The last week was one of the most stressful for a long time, there were a number of things going on but mostly we were worried about my mum, she was in hospital all week following her fall. I didn't know which way to turn, I needed to spend time with my mum and support her, but I also needed to help my step father who is ill and frail and not used to being on his own. Then there were the ordinary demands of life to be considered, going to work, feeding the family and trying my best to keep on top of the house work. I seemed to rush from one task to the next with no time to stop and think – perhaps that was a good thing!
My mum had a deep wound on her head which was surrounded by a large area of severe bruising; they were worried that the force of my mum’s fall may have caused a bleed into the brain. The wait for the brain scan seemed endless, but thankfully it showed that we have hard heads in our family, there was no damage to her brain. More tests were necessary to determine why she blacked out, it seems her blood pressure is very high but at times her pulse becomes dangerously low. This may necessitate a pacemaker, but in the short term she has been sent home to recover from her fall and to stabilise her blood pressure with medication.
We picked her up from hospital on Friday evening and settled her in at home before going home to pack the car and do all the last minute jobs in preparation for our holiday. I was disconcerted but too tired to argue when Robbie announced that he was packing the Lego men. It left me wondering about his priorities because at that stage he still hadn’t packed his underwear!
Robbie came home in a foul mood today. He got so wound up that I learned a couple of 'new words' when he was telling me what had annoyed him so much. I think the term incandescent with rage more or less sums it up! What was the cause of his fury? It was an organisation that regularly has me on my soapbox -the most recent episode was on Monday when I was reading the latest copy of Rail. It isn't really hard to guess - it's Network Rail!!
Every time the I hear the name Network Rail I can feel my blood pressure going through the roof and Robbie's blood pressure must have been stratospheric this evening! I wonder if it could be classed as an industrial injury?! At least I only have to share the same planet with them - and that's challenging enough when they talk such rubbish, but Robbie has to deal with them every day! It is enough to drive him mad.
At least he had plenty to distract him this evening. He went to a Sixth Form open evening with Laura. She wanted to see what the facilities were like at our local boy's school, but she had no real intention of moving from her own school which in my opinion offers a better package and will equip her better for university. She wanted to take Robbie with her rather than me because her friends like him, his accent makes them laugh and they think he is really cool.
