Oh the shame...

This blog is beginning to be the least written in the world. I am sorry. But life has just been exceptionally manic of late. Aged mil has been in hospital (again ugh). I won't go into grisly details, suffice to say that the latest report on care of the elderly in NHS hospitals chimed totally in with our experience. And this time I did write to complain... There was one health care assistant who was very very lucky not to get thumped, but somehow I restrained myself...

Having said that, not all the staff were bad, and the ones who were good stood out like beacons of luminosity. I was particularly grateful to a health care assistant who actually offered me a cup of tea, which is pretty much unheard of. The junior doctors on the ward she ended up on were delightful, as were the sisters in charge. It was just a shame she had to endure five days of misery in the wretched Clinical Assessment Unit, aka the dumping ground for people in A&E to stop them blocking up the corridors. There is no consistency of care there, and precious little evidence that anyone actually cares. The best people we met there were two young trainees, and they weren't even training to be nurses, but paramedics:-)

Having managed to get her out of there (my mother in law has the strongest will of anyone I have ever met, and made herself practise walking so much that her mobility improved immensely quickly), she hasn't been that great since, and as a result of one weekend where we were away (Bruges, for a belated 20 wedding anniversary treat, two years late. And yes, very nice thank you, I may even get round to blogging it some day.), and she was very poorly, and last week when she succumbed to an infection and was so ill she could barely stand, we made the decision to move her in with us. So yesterday, bil, sil and I packed her stuff up and then bil manfully carried mattresses etc down the road, while we settled her in, and then with Spouse got the rest of the bedframe on top of the car roofrack. This morning she was most surprised by her bed. "Oh, it's like the one I have in the flat," she said, Er, yes... that's because it is the one you have in the flat.

We don't know how much longer she's got, we don't know if we will be able to manage, and it may be eventually we have to let her go into a hospice, but for now, it's a great relief to have her under our roof and know she is safe.

But net result is, I am a tad busy, and probably won't be posting much. But will do my best to at least get some pictures of Bruges up here anyway...