and balm.
06:27 48/min.
06:28 The nurses came in to turn, swab and apply balm.
06:30 Greg sent an SMS 'How is dad doing?' I replied 'same'.
08:02 A friend called to see how I was doing.
08:10 The manager came in to see dad and swab his mouth.
08:30 Greg called to see whether I would stay for a bit longer.
09:00 Greg arrived with coffee.
09:10 I left for home.

I got home at about 10 am. I called a friend and began this blog entry. At 11:35 Greg called, in tears, unable to speak.
'Is it dad?' I asked.
'Yes.'
'Is he dead?'
'Yes,' he said.

I said I would come over, and asked him to take it easy. He told me the home is going to notify Rachel.

It looks as if dad held on to die on his own.

Saying goodbye

Mike — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 20:05:00 +1000

When I spoke to Greg this morning, he was already in dad's room, and said he would wait until I got there.

When I arrived, dad was lying with his head turned to the room, breathing hoarsely, but continuously and fairly evenly. His eyes were half-open, but unblinking. Two of the staff had just finished tending to him and they told me that a morphine patch had been applied to his back. His head was very skull-like, due, no doubt, to the dehydration, since he is neither eating nor drinking much at all now. Later, as I was on my way out I stuck my head around the manager's door and she told me that when it gets to this stage, when food and drink cannot be administered normally, then it is usually less than forty-eight hours until people die. She had been surprised, she said, that dad was still alive this morning.

But before then, just after I arrived, I spent some time talking to Greg, who was clearly upset. I just reminded him that this was probably the time to say goodbye, and he said he had already spent some time doing that, talking to dad and going over some good memories, that he had now recalled. We talked about those times and I realised that the were indeed rather good. I used them later when I talked to dad alone too. Greg said that he would come back later in the day, after work, and left me alone with dad.

I sat next to the bed and said something like the following:

Hello, dad. It's Mike, your son. We know you're not doing too well at the moment and we don't know how long you are going to be with us. We are all hoping the best for you, but it is probably a good idea to say some goodbyes now.

You did a good job. You gave us all a good life, and you kept a roof over mum's head for 60 years. You travelled all over the world, like you wanted to. We are all OK now, and mum is being looked after properly, so you have nothing to worry about.

I remember when we lived in South Africa and you bought that above-ground swimming pool for Greg and I. We loved that. And I remember the day you bought me a complete set of fishing tackle on my brithday. That was great. And we had those two dogs, Patch and Toby, and the siamese cat, Jason. You used to get home from work early, while it was till light, and Greg and I used to wait for your car to come around the corner, hiding in a big hole the builders had left behind. We had some good times while we were there, and a fantastic holiday driving around Rhodesia.

So you've got every right to be happy with what you did. You helped all of us out in the times when we needed that, and we appreciate it. You've had a good run; you're 87, and you've outlived all your brothers, who were all younger than you. So, it looks like you're going now, dad. We don't want you to, but there isn't much we can do about it any more. We just have to accept that it is time. And we can all look after ourselves now, thanks to you.

We are all going to keep coming in to see you. Greg was here earlier, and Rachel will be over soon, too. Then Greg will come back this evening. And in a minute, I am going to go next door and bring mum in. You would like that, wouldn't you?

I brought mum over and she was content to sit next to the bed. She seemed to have a little glimmer of an idea of what was going on, but she didn't take dad's hand this time. She may have been a little upset at one moment, but I could have imagined it. it was nothing more than the momentaryl distress she often seems to feel for no apparent reason. It was rather like before. I reminded them that they had been married for 65 years, and that they had four children, who I named one by one. Mum didn't appear to follow what I was saying but she did follow that I was talking about her. I stood beside her with my hand on her shoulder as she sat slightly slumped in the chair. This may have been their last time together, so I took another photograph of them. After 10 minutes or so she moved to get up, so I helped her back to her area of the village and returned to see dad.

I reminded dad that we were all going to be coming in to see him, and that all he had to do was lie still and rest. It was approaching noon at that stage, the time at which Rachel said she would be arriving, so I left, so that she could have some time alone with dad too.

