Extreme Knitting Redhead: Clue 2 completed, taper time & Best magazine

Monday, October 13, 2008

Clue 2 completed, taper time & Best magazine

Here's one of the socks for the KAL. It's a very simple stitch and grows quickly. If I was knitting it for myself I would have chosen the cable version as that looks lovely - scroll down the page to see Kirsten's cabled version but Mike is quite happy with this as they are for bedsocks.

I did my last long run before the Beachy Head marathon and it was a rather strange one. It was so foggy that visibility was down to about 50ft in places so I stuck to the quiet lanes. As I was out really early I didn't meet any vehicles until I was nearly home so that was OK. I ended up very wet though and I had little water droplets on my eyelashes which felt most peculiar.

The other thing of note is that I did another interview for a magazine the other evening. The magazine is a weekly publication called Best and I always thought it was just celebrity gossip type stuff. Anyway, the journalist is doing an article about the loss of a loved one and how it felt the first Christmas after their death. She has interviewed someone who lost her husband, a lady who lost her child and me who lost my mum. She was interested in my fund-raising acticities too so I'm hoping that it will get more coverage for the Alzheimer's Research Trust. I'm not sure when it will be published yet but I've sent some photos over and she said their own photographer will be along to snap me at some stage.

Now I'm trying to work out my fund-raising strategy for next year. The marathons will all be for the Alzheimer's Research Trust but I'm thinking of trying to get a team of ladies from our village interested in running the Race for Life in aid of Cancer Research UK with me. It's a cause I always support as that was why I started running in the first place in 2002 and it quite literally saved my life by setting in motion a series of events that lead to me visiting a Specialist. I won't publish the details here but suffice to say that if I hadn't seen someone when I did then I most likely wouldn't be here now, so I feel I owe the race a debt of honour and do it each year.

2 comments:

Carol said...: The socks are great! I've had to put mine aside to finish my Rhinebeck cardigan. Good luck with your marathon!! The preparation will do you well. And my half time was 2hr 13min - basically 10:09 per mile. I was very pleased!; October 13, 2008 at 3:56:00 AM PDT
Susie Hewer said...: Great time Carol!; October 13, 2008 at 4:40:00 AM PDT

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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.