I am morphing into my mother!

Her hands show all the signs of a long life, arthritic and wrinkled to the point of feeling like corrugated iron. She keeps them busy; they are rarely idle. Lately she has become 100 per cent addicted to colouring in and considering she has dementia, blind in one eye, arthritis and a brain tumour, her dogged determination makes every picture she completes quite amazing. I know I have inherited that determination.

When Mum was the age I am now she would constantly wear 3/4 pants from Millers and I would swear blind I was never going to wear them. My oh my how age changes us. Not only do I wear them frequently, I also have them in a delightful array of colours.

As a rule I don’t buy anything blue – it’s Mum’s favourite colour. She would have the grass dyed blue if she could! I would get sick to death of seeing everything blue and everything shade imaginable lives in her wardrobe. As I age I have noticed blue is slowly sneaking into my life and more often than not Mum will come out of her bedroom of a morning wearing the same colours that I already have on, and I am getting so very tired of opening my mouth and hearing my mother come out! Serenity now, I am morphing into my mother!

Recently we had to do a quick trip to the doctor with Mum, she had a swelling and a sore spot in her arm and it turned out to be a surface clot surrounded by inflamed vessels. It was swollen, inflamed and painful but the doctor could not prescribe anything because of her extreme allergies. We had to wait two weeks and if it was still there the doctor then weighs up the risks of surgery versus her 91-year-old body and a decision would have to be made whether to operate or not. Mum was not a happy camper when we left the surgery mainly because the doctor is a low talker and she is as deaf as a post.

With the doctor’s information on board we went to a cafe so I could repeat everything the doctor said over a soothing cappuccino, and we ended up having lunch. Mum took a fancy to a breadboard of different things, as much as I said you hate sun dried tomatoes and marinated fetta! Fact was she was just feeling very cranky about her arm and come hell or high water she was ordering the breadboard of delights. When it arrived mum tasted hers and said this tastes like – Mum behave – “No,” she said. “I am cranky. Grow old they said, it will be fun they said! Well here I am nearly 92 and I can’t see properly, I can’t hear properly, I can’t pee properly, I can’t walk properly, I can’t think properly and now I can’t move my arm properly! I can’t even remember that I don’t like eating sun dried freakin’ tomatoes ,and why did they give us this rubbish on a breadboard? When is old age going to start being fun?!” 

Tell us: are you scared you’re turning into your mother?