Wednesday night I returned to Darwin and Susan took me straight out to Hospice. It was 10pm by the time we arrived so perhaps not surprising that Helen wasn't so with it but nonetheless I found it pretty distressing to see her as she was. Seemed like there'd been a lot of changes in the 6 days I'd been away - most notably in the look of her face and the way she was speaking. Her eyes were wide and starey and her voice slurred. She was a bit confused (although delighted to see me) and had a story about walking into the next room that didn't make a lot of sense but seemed to be important to her as she tried to tell it several times.
That night I felt perhaps this was/is the beginning of her final illness and despite having gone through this a number of times since she first got sick found myself feeling quite upset and sad.
Her house at the Gardens is strange without her. It's weird not to have Jo and even weirder to think that Susan and Freckles will move away after she dies.
Thursday morning however I felt more positive about how she is. I caught up with Kate the junior doctor on the ward and had a talk about how Helen has been going. Apparently the physio has been coming daily and has succeeded in getting her to do some standing and short walks (a good sign in general), she has had another Klebsiella UTI confirmed, she has a dermatology review planned for today and also a bone scan to look at the possible rib fracture and any other metastases. Apart from the confusion, weakness and tiredness they have been pretty happy with how she's going and apparently she has been eating well and settled most of the time. When I went in to hang out with Helen herself I had a look at the rash - definitely new and different to any of the weird rashes she's had before so I'll be interested to see if there is an official diagnosis.
Helen and I had a nice time together and she wasn't really too confused for most of the visit. I told her about some major personal stuff from my own life, we talked about the possibility that she might die in the next little while and whether there was anything she wanted to do or say at this time and I started a conversation about funeral/memorial ideas.
To those who haven't been hanging out with Helen over the last year that probably all sounds a bit direct but one of the lovely things about how she is - and how we are with her is you can pretty much talk about anything and there's no major emotional reaction or distress even when you really think there might be - it's very freeing!
I'm away again in Victoria until Tuesday and Louis is still in Brisbane. Susan is holding the fort at the moment but she will be out of Darwin from Friday to Sunday - so - any Darwin readers please do visit this weekend as I'm worried about her being lonely. Hospice is well staffed and a very caring safe place for her to be so I know she will be ok but visitors are still nice.
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