Well, tonight, while I took Adele to the bus station, kp finished off her chicken bake. She does this lovely topping of fried bread in pieces. It is lovely. I half expected to return home to find that she was still struggling with it, but she was sat in the lounge watching “Deal or No Deal” as proud as punch

She took me in to the kitchen to show me her work. It looked gorgeous……

Unfortunately, she was completely unaware she had left the hob on high and left the top off the olive oil.

The chicken bake was gorgeous !!!

kp didn’t have any snoozes yesterday and was keen to make a day through without a snooze. By 9pm, she was flagging big time. She couldn’t wait to get to bed. Unfortunately, she had the sh+ts. There must be a nice way of saying that. Oh yeah, she had an upset stomach and had to get up every 10 minutes for the first hour of her sleep !! Poor cow.

It’s 12:10pm Saturday when I write this and she is still asleep.

When kp had gone to sleep, I had a look at which countries have been reading the blog recently and was pleased to see someone from Canada had come across it. I am able to see how they find the blog, and this person found it by searching at MSN for “bionic woman lifting car” and kp’s blog site shows up ?!?!?!?!?! The post that it takes you to must have some mention of kp being a “bionic woman” with all her metalwork I presume.

Well, kp was up by the time I had returned from picking Marie up from the station. We had a long chat with Marie about her exploits the previous week. She was away visiting Kieran (Glenn’s son) in Bognor Regis. kp and I both missed her and not just for the jobs she does around the house.

At about 4pm, kp was knackered and had to sleep. Marie did our ironing, star that she is.

kp has had more upset stomach issues and doesn’t feel like eating anything at the moment, so pizza is off the menu tonight.

Generally, a quiet day.

I think we may be looking at knocking back some of kp’s fentanyl (morphine) patches as she spends more time asleep than awake these days.

That’s it for today.

PS – Wendy Widelegs. kp did get your first and second emails, but mistakenly filed the first one and forgot you had sent it. She will be emailing you over the next day or so ! Looking forward to the visit Thanks for the reminder email !!!!

Awful awful day today. Marie told me yesterday’s blog didn’t reflect Karen’s mood at all. On reading it back, I know what she means. Karen started on a major downer yesterday – I wasn’t sure if it was just the upset stomach, leaving her feel subdued.

Today started off ok. kp got up with Marie for breakfast. They were met with a very snowy scene. I didn’t get up until 11am. I took the dogs out in the blizzards. Cleo’s left hind paw doesn’t touch the ground any more and it had icicles hanging off it by the time she got back.

Boy, it was cold.

kp went for a snooze at about 1pm until 3pm and got up for a nice chat with Marie, before I took Marie back to the station.

And then poor kp hit rock bottom. She started crying about Cleo and her poorly leg, but it became clear that it wasn’t just Cleo that was on her mind, but everything from her slow rehabilitation to “what’s the point”, from her “aches and pains” to other issues I can’t go into. We spent 15 minutes on the sofa. I tried to reassure her how well she is doing, but it didn’t help. I tried comforting her physically (arm around shoulder stuff) but “Don’t touch me.” – I need to be on my own. Well, I can’t leave her when she is in that state – I just can’t. And I don’t think she wanted me to anyway deep down.

Whilst I had been away, she had run a bath for herself. She likes to have a bath before her big pain patch goes on. Her crying eased off and we decided to do the bath thing. But she started crying again in the bathroom whilst I was getting her clothes off. I comforted her and got her to sit on top of the loo to get her breath back. She regained herself after a few minutes, and sat on the bath chair (that lowers her into the bath). I started lowering her into the bath and she started getting upset again. That is a site I will never forget. She was sat there, helpless, being lowered into a bath and crying her eyes out. It really hit me hard

After the bath, we had a cup of tea, and since then she has been “ok”, by that I mean no more tears/upset. She is in bed now, and I am getting her up after I have written the blog.

Sad day today. A number of people have tried to ring/email kp over the last day or so, but understandably, she doesn’t want to take any calls/reply to emails at the moment. Bear with her, as I am sure she will get past this day soon.

Well, touch wood, fingers crossed, don’t walk under a ladder, but we have had a slightly better day today. kp isn’t back to her old self by any means, but I sense a bit of an improvement.

She has had a bad left (and right) shoulder for the past 3 or 4 days, and was looking forward to some relief from physio. The physio got out her magic “Anti-Flam” potion and gave kp a good massage with it, whilst moving her shoulder blade all over the place. At first, the slightest touch feels very strange to kp, but as the physio does more and more of it, her nerves get accustomed to it and within 15 minutes she had relief in her shoulders. Yay !!!

It was then time for kp to do some work with her left arm, the idea being that exercise helps keep it loose and mobile. First off, kp had to place the pieces into a board but only by using her left arm/hand. She has a tendency for her left elbow to stick right out. If you try this while reaching out for something, you’ll know how unnatural this is and that it causes your shoulder gip, but it’s the only way kp knows to get her arm out across a table. So, she has to relearn how to keep it in. Easy said ! kp doesn’t know how to get her elbow in and kept having to ask the physio …

kp:- Is it doing it right now ? (as she concentrated on placing the piece on board)

The physio suggested kp do the puzzle as 2 actions. Get the piece from the side and bring it to your side and then place it. This seemed to do the trick.

