When do you put your foot down?

Today began badly and deteriorated quickly until Ash was stomping around because he had nothing to do.  The situation wasn't helped by my carer's assessment which involved an hour and a half on the phone with a lovely man called Mark who listened to me talk, asked relevant questions and came up with ideas to help.  I know I've said over and over again that there is no dementia support in Lincolnshire but it seems, when you actually find it, they pull out all the stops and make you start to feel in control of your life again; at least that's what's happened to me.  However when I got off the phone Ash was glowering at the tv and my heart sank.  This was obviously all my fault and I needed to find some thing to occupy him so I suggested we went out into the sunshine to collect some fallen branches from the verges at the end of the village then we'd be ready for fire lighting in a few weeks time.  I was instantly told we didn't need any extra wood so that was a stupid idea at which point he pushed just one too many of my buttons and I snapped telling him that it was fine if he didn't want to come with me but not to blame me when he couldn't find anything to do.  I'm not proud of that moment because I do know that he can't help these moods but then again maybe he can and the reason I say that is because when I walked out of the room he followed me to sort of apologise and I suddenly realised that he does this when he knows he's in the wrong.  If he really can't help it we get into one of those downward spiralling discussions where there is no way out but there are times, I've noticed, when he's just in a bad mood and I'm the easiest/only target.  The good thing is that we got over/through all of it and he began to smile which is always nice then I left him for an afternoon drinking tea with a friend I haven't seen since the beginning of lockdown and soon all was right in my world again.

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