The celebrations are almost over

 All official birthday lunches, breakfasts and visits are now at an end but the treats continue for a few more days with the arrival tomorrow afternoon of Jake and the very nearly 7 year old.  They are coming specifically so that I can disappear for a few days of peace, quiet and a definitely lack of responsibility but as far as Ash is concerned they are coming for a 'boys' weekend and he seems quite happy with that.  Jake and I have learnt some tricks from past trips and this time I've sent a complete plan of Ash's daily routine including where he likes to go out for tea, what he likes to watch on the tv, what time he likes to eat and anything else I could think of which will keep his life as close to normal as possible and consequently make him feel safe even when I'm not around.  I've also mentioned again and again that I'm not going to be here for a few days and once again he seems relaxed about it all but we've been here before when he's seemed relaxed and then had a complete melt down just as I was about to leave the house so we'll see how it goes this time.  It did seem last time as though he'd begun to associate Jake arriving with me leaving but who knows whether that will happen again.  Only one thing is certain with dementia and that's that everything is uncertain and we have to go with the flow.

A friend asked me what I was going to do with my time off and I reeled off some plans, none of them very interesting but things like learning how my new car actually works, transferring files onto the new laptop, going for walks etc.  She listened and then said 'or you might actually just sit and do nothing' and do you know, I think I might.  

One thing I won't be doing is writing blog posts while I'm away because I really, really don't want to have to think about my current dementia affected life but what I might do is begin to think about my book.  A friend and I have been talking for a while about writing a book together and we did get started but I need a focus, something to keep me anchored to the project so I've promised myself, and her, to use my birthday as a kick start to get going and this would be an ideal opportunity to really set out a plan and what I'd like to know from all of you is what sort of things you'd like me to talk about in it.  My idea is to have a topic per chapter with excerpts from this blog at the end of each of those chapters but as far as the list of topics is concerned it's currently very short.  So what interests you?  What would you like to hear more about?  is it travel tips, how to remain patient, how to retain your sense of humour, how to keep your sense of self?  Is there anything I've already written about that you'd like to hear more of, is there something that's playing on your mind that you'd like my views on or is there just something that you've always wondered but never liked to ask?  Please let me know because there's no use me writing this book if it doesn't contain the things that are really important to you.  You can leave your ideas at the bottom of this post or you can email me at memoryfortwo@gmail.com.  Please don't be shy because without your help I really won't get it started.

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