I didn't sleep much last night, so when I got back home at about 1 pm, I went straight to bed. It is now 8 pm, and I have just finished having dinner. Greg called twice this afternoon and told me how he'd found dad. It appears that he is gradually worsening.

I am about to make some sandwiches and fill my thermos flasks with coffee, grab a book for some light reading, and a notebook, and head back over to stay with dad tonight. I have the feeling that his time has come and he won't be here in the morning.

A step closer

Mike — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 22:13:00 +1000

Greg called today. The manager of the section that is looking after dad had called. She said that dad was going to be put on morphine, to try to relieve his restlessness, which, it is thought, is caused by mounting discomfort. She told Greg that she thought that things would be 'sooner rather than later' (the sort of vague metaphors that start to pepper dialogue concerning someone about to die). Greg decided to go and see dad this evening.

Apparently, the manager had called Rachel earlier in the day, but Rachel has been too upset to speak to either Greg or me, and the manager had then called Greg and asked him to pass the information on.

Greg asked me when I was going to visit, and I said I would go in the morning. He seemed not to like this answer, asking 'what are you doing now?'

I called Greg later in the evening and he gave me a rather terse report. He'd been shown the blotchiness of dad's hands and feet; a sign, apparently, of imminent death. I don't know whether this is verbatim or not. The morphine had not yet started. Dad has lost his swallow reflex - a serious step towards complete shutdown, I imagine. He didn't take mum in for dad.

I'll call Greg again in the morning, as his visit is likely to occur before mine.

Good visit

Mike — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 21:31:00 +1000

When I entered dad's room this afternoon, he barely reacted. The room was warm and the curtains were drawn. It seemed clear that dad had been left to sleep. I bent over and touched him, and told him who I was and that I'd come to visit him, that he just needed to rest and get well, and that we were all looking after him. No reaction. I counted his breaths and timed the pauses. No change.

Then something quite surprising happened. Dad was struggling to move his arms, trying to push them under the sheet, perhaps.
'What's up, dad?' I asked. And in a voice barely audible, I heard him say:
'I don't know what's wrong.' Probably one of the truest things he's ever said. It then occurred to me that it might be a good idea to bring mum in again.

I went next door and looked for her. At first it looked as if she wasn't in the common room. Then I saw her sitting on her own in a small circle of chairs in a back corner. I went over and spoke to her, startling her somewhat. She reached for my hand and stood up. We started to walk out and she seemed to be in very good spirits, smiling at most things and walking quite fast. Unfortunately, just as we got into dad's part of the village, one of the residents shouted out loudly, which made her jump, but even then she didn't get locked into that unfocussed anxiety that she often experiences.

Once inside dad's room, mum went straight to the bed. Dad appeared to recognise her, but there was little reaction.I cleared the chair and brought it up to the bed for mum and she began sidling out of the way, not realising that it was for her. When I got her settled I took one of dad's arms and tried to pull it nearer. He resisted initially, until I told him to relax his arm, then he let me place it by mum. Mum took his hand without being asked.

'That's mum holding your hand, dad,' I said.
I kept reminding them that they had known each other for nearly 70 years. Mum nodded. I don't know if she knew what I was talking about. I took a few photographs of them together. Neither of them seemed to really look much at the other except, in mum's case, when prompted.

After a few minutes, during which I reassured dad that we would bring mum to visit him often, and encouraged him to get better so he could get up on his feet again, I led mum back to her area. She was still cheerful, with no apparent concern for dad. She showed a lot of delighted interest in a baby that some visitors wheeled by in a pram. Back home, I took her to the desk and suggested that one of the staff might like to change her, at which mum shifted her attention to her, and I backed out again.

This was a great visit, unlike the previous one. Alone in a room of their own (despite one confused resident wandering in at one point) they were able to just be quiet with each other, undistracted by noises and movements. It seemed to do dad a bit of good and no harm to mum. And, on top of all that, it gave me something apparently useful to do.

Fading picture

Mike — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 15:01:00 +1000

I received a call from Rachel at 8:30 this morning, to say that the retirement village had called her with the news that dad had gone into renal failure.