With that puzzle over, it was time for a jigsaw. I knew kp wouldn’t like this. She finds this kind of activity hard on both a physical front (moving and manipulating the pieces) and a mental front (scanning for the right pieces and working out their orientation). The physio realised that she couldn’t work out which pieces went where and picked out the 4 corners so kp could place them first. With the 4 corners done albeit at a very slow pace, the physio got the edges together so kp could work on them. She struggled on both the physical and mental front with this. The pieces were hard to pick up, hard to turn and she had to really think about where they went.

We had a little amusing moment when she got one of the pieces, sussed out where it was to go and started trying to place it next to the corner. Unfortunately, the piece was upside down, but she felt it was right. And she started trying to force the piece into the slot. We could all see that one of the prongs of the jigsaw was overlapping the edge of the board and that the other prong (from the corner) didn’t fit. But, BOY, did she try and get it to fit. I was amazed the jigsaw didn’t break.

Noone said anything about this to Karen, with the physio politely saying “I think it goes the other way round.”

Physio over, we went to Costco, the pet shop and Sainsburys for supplies. kp did very well round the shops. I got her to tell me when it was safe to cross the car park into Costco. No problems there !

At Sainsbury’s another funny moment occurred. I loaded up the checkout conveyor and we waited for the person in front of us to get through. While we waited, kp started fumbling through the lady’s shopping in front of us.

kp:- Why have you got this ? (pointing to some Spicy Madras sauce)
dp:- That’s not our shopping love (ours was to the left)

With shopping over, we came home and had a nice lunch. I was pleased at this, because kp has been off food for a few days, and she had a good lunch/dinner (4pm).

So, fingers crossed etc…..tonight will see her mood lift even further.

She is cancelling her OT session tomorrow because she doesn’t feel up to it and I think she is looking forward to a “nothing” day, something we don’t seem to have had for a while. It’s a fine balance between “keeping her busy” and then the quiet days where all she can do is focus on her aches/pains/condition.

Oops forgot to mention.

During physio, it became clear that Karen couldn’t maintain her posture (probably due to having no stomach muscles at the moment, they need sewing up).

So, the physio taped up Karen’s back with some strong tape. She basically put a 6-starred cross going the whole width of Karen’s back. So, when Karen loses posture, it reminds her to straighten up.

It has really done the trick today, with kp constantly correcting herself

Another thing I forgot to mention.

During breakfast yesterday, Karen and I were talking and at this point, she wasn’t showing any signs of improvement. She said something like this……..

kp:- I feel like I am just going down and down and down. . I feel like I am entering a really dark place

It’s 1.10pm and we have postponed OT today and kp is still asleep in bed. I am going to wake her now.

dp

Today has shown more improvement in kp’s mental state. I am very relieved. kp has been in a very dark place (as she described it) before and she didn’t speak for a month (no exaggeration). I remember her trying to talk to Eileen (our next door neighbour) over the fence, and she could only whisper. That was when our final IVF attempt didn’t work.

Today she has pretty much slept all day, probably something she needed to do. She WAS awake from about 1.30am until 5am to be fair and from 1.15pm until 2.30pm.

So, very much a nothing day today, but worth it to see Karen turn a very welcome corner.

Tomorrow we have the neuropsychologist coming which is a big relief as well. I know she will work her magic and kp should feel even better.

That’s it for today.

Well, that’s of course until I remember the things that I have forgot and end up doing 2 bl++dy addendums.

kp’s sleep is still all to pot. She got up about 2.30am and came back to bed at 6am. At which point, I got up and walked the dogs, had breakfast and rejoined her in bed. She ended up getting up at 2pm.

The neuropsychologist came at 3pm. We had a good chat with her…..

She helps explain kp’s changes in mood very well. We explained that we nearly called her on Monday when things were really bad. In future we will, as she would rather be called when kp needs her than when she doesn’t.

We have a few action points from the meeting. I think the pace of the meeting was too fast for Karen as she kept asking me afterwards….

kp:- So, what do we have to do again…?

That’s it for today. kp is feeling much better in herself. We were going to meet with one of the off-duty policemen who helped kp at the accident, but we have postponed. Thanks John for your understanding.

I think kp will appreciate a “nothing” day tomorrow before “Trouble and Strife”, “Bitter and Twisted”, aka Debs and Lydia descend on Friday for a lovely massage and chinese.

A nothing day today – But a nice day, pain is under control, kp’s mood is back to normal All is well in the Pollard household.

kp’s day has been pretty much – get up, breakfast, snooze, tv. Perhaps an uneventful day has been a bit overdue.

Good Day today.

We had an appointment in the morning at 11am at Hunter’s Moor to see a Doctor about kp’s rehab. We both found the session very helpful. She said a few things along the way that kp felt really hit the nail on the head for her.

