I only saved this recently, but already I have forgotten where I picked it up from.
It just rang so true.
We are currently trying to pick out Mum's absolute 'treasures' from the chaos of papers and trinkets that fill her drawers and cupboards.
We have already filled the walls of her new room with her most treasured wall art, her clock, the portrait of my Dad with my youngest son at a couple of weeks old painted by the son in question a few years ago. Family photos, all in multi-frames and labelled neatly with Children, Grand Children, and the final frame Great and Great-Great Grand Children.
Her bathroom is stocked with toiletries from home. Twelve bars of Dove soap anyone ... at least she'll be nice and clean. 😄
Her clothes are all hanging freshly laundered and labelled in her new built-in wardrobe.
We ask her what she would like bringing from the bungalow regularly, but she can't remember what she has and what she loves.
Luckily I have a brilliant memory, although to be honest it is stretched to almost breaking point at the moment, but it means I can pick up most of Mum's things and know where they are from and what they mean to her.
There are my Dad's gardening and table tennis medals, the Derby and Joan garden gnomes, the silk flowers in a vase hand painted by my late Aunty Barbara.
And pride of place has gone to the cookery book that my Dad bought her way back in 1957 when they were first going out. He obviously wanted the girl he was about to propose to, to know the foods that he liked as there is a piece of paper tucked inside with a list of his favourite foods and their page number.
These are all now in residence on one of her windowsills, she doesn't have many surfaces, but those that she does have are filling up with treasure.
I have to recognise that the bits of blank paper, the shopping lists from 2021 and the leaflets that Mum was 'saving' were also special to her, but in a care home room there is not the space to keep those sorts of 'treasures'. Anyway it brought a smile to our faces when we arrived for a visit on Sunday after two full hours of sorting back at her bungalow, to find that my brother had taken the Radio Times and the Saturday newspaper for her the previous day, and someone had just given her a Sunday paper, so she already had a little stash of junk mail and the leaflets that fell from the newspapers and magazine to read through and pile up by her chair.
She will never change ... but then she is my Mum. 💖
Sue xx
It's lovely that your Mum has room for some of her bits and pieces, it must be strange for her - and what a good thing you are closer than you were when in Wales.
ReplyDeleteI never got a chance to sort through my Mums things when she died and only managed to save a couple of things of hers later when my sister cleared the house after Dad died . We were an hour away and sister was next door so she just chucked almost all small things into a skip!
We are about half an hour closer if the roads are clear, but sadly we are on three different motorways with frequent queues to get from one to the other, so sometimes it actually takes us longer now.
DeleteWhat a shame your sister got rid of things without waiting for you to help. We are trying to make sure all three of us get to see everything but I have to admit to me and Alan being quite ruthless as my brother has inherited my Dad's hoarding tendencies ... and he only lives in a studio flat.
It's a tricky task but sounds like you're making a brilliant job of it.
ReplyDeleteAlison in Wales x
We're doing our best. 🙂
DeleteReading this I'm back in my mil's room at the nursing home.
ReplyDeleteA favourite cushion and throw, a photo of her late husband, trinkets from her dressing table, they all helped to make her feel at ease although we were never sure she felt entirely 'at home' - with dementia it's very hard to tell. But she seemed content and ate well till she passed away 4 years later.
It's the little things that make it feel homely isn't it. She's settled in well now, although she got trodden on by a pony the other day and ended up back in A&E ... don't ask!! 😂
DeleteYou are taking well care of her. Reminds me of my mother's move from independent living to assisted living and decided what to take. She passed away 11 years ago.
ReplyDeleteI hope you have happy memories. It's good to know that loved ones are being looked after isn't it. Just that 24/7 care is such a relief.
DeleteWhat a lovely post. Catriona
ReplyDeleteThank you. ❤️xx
DeleteI was gong to say "what a lovely post" but have been beaten to it x
ReplyDeleteThank you. 😀
DeleteTake care of your brilliant memory! I loved reading posts about your parents in the early blog days. I am glad she is in a safe place.
ReplyDeleteTake Care,
Bun
Gosh, it's feeling really stretched at the moment. 😶 Yes, I used to write about all the family fun on my other blog didn't I. Unfortunately, Mum doesn't remember ever coming to the farm, that was a sad realisation for me last week, as she used to boast to people about her and Dad looking after the pigs.
DeleteI agree with the other comments, a lovely post from the best daughter in the world! xxx
ReplyDeleteI wouldn't go that far, but thank you so much. xx
DeleteI hope she settles in quickly. If it works out, moving to a care home can be a huge relief for everyone including the person needing the care. But it's not without it's sadnesses.
ReplyDeleteShe seems to have settled in well now. It has to work out as there is literally no other option.