Rachel sounded upset, and was getting ready to go over to see dad straight away. I resolved to do the same thing, and we arrived there about the same time. Dad was flat on his back in bed, his bed extension was in place. He was slightly restless, not much. And he showed almost no signs of recognition when we spoke to him and announced that we were there.

Over the next 90 minutes, we watched him. His breathing pattern has shifted somewhat - for the worse, I think. He is breathing maybe 9 to 15 times and then not breathing for 45 seconds. Towards the end of this spell he often started to raise his arms high off the bed, as if to get something off his chest, as if he felt his lungs were being compressed. The staff and nurses kept popping in every 10 minutes or so, to give him some liquid, move him, leave things for him, and so on. One thing that absolutely amazed me was when two of the retirement village staff came in and moved dad. They were so gentle and soft with him, one even kissing him before they left. It was touching.

Meanwhile, Rachel and I could do nothing. We talked to dad and patted him on the shoulder, but there was barely any sign that he knows we are there. One eye is shut and the other is open just a fraction, but not over the pupil.We didn't get a single coherent word out of him all the time we were there. He seems to be going, but he's recovered before. And we don't know how long any of this is going to take.

I left first and went to see mum, but she was having lunch and I therefore decided not to disturb her. I drove over to the house and checked progress: very little. Rachel then turned up too. I answered a call from Greg and filled him in on the day. He is out of town today, and wanted to hear what the doctor has got to say. Then, finally, I collected the mail from the mailbox and drove home. It was after 2 pm when I got here.

The funny thing is that I feel completely resolved about all this. Dad is dying, and I am reconciled to it. In fact, now when I look back I feel that this blog has served over the last two years for me to air all my thoughts and feelings about mum and dad, their lives and their imminent deaths. It is not as if death now is a surprise, since it is inevitable in any case, cannot be too far off for either of them, and we pretty much knew that it is not Alzheimers disease that kills people, but the concomitant conditions brought on by forgetting how to do one thing after another, until even the basics are beyond the sufferer, and losing the power of recognition and therefore the ability to react or respond correctly to the world around them - leading to accidents, sedentary lifestyles, poor diet, poor hygiene, and a host of other problems that we have been trying to mitigate. So, this current situation was to be expected at one level and, at one level, I expected it. The fact that is has been a particular sequence of events starting in May with dad, leading to two stays at the hospital and two big drops, now possibly a third, in capability, was the unpredictable part, but that is now with us, and no longer requires a preamble. I hope Greg and Rachel feel the same way, but I suspect not. I wonder how Derek feels, so far away from all this and hearing only our second-hand reports.

I took a photograph of dad today, lying in bed, looking very thin, mouth agape. I was thinking that it may be the last living photograph we have of him. I must remember to take others each time I visit.

How to mess it all up in 20 mins

Mike — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 00:36:00 +1000

Busy on Wednesday, I postponed my visit to see dad until Thursday. The drive takes about 40 minutes to an hour, so I always hope that there is going to be some reason for the visit to be prolonged more than a few minutes, otherwise the journey seems excessive. I aimed to get to the retirement village at 4 pm. I walked in and was pleased to see dad sitting in the common room, dressed in a bright red flannel shirt and looking relatively normal compared to the others around him. There was evidence that he had wet himself, and that the nappy that all the residents wear was leaking a bit. He recognised me and immediately said hello, and then, 'I want to get out of this place.' I couldn't look him in the eye. I said 'you are going to have to get a bit better first, dad.' He didn't understand this. I made a bit of smalltalk, asking him how he was, and so on. I asked him about the walking frame in front of him, whether it was his, despite the fact that I could see it was labelled with his name. A few minutes later he asked to be taken out of there again. And again, I had to look away, knowing as I did so that my aversion to the question was something he might sense even if he cannot see or hear properly. I had been thinking of bringing mum in to see him, partly because of the possibility that it might be her last chance, and partly because it would undoubtedly be motivating for dad. Now, even though dad is recovering well and things are looking a lot better for him, it seemed the best thing to do to keep his mind off getting out.

