The sound of John taking his morning tablets as quietly as he can has become my new alarm call. It is a good sound as it means he wasn’t up in the night. Nearly a year has passed since his surgery, so this is becoming the norm but every now and then – for whatever reason – something upsets his system and he pays the price in the wee small hours.
I have been asked by the chairman of the support group to write about being a carer. I find that word has so many connotations and doesn’t really sit comfortably with me. The word ‘carer’ conjures up someone being pushed around in a wheelchair like Matt Lucas and David Walliams in “Little Britain”, not my husband and me. Don’t all wives (or husbands) ‘care’ anyway? I just see myself as having to do more than before, that is all.
So, John gets up and cooks his very small breakfast and I leave him to it. This is partly because he was never at his best in the morning and now he is even worse! It is also because I think it is good for his morale to be able to do things for himself. That is my excuse … the fact that I get a lie-in is a carer’s perk, it’s a well-known fact.
After he has eaten, John always needs to sit quietly for a while as his insides deal with the latest intake, so once he has retired to the living room, I have my breakfast in peace. Then, it is off to the supermarket to do a food shop. John used to like coming with me but he tires far more quickly these days, so I suggest he saves his energy for something more interesting than going up and down the aisles at Morrison’s looking for things on the list we have made. We like lists.
In the supermarket, I am irritated by the assumption that everyone is trying to lose weight; so many items are described as ‘low fat’ as if that is a Good Thing (actually, they are usually low in fat but high in sugar!). He has lost over a stone, which is totally normal and neither he nor his consultant are concerned but as winter approaches, I would like him to carry a few more pounds if possible. Our kitchen cupboards are now bulging with a range of desserts and goodies that he has tried and liked but then his tastes have changed. I shall keep trying, though; pain au chocolat, anyone?
When I return home, I am pleased to see he is working in the garden. The fresh air and exercise will do him good. However, after an hour or so, I start to worry that he is overdoing it and neither of us knows whether or not that is true. There is such a fine line between caring and fussing! We will only find out when he wakes up tomorrow morning. They call it learning the hard way.
After years working in IT, much of John’s time is spent on his computer. We have been told that his body needs a good two years to get over all that has been done to it, so I see this as a good way of letting the healing process take place. All the time that he is sitting quietly working on the competitions for his photographic club or on the schedule for the chess club he captains, his body is getting on with recovering.
Evenings are spent pretty well in the same way as they have always been with a few minor tweaks. This evening, he has choir practice so I remind him to take a cheese sandwich with him to eat mid-session – the new regime of eating little and often has to be observed. Then it is bedtime and a case of propping himself up with extra pillows while I hope that the next sound I hear will be him taking his tablets in the morning, at the start of another day’s healing.