DeleteSo glad that you can remember your Mom's most loved treasures. Moving to a care home means one has to leave so much behind, we found that out with Harvey's parents.
ReplyDeleteGod bless.
It's made me realise how little we actually need, and that when it comes down to it how little we even want.
DeleteA lovely post. I'm glad your Mum is able to have some of her treasures around her at her new place. "Got trodden on by a pony"?! Oh, my! Hope she's recovering well from that!
ReplyDeleteHer foot is healing thank goodness, we were very worried as she has lymphedema and weak skin.
DeleteThat poem hits home. Glad your mum is settled and you are doing your best to have all her special things around her. Good Lord, I have so many!
ReplyDeleteI am always being told by Tamzin to "go through my drawers" and get rid of the useful rubber bands, out of date batteries, too many pencil sharpeners bought for them as children when we visited somewhere on holiday, recycled bits of string to use again . . .
It really does, I hope it didn't upset you too much.
DeleteGoing through Mum's drawers and finding all those 'might come in useful one day' things has made me realise that usually they don't. I don't want anyone to have to do this after I die, so I am getting seriously ruthless at home.
Don’t be too ruthless. When my mum received her terminal cancer disgnosis she went through her things and got rid of an awful lot of photographs and pictures she had painted. Dad and I would have liked some of them as memories.
DeleteI was talking about the detritus drawers ... rubber bands, pens, blank notebooks, things that used to mean something to me but no longer do etc etc. I would never throw actual photos etc away without asking my sons if they would like them.
DeleteTouching and moving post Sue❤️
ReplyDelete❤️ xx
DeleteI'm so glad that at 95 my mum is still able to live at home - despite there being stairs up to the kitchen & living room. My sister shares the same house, but mum is still relatively independent. This is a moving post. Wishing you, your mum & Alan well.
ReplyDeleteShe's doing really well. It's good that she shares the house with your sister, at least you both have peace of mind.
DeleteThis is such a moving post. We tried so hard to get mum into care towards the end but the powers that be were having none of it until she kept having falls and I kept constantly having phone calls during the night to go to her. It was making me very ill, getting no sleep and trying to hold down a part time job to make ends meet. She was in care for the last 2 weeks of her life so didn't really have time to settle in. It was so very sad.
ReplyDeleteI'm so happy for your mum that she is in a lovely place and you are all making her room cosy and familiar. You are a lovely daughter and son-in-law. I just hope mine step up to the mark if I need them.
Angie x
We almost had a care home lined up after her previous stay in hospital, but she rallied really well and wanted to go home, so she did, with carers calling four times a day along with District Nurses and my brother doing all the running around and shopping for her. After a couple of weeks of us being called at all hours by worried alarm people and her carers, and then three falls in three days with two ambulance call outs and A&E admissions and then back into hospital for weeks, we all decided enough was enough. We were extremely lucky to find this place and get her a room. It is very expensive as there are literally no council funded places available, but worth every penny for Mum's safety and our peace of mind.
DeleteIt sounds as though you did everything that you could for your Mum, it's a very hard situation isn't it. I have already formulated a plan to murder Alan if he gets very old and sick, and then ride out my last few years in prison, with three meals a day, my own room and television and good healthcare ... do you think I should tell him. Mind you he said he would do the same for me. ;-)
When Paul’s dad passed away. We had to come to the UK and sort the house out. It was so hard and mentally exhausting on us both. 5 dinner sets!! Most had to go in the skip they were no good. More kitchen gadgets than curry’s . Glasses I could have opened a China shop. And then there was my late mother in laws art . I couldn’t take any home it was to big. So I had to donate it. It broke my heart. The amount of stuff.
ReplyDeleteFrom QVC and ideal world I wasn’t supprised if he was their number one customer. The amount of drugs we returned to the chemist and stoma stupplies the mind boggled. No wonder the nhs is struggling. In Japan we are only given the amount we need for a week or we go to the hospital if we need more.
5 skips it took. Wiltshire farm foods must have loved him as well . Because the meals were awful. It broke my heart. I still miss him now 2 years later
It's so hard isn't it, we went through having to just throw away huge quantities of things when my Dad died. He was a hoarder, but most of his stash of treasures were piled floor to ceiling in the garage, and mostly ruined by damp. It was hard work and soul destroying to have to take it to the tip and fill up a skip. It just drains you both mentally and physically doesn't it.
DeleteI sympathise and empathise - when my father-in-law died we had to do the same - a massive shed and garage, both piled so full you had to haul out bags and boxes before you could even get through the doors. And then all the ruined items covered in mould and damp.
DeleteHimself and his mother did the sorting, I ran a constant back-and-forth to the local tip in a large estate car.