'I'll bring mum in to see you in a few minutes, dad.'
'Is she here?'
'Yes. Just next door. Sit here and I'll go and bring her to you.'

On the way out I caught the eye of a member of staff. I told her that I was going next door to get my mother and that perhaps it would be good if a seat were placed next to my dad so that she could sit there.

Mum was taking part in a sing-song ('Wonderful, Wonderful Copenhagen') but when she saw me she got up and left the group. She came over for a hug, and I walked her out of her area, into dad's next door. She was already getting nervous as we approached the door. Once inside she became more apprehensive. The people in dad's area are a bit louder and apparently less docile. It has not as relaxed an atmosphere as mum's area.

As we entered dad's common room I saw that a chair had been placed next to him, but that a woman was just about to occupy it. She had barely begun to bend into it when another woman stepped forward and stopped her. 'Oh, good,' I though, 'they've been told not to sit there.' But as I watched, slowly walking mum towards it, the other woman sat down in it herself. When mum and I got over to dad, he recognised her and reached both arms up towards her. Mum stepped forward and bent down, putting her arms out to dad. In slow motion, they closed in on each other and dad kissed mum on the cheek. Then, the effort of leaning forward having tired him, dad sat back and they held hands, mum leaning over dad awkwardly. I turned to the woman who had sat down next to dad, and said:

'Would you mind letting my mother have that chair so that she can sit next to her husband?'
'No, I'm not going to do that,' she replied.

Well, I know there is no point trying to reason with people with dementia, once they have their mind set on something, but as mum and I stood there, this woman appeared to become irritated with us taking her space.

'You know, it really would be much easier if you just let my mother sit there,' I said.
'No, I'm not going to do that,' she repeated.

I was irritated, to say the least. I turned mum and led her to two adjacent empty chairs on the far side of the room. I sat her down and tried to calm her - saying that she should just stay there for a few minutes and I would bring dad over. Already, she seemed to be losing the sense of what I was saying, and was wringing her hands. I went back to dad and urged him up out of his chair, and got his weight over the walker. He is able to push it forward, but his steering is not that good. I had to keep wrenching it to the side while at the same time supporting a lot of his weight. We negotiated our way through the sprawled legs and discarded walkers and soon reached mum. I turned dad around and got him to fold his frame and settle into the chair. But, he just slumped right down, completely exhausted, and wouldn't open his eyes. I tried to get him to sit up, even bodily lifting him, at which point the member of staff reappeard to tell me that was all wrong.

We managed to get dad into a half sitting, half slumped position, but his eyes were closed.

'Open your eyes, dad. Mum is here and she will be going in a few minutes.' But dad was out of it, and now mum was getting quite distraught, apparently afraid of dad. Dad had been sitting on a cushion to either absorb urine or ease the pressure on his bones, but even though I went back to get it, I couldn't get it under him. The first need then became getting mum out of there before she really got upset. I walked her back next door. As I went through the gate, a wild-eyed woman was shouting 'someone's fallen over in the street.' At first, I put this down to demented delusion, but then I saw down at the far end of the facility a door was open and what looked like a body was slumped on the floor inside. I left mum and went down to see what was wrong. A lady had fallen over after using the toilet, and was being helped to her feet by two old men. It looked very much as if the three of them were going to fall over again, together this time. I pulled the lady's pants up, and positioned her with her hands on the basin, and the two men holding her at the elbows. I went back to the desk and told the staff what had happened. They both just looked at me as if I had said, 'the sky is blue'.

The next time I looked at mum she was miles away, and had apparently forgotten I was there. So, I left. I'd planned on being there for maybe an hour, but it was all over in less than 20 minutes.

Result: dad exhausted, mum distraught, me frustrated.

Dad's prognosis

Mike — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 21:14:00 +1000

I went see dad, and mum, today.

As I arrived, dad was just being put to bed. He'd been up and sitting in the common room, had been able to support his own weight on a frame, and had been eating a bit more too. One of the staff told me that he had heard dad say several words clearly. Everyone agrees that dad has improved.

And now perhaps a pattern has emerged.

