Extreme Knitting Redhead: The long and winding road

Wednesday, November 15, 2006

The long and winding road

Today I was scheduled to run 8 miles at a steady pace so I chose a route through the village, towards Mill Corner, round Northiam and then back again. The first 3 miles are undulating with a nasty hill at the 2 mile mark. I set off 11 minute miling and decided to attack the uphills on the way out which I managed quite well. On the way back I was feeling a bit tired so I practised my downhill running using the technique Jan had shown me at Beachy Head. It's quite scary to just let yourself go on a downhill as you can feel your speed increasing but if you're going too fast you just put a skip into it and it slows you right down. Apparently it's a fell-running tip and it works really well. I feel quite tired now so I'm enjoying a nice cup of Earl Grey tea to revive myself.

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Mum's Story

In 1997 my mother, then aged 81, had a series of minor strokes. Shortly after that we started to notice behavioural changes notably memory loss and confusion over everyday items. We thought it was just old age finally catching up with her. Then she started wandering and had violent mood swings. Although she already lived with us it became obvious that she couldn't be left alone for long and so I left my job to care for her. The next few years saw a gradual decline into the blackness that is 'vascular dementia'. My normally placid mum became violent and aggressive. She had psychotic incidents where she would see imaginary people (children hiding in her wardrobe, Russians sitting on the stairs, women stealing her clothes) and she would shout at them and sometimes throw things too. She was so convincing that we used to go and check that there wasn't anyone there! When my sister died mum did not know who Judy was or that she was her daughter. There came a point when I suddenly realised she no longer knew that I was her daughter and this was a terrible time for me. In the last 2 years that she lived with us, life for us all became almost unbearable as she needed 24 hour care - she couldn't be left alone at all because she would either wander off or hurt herself, she never slept for more than 30 minutes at a time during the night, she became incontinent and incapable of doing anything for herself. Finally my husband and I realised that we could no longer provide her with the care that she needed and she went to live in a special care home where the team did a splendid job caring for her in the last few months of her life. There she lived a zombified existence unaware of who she was, what she was or where she was. It was heartbreaking. She died in March 2005, the day after her 89th birthday.

Thank you for taking the time to read mum's story and I hope you'll dig deep and sponsor me using the link below to help find a way of beating this destructive disease.