Things like kp’s recent bout of feeling very down. When kp’s aches and pains were more in control, she seemed to be able to pull herself out of it. The Doctor likened this to when an animal is hurt, they tend to hide away to lick their wounds and that is what kp has been effectively doing. Made sense.

Also, we discussed when kp had suffered a mental breakdown after all the IVF treatments and adoption ended many moons ago. And the Doctor brought the positive out of that to show Karen, that she has a tendency to pull herself out of these tricky situations given time.

It was a very good session and the start of many to come as we will be seeing each month.

When we got back, I was very keen to get kp to sleep so that she could stay awake for Lydia and Debs’ visit. We had a good hour and then Diane arrived with her massage table.

kp was first up for a massage. I managed to catch this photo of her head from underneath the massage table.

For 5 points, can you guess what kp was saying as I took the photo. Have a guess, and the answer will be revealed at the bottom of this blog entry.

We all got our Chakra points tested. We all had the odd one or two out of balance, which Diane sorted out.

All the girls had body massages and I opted for reflexology. We all thoroughly enjoyed it. Diane’s website can be reached by clicking HERE for anyone else who wants a lovely treat.

I was last to go in. I entered the tranquil room with candles lit and lovely relaxing music playing. Got on the bed, started to relax and then for the next 30 mins all I could hear (above the music) were 3 wailing women in the front room laughing their socks off.

Here are the girls in full gossip mode………

So…….a really good day today. The only negative is Karen discovered a BIG (tennis ball) size swelling of Cleo’s bad leg, so we will need to go to the vet tomorrow to get that checked out.

ok………..what was Karen saying when I took that photo ?

I’ll give you the full five points for ….

kp:- Turn that bl++dy camera off

and I think it was followed by………

kp:- That’s not going on the blog

Well, it truly was a fantastic day today. kp has “never laughed so much in her life” (her words). It was so good to see her laugh so much after such a long “dark” period.

The girls left at about 12am I think, maybe a little after and kp was asleep by 12.30am although she was still offering them a cup of tea at 12am !!!

The most memorably moment of the evening was Lydia’s telling of her “Shiney Row” experience. Unfortunately, I have probably said too much already, but it was a corker.

We did have a brilliant day and night and it was so good to see kp in her element.

Today, we took Cleo to the vet, meaning kp had to get up before God at 8.30am. The vet wasn’t sure what the lump was but Cleo had a temperature so she thinks it may be an infection. We came away suitably equipped with antibiotics. Fingers crossed.

kp was straight to bed to catch up on her lost Z’s when we got back.

At 1.30pm, the Donovan clan arrived (Marie, Adele, Abbie and Louisa). We had a great time with them as well. I seemed to be the kid’s entertainer, while the girls gossipped. I seem to be getting better at managing kids. One on my knee drawing while helping the other one compile a cd compilation album of Sugababes and Gwen Stefani. Throw in the added knee bounce for the little one to the music and it kept them all happy.

My only complaint is kids should come equipped with “pause” buttons or a “snooze” button like an alarm clock, but that aside it was a great day. Great to see kp back in the swing of things.

Pizza night tonight.

A little funny from yesterday. kp couldn’t get on the massage table for her massage, and although i could have lifted her up, it would have probably dislocated something or other, and been very painful. After a bit of thinking, I had to get the large step ladders for her to climb on the first step to get her bum on the table. Day off tomorrow, before quite a busy week.

A very welcome relaxing day. Nothing happening – nice change.

We had a great day yesterday with Marie, Adele, Abbie and Louisa, and a nice relaxing day today. kp spent most of it asleep. We have started to wean her off the Tamazepam (sleeping tablet). Apparently, it is addictive and you can’t just come off it, so the rehab doctor advised she go down to 1/2 a tablet a day for a couple of weeks. She certainly doesn’t seem to need it for sleep any more.

kp’s opening hours today were 11am – 12pm, back to sleep and then she opened up for communication at about 4pm.

Very uneventful day. This week reads as follows :-

Mon – Stroke Association meeting in the morning, OT in the afternoon
Tue – Yvonne and Marie coming up
Wed – Physio for kp & I while Adele cleans house
Thu – kp meeting Sue at Chevitas for an early dinner
Fri – kp + I go to Mum and Dad for the night and for Saturday lunch
Sat – Marie staying Friday and Saturday nights

Busy week

Happy Anniversary Karen 13 years today and she remembered.

A stonkingly good day today. kp is “on fire”

Compared to last week, Karen is sooooooooo much better in both mood and physical ability. There was nothing getting in her way today.

I think her pain being in check helps significantly with her mood, but it seems more than that. The day pretty much well started on a high and got better all day.

kp got herself up while I was dog walking and showered herself (no change there), but today ………..

kp:- I washed my hair with 2 hands today (beaming smile).

She went on to demonstrate her new technique, which was as much her head going down to her left hand as her left hand going on top of her head, but hey – it works !!

We had a nice cheery breakfast before the lady from the Stroke Association arrived. She said the right thing to Karen over and over again. It was as if I had written a script of all the right things she should have said and she said them.