Each time dad has been to the hospital his condition has worsened substantially. Each time he has been discharged, he has suddenly started to recover. Even if I had not already lost all regard for the hospital, I would be wondering about this. I now think that the hospital is the worse place for dad, unless he has an emergency. From what I have seen and heard of their treatment, it is harsh, aggressive, and not adapted to dementia patients. The drugs are administered automatically. The cot sides are put on beds, despite the fact that dementia patients try to climb through them, get stuck and strip their skin trying to get out, or fall over while part of their body is sticking through the bars and break their bones. The casual meals, the scant bedding, the disregard of cries for help and inarticulate vocalisations all add up to a dangerous, alarming and inimical environement. The discharge papers showed that the hospital staff could not find any reason why dad was so dopy. They fixed the chest infection which was a consequence of his congestive cardiac failure, and noted that his frontal and temporal lobes are atrophied, but had nothing more to suggest.

Greg and I had a 90-minute meeting with the manager of the facility which looks after both mum and dad. We shared our view of the hospital and, surprisingly, it found sympathetic ears. We have now agreed with the manager that if dad's condition begins to fail, she should just make arrangements to make him as comfortable as possible where he is, rather than send him to hospital. The hospital cares nothing for comfort, it simply works in problem-solving mode. General systems decay, which is what dad appears to be suffering from, cannot be solved. It therefore lies outside the hospital's area. They have no interest in old-age care, and so dad is better off staying where he is. The manager is happy with this and feels that although he is almost certainly a nursing home case, there are no beds available right now, and so arrangements are being made to keep dad: a bed extension has been ordered (he's too tall for the bed when the back is raised), the staff are turning him over every two hours. He is receiving physiotherapy. I am actually very happy with what is being done here now.

Apparently, old people who enter this end-phase of general systems failure can remain in the state for several years, or simply die in their sleep within weeks. We therefore have no reliable estimate of how long dad has.

I sat in dad's room for quite a long time today, occasionally speaking to him, occasionally getting a groan or mumble in reply. To pass the time I began counting dad's breaths. He breathes quite heavily for 16 -17 breaths, then stops breathing for 26-31 seconds. This cycle just repeats over and over again. It is quite regular. He was eating very little, and what food he did eat seemed to be a labour for him. I am inclined to say that if he doesn't want food, we should just not push it on him. If he starts to die through the inevitable malnutrition, so be it. It was rather painful watching him grimace and moan as food was pushed into his mouth this evening. He spat a lot of it out.

I went to see mum. She was well dressed in a blue dress and beige cardigan, and was standing with some other women. She recognised me and we just walked around the facility together. She seemed to be in quite good spirits. Later, the staff brought out cheese and ham sandwiches and mugs off milky tea. Mum was very interested in this, so I sat her down at one of the tables and the staff gave her what she wanted. While whe focussed on her sandwich, I quietly slipped out. I'd spent nearly three hours there altogether today, the longest ever for me. It was a relatively reassuring visit.

Seeing with my own eyes

Mike — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 01:15:00 +1000

Finally, after being warned off by norovirus, and a day spent waiting for the message from the hospital that never came, I saw dad. Rachel, Greg and I had agreed to meet at the village at 2 pm. I saw Rachel's car ahead of me as I drove down the street beside the retirement village, and we met in the car park.

I was keen to go straight in to see dad, but we talked for quite a while at the office. What struck me about this conversation was that when I asked whether dad was better or worse than when he went into hospital, I was told that he was the same. 'So, there was no incident of unconsciousness, or him falling out of his chair?' I asked. 'Oh, I tell a lie. Yes, there was that. Twice on the day we called for the ambulance I found him flat on his back on the floor beside his chair.' So, I felt I just had to see for myself.

Dad was in bed, with the oxygen tubes in his nostrils. The nurse was just raising his feet a little. Dad was weak, incoherent, and uncoordinated. He looked for all the world like a baby, unable to control his limbs, restless, making sounds, not words, and completely helpless. The nurse pointed out some juice that had been left for dad, then left. Rachel came in a minute later.

