Back and on the roller coaster again

On Saturday lunchtime, as we waited to board the ferry from Dublin to Holyhead, I received a text message from my brother informing me that Mum had had a fall and was in A&E at Arrowe Park Hospital, which is about 15 miles from where we live, waiting for the results of an x-ray. I have lost count of the number of falls that she has had. She has been like a cat with nine lives. Until now she has got away with nothing more that minor cuts and bruises. Her luck must have run out. Then just after we had arrived in Holyhead I had a phone call from him. Mum had broken a bone at the bottom of her back and the hospital would be keeping her in. He then went on to tell me that the consultant who had seen Mum had said that when she was able to be discharged, that she would need nursing care rather than residential care. The residential home that she is in had said that they would not have her back if she needed nursing care and that the nursing home on the same site as the residential home did not have a vacancy. It seemed to me as if I was going to be spending the next few weeks looking for another home for Mum, when I was not busy driving the 30 mile round trip to visit her at the hospital. Why hadn't they taken her to the nearby Countess of Chester Hospital, which is about three miles from where we live? The signal on my mobile phone in the Holyhead area of Wales was almost non-existent, so I was concentrating on listening to what my brother said and not really analysing what he was saying. It was not until we had got back to the cottage that it registered with me that the home have to give four weeks notice if they can no longer cope with my Mother. They can not just decide that they don't want her.

On Sunday morning, after about 15 minutes on the phone I managed to find the ward that my Mother was in and was very surprised and somewhat relieved to be told that she was being discharged back to the residential home later in the day!