Karen queried her about her constant tiredness, something I am always saying to her is normal given her stroke/medication etc…

Stroke Association Lady :- Yes, that’s totally normal. With a head injury or stroke alone, you would be feeling a lot more tired all the time. Noone knows scientifically why that is, but they say it is something to do with your brain having to work harder to do everyday things.

kp quizzed her about how long her recovery will take. The lady told her not to rush herself and allow a couple of years (from now) for things to get as well as they’re going to get.

She also gave kp a good “measure” for when she should consider going back to work, specifically……….

Stroke Association lady :- When you can get up at 8am, get yourself ready completely on your own, go shopping all day, come back and make tea and not fall asleep until the night time, and you can do that 3 times a week, then you can consider some part time work.

This was brilliantly put, as kp now realises that she can’t do that without 12 snoozes per day and therefore isn’t ready for work.

It was a really good session.

No sooner had she gone than the OT and assistant arrived to take kp shopping. kp had done all the menus for the week and the resultant shopping list. I didn’t go as the whole point is kp doing everything (bar the driving) for herself. According to the OT, kp did very well with no problems.

Snooze beckoned when she got back and I can hear she has just got up now. So all in all, an exceedingly good cake of a day.

May tomorrow be much the same !

Another good day, although kp was in a bit of pain today, presumably because of the shopping trip.

Yvonne and Dave (kp’s sister and bro-in-law) were due to arrive at lunchtime (“dinnertime” as they call it up here) with Marie, Michelle and Louisa (sisters and great niece) arriving about 1pm.

kp got up about 11.30am and then 5 minutes later Yvonne and Dave arrived. It took kp by surprise, but Yvonne was amusing herself within minutes. Yvonne’s idea of amusement is “cleaning” or should I say “cleaning with a vengeance”. Within seconds of her arrival, the kitchen surfaces were immaculate. Our oven looks brand new.

We had a sandwich lunch together (which kp helped prepare).

Louisa kept herself amused (she is only 2) on my computer, listening to the Balamory theme tune. All together now………….

“Ba—la—mo—ry, Ba—la—mo—ry, what’s the story in Balamory, wouldn’t you like to know”

It’s quite a catchy song, unfortunately too catchy. Within minutes we were all singing it and cursing ourselves for doing so.

We had a lovely afternoon. kp didn’t snooze until about 4.30pm when she had a couple of hours.

Here’s a few photos of the day….As will all photos (on the blog), just click on them to see them full size !

Louisa and Bonnie

I wonder what Louisa has been eating ?

Still guilty

Louisa looking at Cleo’s bad leg……

The ringed bit (although not obvious from this photo) is her ankle joint and it is bigger than a tennis ball

Another good day It started with a phonecall from the physio’s assistant at 9am to cancel this afternoon’s session. The physio wasn’t feeling too well

kp stayed in bed until 11am as I took Cleo to the vet for another examination. She is going to get x-rayed and biopsied tomorrow.

But it was a glorious day so it was calling for kp to walk the dogs with me She was happy to give it a go and when she got up, we took all 3 dogs out for a “W” (as we call it. If we say “walk” they all jump up excited). It wasn’t the fastest pace in the world (1mph), but we made steady progress, feeding the donkeys on the way.

kp on the walk

kp watching me play with dogs

And who the hell is this handsome brute ?

Adele was at home when we got back and soon got stuck into the cleaning

kp snoozed after her expedition – I kept her company. As I write this, she is making Chicken Bake for tea The only thing I have been called for so far, is to get the flour down from the shelf – Fingers crossed

Easy relaxing day tomorrow for kp with dinner (with Sue, ex work colleague) at Chevitas

Not the best of days today.

I took Cleo to the vets today to get an X-ray and possibly biopsy done. It’s a sedation job for Cleo, so I left her in the vet’s good hands. When I returned I got kp up and we had a nice breakfast although were both a little quiet, probably anxious about the outcome with Cleo.

kp went back to bed after breakfast and about lunchtime the vet phoned with the bad news. Cleo has bone cancer and the growth in her ankle is a large tumour. They couldn’t be sure if it had spread yet. The vet didn’t recommend amputating her leg as this is not always a good idea with larger dogs. The prognosis is it’s terminal and just a matter of time. The vet hinted at putting her to sleep now, but I am normally good at telling when the right time comes and it isn’t now. She loves her walks so much despite it being a 3-legged affair.

I had to break the news to Karen which was very hard and she got very upset. During the day, she picked herself up and her mood is better than it was but she is still subdued. She was due to dine with Sue tonight at Chevitas in Durham, but she didn’t feel up to it. Sue was understanding.

I picked Cleo up from the vets and we spent quite a bit of the afternoon with all 3 of us (kp, me and Cleo) on the sofa. Here is Cleo (the leader of the pack) on the sofa doing her “soulful look”. It’s a real killer.

Generally a sombre afternoon.

kp has just gone for a lie-down. She is ok. We had a bit of a chuckle in the bedroom. She sat on the side of the bed before flinging her legs up on to the bed. Just before she flung her legs. I said……..

dp:- Do you remember when I used to get you into bed ?