We tried talking to dad, but there was little sign that he was able to understand, although he clearly knew we were there. Soon, Greg turned up. We interpreted dad's restlessness as physical discomfort, so we tried raising him up the bed, straightening his legs, raising and lowering the sheet. Nothing really seemed to make any difference. His legs are going oedematic, so they are swollen and dark, and must be uncomfortable.

Here is the situation:

Dad's heart is failing. It is enlarged, and pumping poorly, which is why his blood pressure is all over the scale.
His brain is either deteriorating badly or is starved of oxygen, so he cannot help himself, cannot speak, cannot feed himself or support himself.
His lungs are filling with fluid, and his breathing is rather laboured, with pauses for quite long spells, then starts up again.

All in all, a pretty serious combination: cardiac, cognitive, and respiratory failure.

The people at the hospital don't think he is ill enough to stay there, or cannot be treated. The people at the hostel think he is too ill to stay there, and cannot be given the level of care he needs. Somewhere in between the two there must be another place for him - presumably the nursing home. The hostel is looking after him for a short time, probably until monday. At that time they will, if he has not rallied, almost certainly send him to the nursing home.

We shall see what they decide. Dad clearly needs a higher level of care now, and whether this is available at the nursing home, or requires a full-time personal nurse, we do not yet know.

We put the friction of the past week completely behind us. I also wanted to avoid any talk about what had happened or who was to blame, and focus purely on one subject: what do we do now?

Having someone in the room who appears to be very close to dying changes everything. You can't make jokes, you can't talk about a quick end, a merciful release, or anything like that. All you can do is talk to the person and tell them that you are there to look after them. Dad seemed to want this. At one time I moved my hand near his and I saw his move to meet mine - so I just put mine over his, on the sheet. I looked at the two hands together - clearly of the same stock, one much older and more swollen than the other.

Outside in the carpark we wondered whether we could have done any better. I don't think we had any better solutions, really. When we moved dad into the village we really thought that he would take to it as well as he had taken to day care. In fact, we sometimes described it as 'day care every day' and dad seemed to be looking forward to it.

The odd thing was that Greg said that when he was alone with dad this week he had tried to think of good times they had spent together and just couldn't think of much. It's the same for me. Dad didn't show a lot of interest in any of us, but I didn't feel I was missing anything at the time and do not feel deprived now. In fact, I was rather proud of my father, and still am. It surprises me when my siblings seem to feel a kind of resentment towards dad. I never felt anything like that, but I appear to be the only one.

We all went next door to see mum. She had just eaten some cake, as it was somebody's birthday today, and was very pleased to see us. We 'chatted' with her. She was alert and seeing things taking place around the room. The contrast between her and dad was incredibly graphic. Ultimately, mum got teary, and I noticed that she seemed to be suffering from tactile hallucinations again - trying to get rid of 'something' on her hand.

Later in the afternoon, I went back to the house. The builders have already started. An enormous wardrobe in the smallest bedroom has been demolished and piled outside. The carpet has been removed and the floorboards are bare. The last remaining curtain has been torn down. Somehow this seems like an improvement. The carpet was a palimsest on which all the spills and accidents of our parents final days were written. The stains had sunk right through in some places and left marks on the floorboards below. I predict that when the house is finished it will appear to have absolutely nothing to do with us any more.

Another day

Mike — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 19:25:00 +1000

Greg sent me a message early this morning to say that the hospital had called him. He'd been informed that dad was to be discharged today. Later, he called to say that an ambulance had been ordered for 1 pm, to drive dad back to the retirement village. He suggested that I call the hospital after this time to check whether dad had actually left.

I called the hospital at about 1:30 pm. Dad was still there. I was told that the hospital would call me when he left. I gave them my number. It is now 5 pm. Even if they call now to say he is leaving, it would be about 7 pm before I could get there. Too late. Another day gone.

I am getting tired of not knowing what is going on and why.

Later...

At about 7 pm, Greg called to say that dad was back at the retirement village, having arrived at about 6:30 pm. So, once again, the medical 'industry' has let us down.

Dad is on oxygen, at the rate of 2 litres per minute. His heart is failing. It seems very much as if he has been sent home to die. Greg and I are going over to see him together, at 2 pm tomorrow.

