Sunday, 26 June 2016

Mum is a bit delirious

When G and I arrived in the ward today we could hear mum talking out loud - obviously disturbing the other occupants of her room - and the word that was most obvious in her monologue was "rabbits". She didn't make much sense. It was clear that she was delirious and that therefore she had slipped back a bit compared to yesterday. Yesterday she was talking normally and making perfect sense. Today she was ranting deliriously.

There was no wall between what she wanted to say and what emerged from her mouth. She would react to the slightest snippet of conversation overheard from a nearby bed. She would react with disdain to the suggestion of a mouthful of food. She would yell when the doctor picked up her arm to examine the skin on it. She was just voicing all her feelings without any barrier between the inception of the feeling and the final word that emerged. It was just not the way she normally is. It was the infection talking.

We tried to get her to eat something but without much success. We had more luck with the coffee - a flat white - which I had bought at the kiosk outside the hospital's front door. They make decent coffees there so I don't blame mum for not eating the chicken breast and pumpkin and mashed potato that the kitchen had prepared (I tried some and had no trouble eating it but it wasn't exactly cordon-bleu).

After the visiting hours had ended we left and came back home, then walked up the street to have some Vietnamese food for lunch. I had a chicken pho and G had summer rolls. Tomorrow G goes back home to the Coast.

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