Daughter shares Covid-19 healing words
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A daughter has praised the care her mother has been receiving at a Grantown care home during the Covid-19 lockdown.
Mary Glover (84) has been cared for at Lynemore care home since the start of the year.
Operators Parklands recently invited relatives with loved ones in their care to share their experiences.
A spokesman for the care home firm said: "We asked what they missed most about not seeing their loved ones, and how they feel now that they can finally visit again, albeit with restrictions.
"During the Covid-19 pandemic, we've published personal accounts from our carers and management about the challenges of working during a pandemic.
"Mel Fitzhugh, whose mum lives at Lynemore in Grantown, has written this exceptionally brave and honest account of how her family has coped in the midst of this unprecedented challenge."
They also hope that by sharing the story it will help others to come to terms with the often difficult decision for a loved one to enter a care home.
Mel had little idea that when she last saw her mum on March 22 that it would not be until last Friday that mother and daughter would be properly reunited.
But she said that lockdown had turned out to be "a period of healing, both for myself, my father and my sister".
Mel states in her story: "2019 was a rollercoaster year for us. My mum, Mary, fell and fractured her pelvis in April last year and from then on, entered a period of crisis, going from one fall to the next, including a broken hip and internal bleeding.
"We thought we had lost her on at least two occasions. My sister and I spent time in the intensive care waiting room at Raigmore Hospital wondering how to break the news to our 86 year old father.
"Throughout this process, mum became a shadow of her former self. She had periods of awareness but a lot of time, she was confused, frightened and paranoid.
"This was incredibly difficult to watch, especially since it was happening at such a fast rate and dealing with crisis after crisis meant that none of us had time to process or mentally deal with what was happening.
"In the midst of this, mum and dad celebrated their 60th wedding anniversary. We had a small family gathering and a card from the Queen, little knowing at that stage what was ahead of us…
The light at the end of the tunnel has been Lynemore.
"Initially, making the decision for mum to enter care was horrendous but we could see that dad couldn’t continue as they were. His health was deteriorating too.
"Mum went into Lynemore on 27th January. We had very little notice so very quickly put a few personal things into her room, but we needn’t have worried. She loved her blue room with the view to the garden and hills at the back.
"The staff went out of their way to help to settle her in and relatively speaking, she settled quite quickly."
Mel visited her mother on the day before total lockdown and said: "We had a great wee laugh and chat but I felt uneasy as I walked away, at that stage not really realising what was ahead of all of us – including the staff.
"I’m not going to lie, initially I felt a bit of relief. I literally could do nothing. Fortunately from our experience of Lynemore up until then, I knew that mum was safe and content 'in her bubble' and I am glad she doesn’t really know what’s going on outside.
"We are very much aware that the staff have become her family and if we could pick replacements for ourselves, it would be the staff at Lynemore.
"They have given me the confidence to relax a bit and allow them to care on my behalf whilst we helped dad to recover.
"We have learnt how precious life can be and particularly quality of life. We have learnt to trust others to care on our behalf. We have met the most fantastic teams both in the hospitals, the social care system and in Lynemore itself.
"The learning curve has been steep but having had the lockdown period to reflect and rest, I can now clearly have the confidence to know that we did the right thing by mum. Dad has even said that he knows she is in the right place.
"He calls the staff 'his angels' and he’s right - they are."
Mel finally met up with her mum again outside in the garden at Lynemore last Friday afternoon on a beautiful sunny day.
She said: "The four to five month time gap just fell away in an instant."