And I did the usual routine of grabbing her legs and lifting them on the bed. She laughed.

dp:- And when I used to turn you on to your side ?

And I went through the commotion of that routine, which involved putting my hands underneath her and pulling her over.

More chuckles

It’s nice that she can laugh with such bad news. Distraction is definately the key at the moment.

A combined blog for the last 2 days as we have been to my mum and dad’s for a visit and had no time to blog last night.

Yesterday, kp and I didn’t get off to a good start. I felt like I had the world on my shoulders (packing, present wrapping, car battery charging, shopping etc etc…) and not enough time to do it. So, I was a bit faster than usual in trying to get kp showered and ready. kp’s speed was leisurely at its fastest. Needless to say, a few cross words were said, and it was the usual…..

dp:- ok……Shall we start the morning again ?
kp smiled, chuckled :- Yes, good idea.

We kissed and made up and started again.

I got het up again, and we had the exact same “shall we start the morning again” conversation about 10 minutes later.

Anyway, we got past that. Marie arrived at lunchtime to look after the dogs while we were away. We had some nice catch-up time with her and then had a lovely journey down to Lancashire. We hit rush hour queues but we didn’t mind.

We enjoyed a Steak and Sidney pie at mum’s before going to the Golf Club for a racing night. We had a cracking time, LOTS of laughs in good company. Here is kp counting her winnings…..

kp slept the whole way down in the car, so I was concerned she wouldn’t sleep tonight, but I needn’t have been. She slept like a lamb. I was woken up at 6am by the damn wall clock we bought Mum and Dad for their 40th wedding anniversary. Every 15 minutes thereafter it continued to keep me awake. Grrrrrrr ! Here is the view again. Our sheep (up north) haven’t lambed yet, but they lambed a couple of weeks ago in Lancashire. You may just be able to make out some lambs.

We got up about 10.15am and went downstairs to find Jane and Guy had arrived with Sophie and Jamie. We had a great time with them and all in all, it was a lovely weekend.

Here is Sophie cutting up her birthday cake. This was taken after the huge tears she had when we all sang Happy Birthday to her ?!?!??!?!

Very good journey back although kp couldn’t sleep ?! That’s it !

Well, today we were due to go to Adele’s but it wasn’t to be. Within an hour or so of getting up, kp felt very sickly and light-headed and had to lie down So, we abandoned those plans.

She has been in bed since about 2pm. I tried to wake her a few minutes ago, but she wasn’t having any of it. I’ll get her up on Tuesday

Very uneventful day

What a sleepy day. We had an awful night’s sleep, getting up for a cup of tea at 2am and 4am. kp went back to sleep until 12.30pm, getting up again about 10am for 10 mins for another cup of tea.

Pain-wise she is doing very well at the moment and mentally she is ok too. So, a good few days Today, she was off with the OT shopping (for clothes) in Durham.

She relayed an amusing incident when she returned. She was trying a new coat on and in the process of trying it on, she had beared her stomach, and her shirt had stayed up. Karen can’t feel this kind of thing any more, so was unaware of this. She asked the OT where the mirror was to see if the coat suited.

OT:- I don’t think you will be too impressed with what you see.

kp looked in the mirror and saw her stomach fully visible

I think she corrected it quite promptly.

On her return, she was “feeling like she had been shopping” and went straight to bed for a few hours.

Uneventful Day.

kp went to bed at about 11pm and got up at 12pm, but it was too early for her. Seriously. She was grumpy and it was clear that she hadn’t had enough sleep. At 1pm she went back to bed until 2.15pm when I had to get her up for physio.

Physio today was very different. The physio asked kp if there was anything she can’t do that she would like to do. kp listed a few things, such as eating with a knife and fork (currently, it’s just a fork), kneeling down (so she can garden), and gettting up from a fall (that’s my suggestion).

The physio decided to concentrate on the last two for today, and work on the other one next week. kp and I had tried this ourselves a month or so ago, but we got nowhere. I tried to get kp lying down on the living room floor, but we couldn’t even get her to kneeling – it was too painful. Her knees haven’t been bent over in such a way for nearly a year – so you can imagine the stretch it must be for her.

So, with the aim of getting kp lying (as if from a fall), she first had to get to being on all fours. kp started off sitting on the physio’s bench, which she lowered as low as possible. kp then had to get on to her knees which she did with the physio supporting her – there were LOTS of “ow”s. I would have aborted the maneuvre at the first “ow”, but she (physio) persisted. Once on her knees, she had to get on to all fours as if she was crawling.

She did this by placing her hands on the floor, palms down. No problem with the right, but the left couldn’t support her weight (strength wise), and it was painful to put it in such a situation. So, with more help, she got kp supported by her 2 knees and her right hand (a 3-legged Karen, much like Cleo at the moment), the physio supported her left arm (so the left hand didn’t have to take any weight).

This was a very painful/awkward position for kp. The next stage was to get Karen on to her left side and then to concentrate on getting kp up again. We got her on her left side and got her legs swung from underneath her until eventually she was sitting on the floor.

With the help of using the bench as a lifting aid with her right hand, she was able to get her knees underneath her so she was back in the kneeling position.