Every time I hear something about dad it is a twist in the tale. The message from the hospital was that dad's condition had improved and he would be home early. Now, he has only just arrived and appears to be entering a life-support phase. It is not at all reassuring. I am at the point where I feel like refusing to let another doctor interfere with dad.

Bad news, bad blood

Mike — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 19:43:00 +1000

I called Greg this evening merely to tell him that my phone had been reconnected, and asked if he had seen dad. In a rather flat voice he told me that he had been into give dad his dinner and breakfast today and yesterday. He added that he thought dad would never get out of there alive. When I asked why, he began to sound impatient and said that dad was barely conscious, 'off with the pixies'. He told me that on entering the ward he had heard someone calling out 'Help me! Help me!' and discovered that it was dad, and that everyone there was just pressing on with whatever they were doing as if nothing was happening. Dad had got both his legs out of the bed but was, apparently unable to get up or get back into bed properly. Greg helped him back in. This is, Greg says, how he has been ever since he was admitted.

This comes as a complete shock to me. I'd been under the impression, as I'd described here, that dad had been sent to hospital for precautionary reasons, that the hospital had not found anything they could treat and wanted to discharge him, and that the retirement village was refusing to have him back until the norovirus outbreak was overcome. It didn't sound particularly serious or worrying.

Now Greg told me that dad had been slumped in his chair at the retirement village, had fallen somehow, and that this is why his blood pressure had been taken so frequently, and how it had been determined, I presume, to have been fluctuating wildly. Nothing of this had been mentioned to me at the retirement village when I visited there on Tuesday. And of course when I had asked Greg questions about the onset of the condition, and whatever the condition had been a few days ago, he had been unable to tell me. Somewhere along the line a lot of information got lost.

When I began asking questions again, such as what drugs dad was on, and when dad's condition had suddenly deteriorated, Greg began to sound defensive. And when I said what a surprise this information was to me, he retorted 'Well, it would have helped if you'd had your phone on.'

So, that appears to be what the strange tone was all about. I was at fault for not having kept up to date with the developments. I responded that nothing I had been told until now had indicated that there was much to keep up to date with, but that I would go to see dad tomorrow. 'Do whatever you like,' was the response.

I took exception to that, and said that of course I would 'do what I like', but a second or two later Greg interrupted and repeated that I could do whatever I wanted to do and hung up on me.

This surprises me. I understand that Greg is upset about dad. I do not understand his attitude to me. I don't understand either why, despite numerous entreaties from Rachel and I, he simply never took most of his belongings from mum and dad's house, that it was left to Rachel to take most of them up to his house.

People handle unusual situations in unusual ways, I suppose. But none of this has made anything easier for us.

Final clearance

Mike — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 22:32:00 +1000

I met the people from the St Vincent de Paul charity this afternoon. Everything was ready for them, and it took less than half an hour for them to carry everything out and load it in their van. What was then left is as follows:

Things Greg will take soon

- 3-piece suite

- tallboy

- 3-door wardrobe

- metal safe

- knitting machine (for sale on ebay)

Things that remain to be thrown away

- dishwasher

- trestle table

- mattress-supporting sheet of particle board

- oil-filled heater (now out on the footpath, deliberately inviting robbery)

- three doors

- garden junk (old gates, bricks, bits of timber)

Things that may be usefully left (some indefinitely)

- cooker
- white cupboard in the laundry

- small selection of tools

- boxes of keys

I almost never thought I would see the day. Ever since I first saw this house, it has been packed solid with family possessions. Now it is about to start a new life.

Once I had finished, I drove up to the retirement village. I'd taken the big trunk of slides and prints, the slide and film projectors, and the contents of dad's filing cabinet. That is it for me.

Dad was still in hospital. As seems to be the way with the medical profession, situations just get more complicated. There is a norovirus outbreak at the hospital and no-one is leaving, least of all anyone going to a retirement facility. I was told that I could visit, but I would have to wear gown and gloves and would not really be welcome. Moreover, after I'd visited, I would be barred freom re-entering the retirement village. Dad, therefore, is in isolation until the norovirus has been cleared out.

