Janet Berry

Yesterday I had to put my mum in a care home.

Janet Berry was diagnosed with Alzheimer's in the spring of 2004 and moved to a new home near where I life with my wife in September of that year. I gave up my job in 2005 to look after her and took her for her last holiday to Walt Disney World that autumn. Late last year she began to show signs of severe deterioration, getting lost outside her home (and also, later, in it), and losing the ability to care for, or toilet, herself properly. She had visiting carers - originally just once or twice a day - who would come to make sure she was washed and dressed, and that she went to bed at night.

In recent months, she started to hallucinate that people (usually on the television) were trying to break into the house and kill her. She spent a lot of time frightened, recoiling in horror, crying or trying to express panic. She struggled to string together more than a couple of words of sense.

Now she lives in a room in a residential home alongside other people with dementia. At the moment, she still knows my name and treats me as her only friend. Every time she sees me, she tells me how much she loves me. She continually asks where I am. I am told this will pass. I didn't even tell her she was being moved. We just left her house and walked to the home together, down the high street, with a suitcase of her clothes. She skipped once or twice like a little girl. She likes being out in the sunshine.

This photo is of Janet when she first went on holiday with my dad, Peter, probably in 1970. She doesn't recognise him in photos any more - I don't know whether this is cruel or otherwise.

But at least this way I can tell everyone, and I don't actually have to talk about it.

The truth about cats and... robotic dogs

It was my birthday last week and, interspersed with bouts of illness, drunkenness and job-interview-ness, I found time to unwrap my presents.

My wife cleverly bought me a 1/4 scale K9 from TV's popular Dr Who show (I'm off to the press premiere next week - coo, the excitement!). I thought it was only fair to introduce him to the house's other 1/4 scale animal, Heidi. She's also been suffering a bit of fur damage the last few weeks (trips to the vet have as yet yielded neither cause nor cure). I don't think she was overly impressed with her new tin chum.

I also got a toaster (as it turns out, K9 doesn't come complete with a grill setting) and various books and DVDs. Lovely stuff. Hmm... perhaps I should add my Amazon wish list to the "vanity" links on this blog?

A concerned parent writes

My mum was never one much for writing, even before the Alzheimer's stopped her from being able to do so. My dad, on the other hand, was always jotting down short notes and sending them to me.

Compared to all the other letters I've got in the box (and isn't letter writing a dying art, eh?) my dad's were short and to the point - each one practically a "to do" list. Although this one, sent on 14 December 1991 is more circumspect and melancholy. It was most likely written after his second heart attack (the one that really took it out of him) and you can read the worry and the resignation between the lines. He'd have only been 55. Three years later and he'd be dead.

Of course, this is some time after I'd been chucked out of university but was still living in Aberystwyth (sharing with Irish Mark, Nerys and co. in rooms above what was The Central Hotel), working at Bronglais hospital for a pittance. In fact, after Christmas, I moved into Glynderwen, the shared house on Trinity Road with Rich, Ad, Big Steve, et al, largely due to a falling out with the landlord but in part a separate falling out with Nerys. It was better being around close friends, even if I did have the smallest, coldest room in the house. Even if I was the only one putting money in the electricity meter. Even if I did come home every night with a slightly more corroded soul after a day's denigration by an overzealous boss.

Despite my dad's stirling work with the local education authority in Lancashire, I didn't seriously contemplate a return to university until the following summer (and, by that time, it was too late to return in the '92-'93 year). But I did make it eventually, after a further "year out", back at home. Which at least meant I got to spend more time with family, and I earned a lot more money.

Middleton Tower Pontins

A photo of me and my Grandad at Middleton Tower Pontins. My grandparents went here for their holidays nearly every year (maybe even more than once a year) at least until I was 18. The site still exists, I think, although it's now derelict and heavily vandalised.

Things I remember from those Hi-Di-Halcyon days; the "Noddy" train (I wonder if they paid the Blyton estate residuals on that), trampolines, a very shallow boating lake, and indoor pool in a building that looked like an ocean liner. Strange days.

Baby book

Proof I was born. Proof I am a Scouser.

I was apparently 7lbs 14oz at birth. I'm a shade over that now.

My dad was late to the hospital on account of watching the first leg of the European cup tie between Everton and Panithinaikos at Goodison Park.

It ended 1-1 by the way.

How things change

When I lived in the 'States (back in the '70s) I went to visit my dad's work at White Plains, Westchester, NY. Someone must've printed me up a laminate for the day, 'cos here I am looking like a right cutie even with a couple of teeth missing.

Right through college and university, I always said the two things I would never do for a living were a) work with computers like my dad, and b) work in a shoe shop like the one my dad bought when he retired. (The former resolution meant I wanted to be, variously, an actor, a pop star, a poet, a writer, a radio presenter. The latter might've been something to do with watching A Taste Of Honey as a kid.)

Lo and behold, nearly thirty years on.

I'm not sure what this proves. Perhaps, that I have failed. (I haven't worked in a shoe shop yet. But if this freelance lark doesn't work out...)