Then came the most painful and hardest bit of the whole thing, she had her right knee flexed and had to use her right leg to lift her bum on to the bench. Her right top part of the leg and hip were broken in the accident, so this is the side which experiences a lot of pain and BOY did we know it when she lifted her buttocks on to the bench.

“OW!” doesn’t do it justice !

The relief on kp’s face says it all !

With the lying debacle over, the physio concentrated on kp’s left arm. kp had worked out why it had been so painful for the past few weeks. She had put in place a new position for the left arm when it is doing nothing and it has 90% fixed the aches and pains of her left shoulder – a MAJOR breakthrough !!! She took great pleasure in sharing this info with the physio.

The proof of the pudding is in the eating. OR the proof of how much she has cracked the pain is how far she can raise her left arm !!!

This may not seem too impressive, but it is a BIG improvement on a few weeks ago. We were all impressed by it.

With the arm exercises over, the physio finished off looking at kp’s wrist movement which she noticed was restricted. If you have your hand face down on your lap and then turn it over as far as you can, then this is the kind of movement the physio worked on. kp has no problem with her hand face down, but she has restricted movement turning it upward.

The physio demonstrated what kind of movement she was looking at achieving….

But kp couldn’t get there at the moment, so the physio gave kp’s wrist bones some painful massage to try and get them a bit looser. kp’s homework is to move her left wrist so her palm is open and then move it further with her right hand.

I can think of other exercises for kp’s wrist and palm but let’s not go there !

What a beautiful day today ! We were a little worried that kp would be worse for wear after yesterday’s physio, but she was “ok”

She was up at 8am (EIGHT, not a typo) and we enjoyed a beautiful breakfast out the front of the house. It was the perfect temperature and it was just so fresh and spring-like

Although kp had no aches and pains, her eyes were playing up a bit and she couldn’t seem to see properly. This happens every now and then and normally just goes away. She also couldn’t concentrate on anything (probably related, I suppose). When the mail arrived, I had to read it out a few times for her for it to be understood, ditto her emails. One of them she still didn’t understand after about 3 or 4 rereads, so I will try again tomorrow.

We had a lovely couple of hours before retiring for a snooze – loveliest of snoozes. In the afternoon we went over to Adele’s to pick up the kids to take them to Pizza Hut with Marie, Glenn and his son Kieran. We had a lovely meal at Pizza Hut.

The kids were well-ish behaved. Although Abby got a bit of a harsh word or two when she returned from the ice cream factory with a bowl of ice cream that would have fed all 9 of us. She was dripping ice cream wherever she walked. Louisa (2) got caught short for the loo and I have never seen a kid being handed over a table as quickly as Adele threw her at Glenn for a “wee”. By the time she got to the loo, I think there was nothing left !

A lovely day today. Glenn, Marie and Kieran are coming up tomorrow. We have to stay in all day while our boiler gets fixed, so that worked out quite well that they are coming up.

That’s it !

The plumbers arrived at 9.15am to fix our boiler. It’s 6.45pm and they are still hard at having taken no breaks !!!!

It feels to kp and I like it has been a hard day, as the dogs have had to be locked up with us for the whole day, which kp has found quite claustrophobic.

Generally, an uneventful day. Marie, Glenn and Kieran came over for the afternoon, which was nice. kp has been quizzing Glenn about different bathroom possibilities, Glenn being in the building trade. kp wants a new bathroom/shower setup and Glenn has been trying to explain to kp how to achieve a better setup. Unfortunately, kp found it VERY hard to take in the proposed layouts and couldn’t grasp where walls were moving and where doors were going. Another practical example of how the stroke has affected her.

It didn’t help when went and stood by the bathrooms. After the 4th or 5th pass of design #1, she had grasped it, but then we went on to another possible design. She is well confused now.

That’s it for today – as I say, very uneventful !

Funny night last night. We were both absolutely knackered after the plumbers’ visit. They didn’t go until 8.15pm ! We had tea and then were fast asleep by 9.15pm !

I got up at 1.30am for a couple of hours. kp hadn’t a clue I was up. kp got up at 4am and came back about 6am and I hadn’t a clue she was up.

Relaxing morning. We enjoyed a cup of tea outside – lovely weather. Here is Cleo fast asleep in the back yard.

Ronnie arrived at lunchtime – she is staying until Sunday. It was good to catch up with her. For the past 2 hours, kp and Ronnie have invaded MY space in the computer room and have been doing online dating trying to find Ronnie a fella. Boy, it’s been driving me CRAZY.

kp:- Oh, he looks nice.
Ronnie:- Yes, but he doesn’t want a smoker.

kp:- What about him ? He’s a football fan
Ronnie:- But he is a Chelsea supporter, I couldn’t be doing with that. They have to support boro

Ronnie:- He’s cute, but he only wants a 25-35 year old.

Ronnie:- Now, here’s one. He sounds lovely, but look at his photo, I am sure he is not 45, more like 55.

And on and on and on and on and on.

kp:- Eeeeee, isn’t this dating site good ?
dp:- Don’t you be getting ideas love !!!

