Part Five.

It’s taken me a lot longer than usual too put pen to paper, well fingers to my keypad because in all honesty the last few weeks happiness has found its way back to me slightly.. The sadness I felt consistently most days is a lot less prominent in my bones & body as it used to be & comfort for me now has a new meaning.

Don’t get me wrong I’m still hurting, a LOT.

There are some days where emotionally I feel I have an elephant stood on my chest & my eyes get so full from the tears I hold back you’d think there were 40 peeled onions dangling around my head.

However, snippets of happiness are more frequent now than they have been in recent months..although I will be honest with saying my new normal is still an uneasy feeling for me. Life without mam is very strange & I am finding the firsts difficult.

Writing & sharing allows me to dig deeper into my emotions, so when the waves hit me, they hit hard.

These waves come unexpectedly & I still struggle for finding reasons as to why they hit as hard as they do & why my breath is taken away by surprise from time to time.

All I know for sure is that there’s no real explanation for any of the ways in which I feel, other than grief & I think I’m ok with it. October the 22nd we shared our last evening away together as a family of 5. We ate out at a local pub close to our caravan, where even Max joined us. Mam somehow managed to eat steak and chips that evening, eating a meal for her at this point was really unusual & it’s probably why I remember exactly what she ate.

We got back to the caravan & I had left matching PJ’s on the bed ready for us to wear to bed that evening ..

We all took a photograph to document the occasion & Max smiled for it. I couldn’t wait to share it on my Instagram.. I captioned the picture “Alexa , play Jack Johnson : Better Together“. We really were better together, it’s a fact.

Mam had become stubborn throughout October & had refused visits from family & friends & then November soon came & we needed all the help from family & friends that we could get..

The short weeks that progressed after our last family trip also meant the nature of mams cancer had now progressed & had a a firm hold of the new norm that we had become accustomed too.

It was not letting go, we were losing grip of mam as the days and minutes passed & faster than we had expected.

My social life had also dwindled nearly as quickly as mams abilities had started to.

I really felt I was losing touch with my friends, not because they didn’t make effort because they all did.. but because I had nothing else going on in my life other than mams illness.

Everything I used to do without any consideration such as popping to the shop, meeting friends for coffee, getting my nails done after work on a Friday, going to the gym or even walking the dog all became non-existent.

Making the decision to give up work and become primary carer for Mam happened no suddenly…

Wednesday 10th November I took Mam to a routine appointment in Velindre, we used to go every 3 weeks to review how her Chemotherapy treatment was impacting her.

I’ve not mentioned it until now but Mam had started a tablet form of Chemotherapy in October.

It was a less invasive form of treatment than she had 11 years prior & the aim of the treatment was to prolong Mams life for as long as possible.. I was skeptical about it as I didn’t want it to hinder mams day to day life.. which eventually it did. However, she was willing to try. She longed so badly to have more time with us.

There are a lot of side effects of any illness, and treatment for that matter & gradually as the months went on I educated myself more & more about them.

Eventually to the point where I was able to pick up on patterns in mams tolerance to morphine & when her calcium levels were high or when the fluid had began to build up on her lungs again, this happened a couple of times. During this particular hospital visit we were going for blood results & to check where mams calcium levels were at.This was protocol to enable Mam to continue with her treatment.

On the way down, I chatted with Mam about a couple of things, Francesca’s wedding being one & I also prepared mam for the possibility of IV Fluids this day as I could tell her calcium was very high.

Her behaviour had changed slightly as she was giving me all the warning signs.

Her breathing had also changed within a few days which made me worry that 2litres of fluid she had drained a week prior, had crept its way back in.

I worked from the tent, yes that’s right tent.

Due to covid, patients in receipt of treatment at Velindre often have to wait in the waiting room alone, whilst family members wait In a tent outside. Shocking isn’t it? The fact that we could go to nightclubs but couldn’t sit next to a loved one before nerve wracking appointments used to rattle me.

Anyways.. appointments were running behind significantly this day which hadn’t happened to us before. The nurses and staff were great though, they made us tea & reassured us we had not been forgotten about.