Mum seemed distraught and teary. I kept holding her hand and telling her it was all right, but it didn't really have any effect. She cheered up a bit after a walk. She seemed to be suffering tactile hallucinations, constantly trying to get something off her hand. I stayed until she got up and wandered away from me, then slipped out quietly. It seems the easiest way to depart.

In a bit of a bad way

Mike — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 02:04:00 +1000

Although dad has improved slowly since his disastrous encounter with Zyprexa, he is, as they say, a shadow of his former self.

He doesn't sleep properly, but gets up several times during the night and wanders around. The staff have tried taking him back to bed over and over again, hoping that one night he will simply adopt the practice of sleeping when he is supposed to, but just recently they have been putting a blanket over him and letting him sleep in chairs in the common room since, this way, he apparently spends more time asleep. One consequence of this is that he has been developing fluid retention in the legs, as he is rarely sleeping in a horizontal position.

He has been dopy during the day. This may be another consequence of not sleeping properly, though he never did sleep that much at home. However, it has triggered what I think is a healthy reduction in his Risperidone dose. He had been getting 1 mg each evening in an attempt to get him to sleep. Since it wasn't working, it was halved, in an attempt to improve his daytime alertness. Since that initial reduction had no effect, the administration of Risperidone has been stopped altogether. Not a bad development, I say.

But everyone knows things are not right with dad. He is not content or adjusted to the centre. He has apparently lost a great deal of whatever limited hold he had on things around him, and has been shaky and weak, unsteady on his legs, and strangely confused. Last time I went to visit him he asked me how long I had been 'out here' (meaning Australia). He had the idea that I had come out from England to pick him up. Our conversation stumbled along with one of us using this idea as a premise, and one of us trying hard not to be too contradictory, but not too complicit in the delusion either.

We went to visit mum. They recognised each other, and grasped hands. But after sitting together for a few minutes and not talking, mum got up and wandered off to sit somewhere else, apparently having forgotten us completely. I took this as a cue to walk dad back to his area, obviating the need for goodbyes and explanations that mum couldn't come with us. Rachel thinks that mum no longer recognises herself in mirrors. She shows no interest in her reflection at all. The wardrobe in her room is fully mirrored, and Rachel says that she has seen mum try to step into it, as if it is a doorway.

This is, I guess, all part of the endless deterioration of Alzheimers. However, there is more. Yesterday dad was taken back to hospital. The staff have had blood tests done on him, which showed that in a purely physiological way, he is in remarkably good condition. They have also been measuring his blood pressure, and yesterday it had fluctuated so much that they called an ambulance. He went into Emergency at the same hospital he was in last time, after the Zyprexa episode. Greg went to investigate the situation and found the same lack of detail and communication as before. The hospital staff do not see any reason why dad is there, and want to send him back. The retirement village staff appear not to have been very specific about how much his blood pressure was fluctuating, over what time frame, and at what frequency. Moreover, we seem unable to determine just how often they were measureing his blood pressure, or why. Dad, meanwhile, is completely confused about what has been happening to him. He recognised Rachel when she went to see him later in the day, but she says that he appeared to be hallucinating again - grabbing at non-existent things in front of him.

I shall visit the retirement home tomorrow to see mum and find out whether dad has returned. If not, I shall then go over to the hospital and see how he is doing. This all seems so mechanical and unnecessarily disruptive, action on the slimmest of pretexts, and I just wonder how much dad can take of it.

It is tomorrow that the St Vincent de Paul's people are coming to take away the final vestiges of our parents' things. Rachel was at the house yesterday and finished the packing. All I have to do tomorrow is make sure that St Vincent de Paul's take everything, that whatever is left is thrown away, and that the last of the things we have set aside in the small bedroom are all brought back to my place.

According to Rachel quite a few of the items that we put out for people to take have indeed been removed. There were some things that nobody wanted, but which just could not be easily thrown away - like heaters, nearly complete sets of crockery, a VCR, a pair of headphones, and so on. But, given what we see of mum and dad, these things are as useless as a gudgeon without a pintle.