Christ – They are still going on about it as I write this blog ! kp is now egging Ronnie on to ring some of them up.

Get me out of here !

Here is a photo I snapped. kp giving her usual “Don’t take a photo” look !

Uneventful Day. Lots of plans (Alnwick Castle, Raby Castle) for today got scuppered.

It ended up being a sleepy day. kp had a restless night last night, and didn’t get to sleep until 6am. Consequently, she didn’t get up until 2pm. So Ronnie and I amused ourselves chatting and sleeping.

Pizza night tonight. I suspect the night will be a bit more intersting Although not on a blog-worthy scale.

Uneventful Day.

We bade farewell to Ronnie at 1pm and had a lazy afternoon in front of the tv. kp went for a 3 hour snooze and was out for the count as soon as she hit the pillow.

In a Devonshire accent………”This week, I have been mostly eating cabbages”

This week………..

Monday – Car in for a service. Angela (other car victim) visiting in the afternoon
Tuesday – Physio in the afternoon
Wednesday – Neuropsychologist in the afternoon
Thursday and Friday, I think Marie is coming up one day and Jane is coming for a lunch out with kp with her friend (but I think these have yet tbc).

Good night’s sleep for kp. She has dropped down her Tamazepam to 1/2 a night and it doesn’t seem to prevent her from sleeping.

Someone came to pick up our car today to get it serviced, so i had to be up for 9am, but kp slept through until 11.30am. We had a nice breakfast outside, it was glorious at that time.

Angela (ex work colleague who was also badly injured in the crash) arrived at 1pm for a chinwag. kp had made some home made soup (I chopped, she ordered me around). It was delicious. We had some real good laughs with Angela. She stayed for about 3 hours, but kp started yawning more than she was talking, so Angela left to allow kp some snooze time.

When kp awoke from her snooze, I was preparing tea. She walked in on me chopping onions, and was surprised to see me with a pair of swimming goggles on. The other day, I made 3 Lasagnes and was really crying, so I took precautions this time.

She said “that should go on the blog”, so I lent her my phone to take a picture… Only fair I suppose…

It took her about 6 attempts to get me and the onion in shot ! She just couldn’t seem to line it up correctly, but we had a good laugh about it.

That’s it for today.

kp wasn’t tired at bedtime last night, so I gave her the emergency button (which I usually do when I leave her on her own), so that if she fell, she could push it and the warden would come to her rescue. There is much more chance of the warden coming than me waking from a deep sleep.

Of course, when I leave her on her own, I have a restless night sleep and keep waking up all the time. So, last night, I woke up every couple of hours and could hear the tv on, so I knew she was ok.

So, something funny happened this morning. I was VERY aware that kp had come to bed VERY late (about 6am) and had been up and down to the commode from 6am until 7.30am (when I got up). She was not aware that I knew of her bad night’s sleep.

At 7.30am kp was snoring like a TROOPER, the loudest snores I have heard in a while. I got up as quietly as I could, but I still woke her. I knew she would tell me about her bad night. It went something like this……

kp:- SNOOOOOOOORE, SNOOOOOOOOORE, SNOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOORE
dp quietly gets out of bed

kp wakes up………

kp:- I haven’t been asleep at all !

Well, I knew what she meant, but found it funny that she was snoring so loud, clearly asleep at that point, and she said she hadn’t slept at all – lol !

I let her sleep on until 2pm when we had to get her up for physio

The physio consulted kp’s notes and knew that this week she wanted to concentrate on trying to use a fork again (with her left hand). She only uses a fork in her right hand at the moment (and I cut up her food).

The physio went to get some adapted forks which basically have big grips, which are more easy for kp to hold.

kp was given some tips to hold the fork correctly…..

She then tried it herself. It took her a while to get the fork in the right position with her left finger on the top to give added pressure.

After a bit of practice, she picked up the knife to try the whole thing.

Once she had practiced holding “things” with a fork so she could cut them with a knife, it was then to try using the fork to get food to her mouth. This didn’t go as well. She found it hard to bend the fork in such a way as it would hold food. Once she got it right, she would then try and leave the imaginary food to her mouth, and then it would go all to pot.

At one point, she moved the fork to her mouth and at the same time, moved her mouth down to the fork and nearly took her eye out. Both the physio and I shrieked at the same time which was funny. At the moment, she doesn’t have the control or dexterity in her fingers to pull this off.

With this in mind, the physio decided to try and concentrate on building up kp’s hand/wrist/fingers dexterity. The physio suggested it would be a good idea to try moving coins around her left hand to improve on her finger/wrist/hand movement. I got some coins out of my pocket (only 1p’s and 2p’s, as I could see that some of them may go the distance). kp has to look at her hand to know there is a coin in her hand, so you can imagine how difficult it is for her to move them around her hand. Well, I must have given her 8p in 2p’s and 1p’s, I’d be surprised if I got 3p back. People will be finding copper coins all around the physio room for weeks to come.

The problem was kp’s left hand can’t make a cup shape to hold coins. Actually, it does do the cup shape but it is at such an angle, the coins just fall out, so the physio started working on trying to get kp’s hand more cupped and flat (not tilted).

