Cockroach Cafe - come and try our new sunroom

@BestIsWest it was otherwise a lovely day.

Has your mum ever done pottery painting? Maybe that's something you could do together. I spent hours in our local pottery cafe when I was going through my divorce and still use the pasta bowls I painted all the time.

Hope your appt goes OK this morning.

@MintyCedric DM and I did painting and drawing classes for years including 3 years of life drawing. She was not bad at it at all and absolutely loved it. We stopped because the local college stopped running courses but you've made me think that I should make more effort to find something like that for her to do.

Oh hairbrush I'm sorry it went a bit pear-shaped...that sounds like such a lovely, thoughtful present.

I backfired with Dad once, about 8/10 years ago. We've both always loved art so I booked for us to do a life drawing and painting workshop.

It was good fun but he'd never used acrylics before and hadn't painted at all for years so he was quite disappointed with the end result, made worse by the fact there were some very talented people on the course (including one quite well known professional).

@BestIsWest glad PCR is clear. I really must try and get my mum to a hearing place in the new year. She can't have another NHS appt for 18 months and her hearing is worse than ever.

@notaflyingmonkey have a fab holiday I'm not remotely jealous!

@MrsRussell I think exactly the same thing with my mum...

"I need to be off now mum..."
"Oh, can you just..."

@IoWfairyonthetopofthetree I also had a good visit with my mum yesterday, perhaps there was something in the air. DD even phoned me to ask when I was coming home!

Her arm is finally clearing up (touch wood) which I'm sure has helped. It's sometimes hard in the moment ot remember that a lot of her less likeable behaviour is born of fear rather than anything more malevolent.

I also have a bonus 'day off' today (she has hairdresser this morning and her friend round this afternoon) so going to crack on with lots of Christmassy stuff .

Phew just got a text to say Mum’s pcr test is negative so the hearing aid appointment can go ahead.

How frustrating hairbrush when you put real thought into a gift that you think will give pleasure.

Sandwich you are right and I know DM would agree with you.

Mum's birthday today. Last week I ordered her a massive Moonpig card, paid an extra £ 4 for delivery today and it didn't arrive and the tracking doesn't show where it is. DD and I went to a lot of effort and expense to get her a shaped photo cushion of her dog. She recognised that it was him straight away and told me to take it home because it made her miss him more. She talks about him all the time but hasn't seen him for at least a year. So all in all not the most successful of days.

[quote thesandwich]@notaflyingmonkey you deserve every minute of your holiday. Don’t feel guilty, don’t look back. 🌺🌺🌺
Loving all the trees and the cats@MereDintofPandiculation.
So many of you lovely folk are going through so much. Dealing with the big C has shifted my focus back to where it should have been all along.
We deserve lives and happiness of our own. We can’t fix the elderlies.
cockroach all.[/quote]
Merry Christmas 🎄 @thesandwich

@notaflyingmonkey you deserve every minute of your holiday. Don’t feel guilty, don’t look back. 🌺🌺🌺
Loving all the trees and the cats@MereDintofPandiculation.
So many of you lovely folk are going through so much. Dealing with the big C has shifted my focus back to where it should have been all along.
We deserve lives and happiness of our own. We can’t fix the elderlies.
cockroach all.

DM has been unusually sweet and lovely this evening and made me feel totally guilty. It’s unsettled me and I’m having a bit of a weepy wobble about dad’s death - only a few weeks ago - he was such a kind and calming influence in the family, a total buffer to mum’s dramatics. I think I had an awful realisation that she’s my only parent left now, and that’s scary!
I’m bracing myself for a hideous week at work then Christmas at mum’s. Glad to hear you’ll be around and looking forward to hearing your tales from the festive cockroach frontline.

I've buggered off on holiday, like the bad daughter I am. Have just spent half an hour moaning to DH about how guilty I fee for leaving DM at Xmas. So no tree pic from me, DS and I bought two bottles of Amarula in duty free, which is about as festive as it's likely to get, but you may be subjected to a holiday pic at some point.

My mum doesn't have any friends.
Never has, really.
She had work colleagues in the past until she retired at 60. She never kept in touch with them.
I got her a buddy through the local church but even she doesn't bother with mum much anymore.
Mum is not fun, difficult to have a conversation with, can be quite depressing to around tbh
She refuses all suggestions of groups, clubs etc
It's not a great situation

Could well be the case MrsRussell. I try to arm myself by taking milk with me whenever I go and checking her bread and wine stocks before I leave.

DM has a lovely group of friends and they all live in the same little village. Over the last two or three years they’ve all been widowed but one so the friendship group has become even more important. DM has always been good at making friends and it was she who brought the group together over the years so I’m really sad to see her not wanting to be with them. She would have been the first to include someone struggling or lonely. They are all more mobile than her so go for a weekly walk and I know she was upset at not being able to join in.

Ah it will sort itself out. I hope.