Mam had me worried this day.. & I think this is where I really hit a turning point with the start of my grief.

She had been sick in the morning in between me muting & unmuting my teams call whilst doing her make up.

She was also sick at the hospital & she really found it difficult to sit in her wheelchair for this prolonged period of time.. & to top it off as expected her calcium levels were sky high. She needed to stay in for a few hours for fluids & to have an X-ray on her chest.

I left her behind at the hospital only for a short number of hours but it felt like a lifetime.. I waited in the village hotel & worked a little more. Meanwhile I also tried to contact her consultant at the Royal Glam in order to arrange another appointment to get the fluid off.

When I finally got to pick mam up that evening it felt like such a relief. I took her for a cone of gravy & chips from her favourite fish shop Sammys which she washed down with a Fanta. I always got such joy out of the simplest things with her.. she may have only eaten 5 chips but this was the most she had eaten in days.

That evening she went to bed, both of us exhausted but unbeknown to us this was the last decent nights sleep we would have for a week & this was the last day I would work for a couple of months.

The morning of the 11th of November Dad woke me up earlier than normal, Mams breathing was becoming concerning she wasn’t as responsive as normal & something felt off.

A couple of hours later I was still really concerned & after speaking with the consultant they said it would be another week before mam could have her lungs drained again. This is was not an option.

So again with the help of our wonderful neighbour, I took mam to A&E where she was then admitted with an infection and increasing concern regarding the fluid on her lungs.

This was probably the most worrying 24hours of my life.

Sat on the re-sus ward with mam, and then staying the evening by her beside, I found my self time & time again talking through all of her meds, her wishes to not be resuscitated & numerous other factors of her illness with a number of professionals.

I will admit I felt so much guilt this day. My Dad was unable to come onto the ward to see mam & I can only imagine the pain he felt because it was worrying enough seeing her as I did.. never mind not being able to see her at all.

All night long her temperature raged which warranted hourly observations. I slept not a wink, between the beeping of the machines the consistent worry & the fear of the unknown.. we really had no idea when we could get this dreaded fluid off.

Every minute the clock ticked the more the fluid would build up & this Petrified me.

Thankfully 24hours after admission my Dad was able to swap with me & he Finally got to be with mam. She was moved to another ward with her own cubicle & was in the process of her second day of antibiotics..

Without waffling on for too long it was Day 3 before we finally got the drain in to remove the fluid, over 5litres came off over a 5-6 day period and on the 17th of November we finally brought her home.

Francesca had gone back home to Manchester a couple of weeks before but she came home for mams discharge.

I remember being so happy at the prospects of getting mam home.. but my mind was tricking itself.

Prior to her discharge Mam made a very crucial, life changing decision to have a syringe driver fitted.

At this point I knew my soldier, my mother the absolute warrior who had just battled through the most horrifying 6 days of her life had decided it was time to fight no longer & life as we knew it that day changed again..

We made arrangements for a commode to be brought home, for the district nurses to attend home twice daily & for the driver to be fitted that very same day.

The next morning we woke up & waited all day for mams discharge, both Francesca & I went to collect mam & dad from the hospital.

She was wheeled down in her chair, wrapped in blankets but with no smile wrapped on her face like I had expected to see..

We drove home in the most awkward, eery silence. Mam then had her last bath & went to bed.

The reality quickly sunk in that evening, the reality that mam had probably walked through her front door for the last time.. the reality that someday maybe too soon she would no longer be with us.

I still have her hospital blanket in my car, I cannot bring myself to get rid of it. It holds memories of an awful week, an awful time in our lives that caused so much trauma, but it also reminds me of the days I would lie next to her in the hospital singing Eva Cassidy - somewhere over the rainbow as she slept.. or whilst I stroked her head & she hummed along. 🌈

Now, both that song & the blanket remind me that mam is somewhere over the rainbow.. hopefully watching over us & sending us gifts like she has now sent me.

It’s good to have my little bits of happy, it’s just hard not having her here to share them with me as I know she longed for that so much. Nearly as much as I will long for her.. everyday for the rest of my life. 💔