We didn’t crack it today, but with a bit of homework, we should loosen her arm/wrist/hand up a bit.

With physio over, we went to Sainsbury’s shopping. Here’s kp heading to the till with an extra purchase of dishcloths.

As soon as she got home, she went to bed.

I’m off to prepare tea. Hot chicken from Sainsburys, carrots, cabbage and new potatoes.

Yum Yum !

A good day today.

kp had to be up at the crack of dawn today (9.45am) as she had to have visit a doctor in Durham for an assessment.

He was a nice bloke and he asked kp lots about the accident and how it has affected her life. He finished with an examination where we had a funny incident. To set the scene, kp has a very large scar on her stomach. It is about 1 inch wide and because of her hernia is very long going from just below her chest to the very bottom of her stomach (about 16 inches). It has the usual cross-pattern where the stitches were, so is quite a sight at first viewing. So, back to the examination…..

He assessed the strength in kp’s legs/arms, saw how much movement she had and various other tests. He then wanted to see her stomach.

Doctor (as he lifted kp’s t-shirt up) :- Have you had any operations on your stomach ?
Doctor (t-shirt lifted) :- My word ! That’s a yes then.

We laughed.

Following this, she went for an eye examination (another one). First of all, kp’s left eye was covered so she could only see out of her bad eye.

Eye woman :- So, what is the first letter ?
kp looked for about 5 seconds, obviously not seeing it (or probably even the board the letters were on)

Eye woman :- Can you see the big “O” at the top ?
kp looked for a second and said ……………… :- “O”

I laughed.

She didn’t get any more, but I am sure if the woman had asked her if she could see “X D and N” she would have got them too.

With that examination over, we came home and had a cup of tea with Adele who was here cleaning the house and then it was time for a snooze before the neuropsychologist (NP) came.

The NP’s visit was good and we had a nice natter with her. kp’s mood has been good since her last visit and so there weren’t really any problems to be addressed. We aren’t going to have any more planned appointments and are just going to ring her if we need her help, which is probably for the best.

That’s it. Things are going well at the moment, so fingers crossed kp’s mood stays lifted.

Nice day today.

kp had to be up at 11am to get ready in time for Jane and Carol who were coming to take her out for a meal.

When I woke her up, she was not a happy bunny. She had slept for 12 hours, but I think another couple were needed.

kp:- I can’t believe the time. (11am)

Jane was running a little late, which was just as well as kp got a phonecall from Linda McMann, a friend of Karen’s from her schooldays. They did a lot of catching up, and kp really enjoyed the call.

Jane had pre-ordered teas/coffees moments before their arrival, so we all had some tea/coffee. Here are the ladies….Carol, kp and Jane

They went to Chevitas in Durham and had a really nice meal.

More chinwagging on their return. Whilst she was out Karen had received a letter asking her to ring to make an appointment with the consultant who will do Karen’s last (I HOPE !) operation.

I told her and she said she would ring them to arrange a date. She came through to the study to make the phonecall so I could open the diary for her at the dates they suggested, but before she made the call………..

kp:- I need to ring the hairdressers first to get me and Marie booked in for tomorrow.

I thought it was funny ! A woman’s priorities will always be a mystery to a man !

Both had a cracking night’s sleep for the second night running.

Well rested when we got up. Marie came over today with Kieran (stepson (17)) for 2 nights. Kieran is jobbing on for us around the house which is good

Karen and Marie went to get their hair done. Here they are coming out of the hairdressers.

Marie’s son died of leukemia in 2001 (aged 18) and whilst he was in remission he planted a “Weeping Willow” in our front garden. Karen and I had arranged a little plaque to go in front of the tree and it arrived today – perfect timing for Marie to see it.

I set it up while the ladies were frittering money away on their hair.

Marie did a double take when she saw it, but I think she was pleased.

I asked the ladies to pose in front of it for the blog, but I couldn’t seem to get them in, so kp suggested they bend down. Well, it got them in the frame, but I can’t say it makes the best picture in the world, what with Lee’s branches masking their faces.

We are off out tonight for a meal with Tommy and Eileen, Kieran and Marie, so that should be nice.

Well, we had a lovely time with Tommy and Eileen, Marie and Kieran last night at the Fir Tree Inn, Crook.

Food was nice, and the pool (ball game, not swimming) afterwards was great fun.

Kieran stayed up late watching a film while we all retired to bed. Marie was just dozing off but kept being woken up by the volume of the TV in the front room. Rather than get up to tell Kieran to turn it down, she texted him !

kp had a “commode” of a night, up and down every hour. That will teach her for drinking 2 halves of lager shandy. Dirty stopout !

Karen got up about 1pm for a Marie cooked breakfast – which was very nice. She went back to bed at 2pm until 5pm. Uneventful Day generally. Marie has been cleaning out our kitchen cupboards, I have been getting stuff from the attic for Lee’s charity stall in May and Kieran has been clearing out our shed. Busy day I suppose. Karen is exhausted after keeping her eyes shut all afternoon