My mother withdrew from most of her friendships and distant family connections, or they withdrew from her, over the past 5 years or so. I think it has become too tiring for her. None of them lived close to her - they used to meet up for holidays or special meals mostly - her memory and hearing became increasingly poor, and she just found it all too much, without enough benefit. Another way they become so terrifyingly dependent on us.

Having a bad mind like I do, Best, I wonder if your mum saves this random stuff for last minutes to keep you just another few minutes, and another few minutes, and another....like the old "and there's more!" joke.

Infuriating, isn;t it? (Mine also.)

Tough day with DM yesterday. She had arranged to go to friends for the afternoon. I had a lot to do yesterday including her grocery shopping so rushed around to get to hers in time to drop her off at her friends.
‘I’m not going, I don’t feel like it’
Well that’s fair enough but why not let me know?
Have you let them know?
No...
So I made her phone.
She reckoned she has a bit of a cold then so didn't want to pass it on to them. Ok but I suspect the cold is made up.
She’s had a bit of a falling out with her best friend of 60 years, I think because DM couldn’t hear what she was saying on the phone and misinterpreted it. I think this is behind the refusal to go out yesterday.

Ended up taking her for a PCR test yesterday afternoon just in case though.. She has a hospital appointment to sort out her hearing aids on a Monday morning (rearranged from one she didn’t tell anyone about so missed). I just hope the result comes back negative in time as the thought of her going through Christmas with non working hearing aids makes me shudder - on both our behalves.
Then as I was about to drop her off at home she said ‘I’m out of toilet paper’. And you didn’t think to tell anyone this? Especially me who was doing your grocery shopping this morning.
So had to detour to the supermarket.

I was completely exhausted by the time I got home. Managed a takeaway,went to bed at 9 and slept for 14 hours.

I am trying my best to be patient and sympathetic but it’s breaking my heart.

That must be upsetting for her. It's hard to separate the natural anxiety from the clingy, neediness sometimes isn't it.

This is the first year I have decorated my tree, my way since 1987. I bought new - 120 tiny wooden shapes - so all my decorations are the same. It's the not the tree I have dreamed of but that is because of the dogs and if they get a whiff of a feather anywhere near the tree it will be wrecked so wooden shapes it is. And none of my vintage toys can be put around either because they would be shredded.

I had a major weepy moment yesterday and raided mum's cupboard for some of her decorations.

I'm going to see her this evening for her birthday. One of my uncles is going this morning, the other this afternoon so she is likely to be worn out and grumpy but it can't be helped. I have bought presents that she can keep and use in the home - a nightdress and a Christmas poncho because it's easier to wear than a jumper.

I love your tree. Your mum would drive me round the bend. You are so patient.

Thank you...I'm one of these wankers that has ro have it all coordinated . I love the eclectic look on other people's trees but when I try it looks like one Santa's elves threw up in the corner of my sitting room!

I hope you get to enjoy your lovely home this Christmas.

I'm really not that patient...but I'm learning. Grey rock is helpful when I remember to practice it.

Unfortunately a friend of a friend of mums died recently and very suddenly overnight which has exacerbated her anxiety about it happening to her.

Thank you @MrsRussell. After 9 years of spending more time in my mother's than mine I'm not used to my house looking presentable. You have honestly made me emotional.

@freshcarnation what a frustrating time for you. It's so difficult to find someone to talk to and find any news about patients isn't it.

@MintyCedric I love your tree. Your mum would drive me round the bend. You are so patient.

@freshcarnation I'm sorry there's not been more progress but glad you've managed to visit.

I went for a walk this morning through the woods/fields I used to walk in with my dad as a kid. Best mate came along and we stopped on the way home for a couple of glasses of red in his favourite pub then came back to mine for baked cheese and assorted dippy bits and mulled cider.

Called mum when I got in...no response. Called again 20 minutes later, she'd just got in from the shops and asked if I'd called her earlier, then questioned why I hadn't called her first thing as she 'could have been laying dead or unconscious'.

I pointed out that she clearly wasn't and when I go back to work I won't be able to call every morning to check she's alive.

Tree pic to counteract the moaning...

Was allowed to visit mum for a hour in hospital. She has basically been sleeping since being admitted on Wednesday night. Don't think she has been drinking or eating really although a patient in the opposite bed said she had a couple of mouthfuls of jelly today. She's not on any treatment or medication, or on a drip. Just laying asleep in bed. I spoke to the nurse looking after her who said nothing much will be done over the weekend. I don't know what to think.

Hairbrush your house is amazing!!
The tree is pretty neat too

Space is at a premium at Casa Hairbrush this year so our beautiful 7ft tree is in the loft and we have in its place a super trendy slim tree which just squeezes into the fireplace.

Yup yup, welcome to the world of the alcoholic narcissist.
In much more important news today, we're gonna have to start clearing the garden of twigs and small branches, if we've got a mate coming over for either Christmas lunch or Boxing Day. We had in mind that if it's cold but otherwise clear we could sit under our pergola and play board games, and have a barbecue.
That's gonna be a fuckton of garden waste right there....