Beauty breaks through life’s dark clouds

THE natural order is parents die before their children, but the kicker is a child is never ready to lose a parent.

We don’t know a world without them in it.

While they’re alive we remain children, even if we are in our 50s and 60s.

My parents refer to my siblings and I as ‘the kids’.

Eight years ago, this Ramblings would be about how my mum sends me expensive anti-wrinkle creams for birthdays and Christmases and has done since I was in my 20s.

I’d be telling you about her latest masterpiece and how she wins international awards in decorative icing.

There’d be a boast about how fit she is, still taking part in marathons and swimming the English Channel.

She swam the English Channel about eight years ago, when she wore a wet suit and daily gym sessions maintained her fitness through her 60s.

About eight years ago, mum was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease.

Gym sessions slowly tapered off and she struggled with things like understanding how a stove worked.

Parkinson’s Dementia was the heartbreaking diagnosis.

Dad became her carer. He made vows on their wedding day and he’s keeping them.

But dad has cancer and is unsteady on his feet and mum will go walkabout if he leaves her alone.

The ‘kids’ stepped up and into new roles.

We made our own WhatsApp group so we could talk about their needs.

We were dreading the time she’d forget who we were.

It became harder to understand what she was saying because her speech was slurred.

We pulled rank and moved them into a little unit attached to my sister Wendy’s house in Kent.

Dad grumbled about his constant ‘downgrades’ saying, “I went from a big house in South Africa to a two bedroom flat in the UK, then a one bedroom bungalow and now I am in a studio apartment”.

He didn’t want to move but it was past the point of him making all the decisions. He wanted to care for mum, but that was no longer practical.

We told him that and they moved a couple of months ago.

My siblings packed and sorted, tossed and sold, kept and gifted hundreds of items.

They weren’t unkind, there are boxes of things special to them in Wendy’s garage they can go through once life slows down.

Last week, mum slipped on a pavement in the garden and broke her hip.

She was taken to hospital by ambulance and underwent a replacement operation.

Her shenanigans earned her a 10 night stay in an English hospital.

My siblings are taking turns to be at her bedside and they’re also helping dad cope emotionally.

“She’s had patches of forgetting, she became confused about who I was for the first time the other day,” Wendy said.

“She asked where I went to high school and what my parents did for a living.

“When I said carpet cleaning, she was pulled back into herself and said oh yes.

“It was sad but wasn’t quite as awful as I’d imagined it would be, maybe because I know it’s not her fault?”

A child is never ready to lose a parent and sometimes loss isn’t death but a disease like dementia.

“I’ve been here over an hour now and she’s just looked at me and said, ‘wait, you’re my daughter aren’t you? You’re Ninky Nonks [Wendy’s nickname]!”

I read the message, and it struck me how love in its purest form shone through a disease like dementia.

The innocence of a child returns and words spoken are heartfelt.

I told Wendy this and she said, “I totally agree, it’s sad, but mostly it’s beautiful.”

We are navigating this disease as a family, drawing on the understanding, empathy and compassion we learned as children.

It’s what mum instilled in us without realising the person we’d need it for most would be her.