Not really up to much at the moment

I've not been around for a while and probably won't be back to much art stuff for a while. Why? I hate off loading across the ether - But - my mum is seriously ill in hospital.

Last Friday night 29th Feb whilst she was doing the washing up at 9.30 pm she had a sharp sudden headache. Sat down , put her head down on the table and then started to vomit. My brother was visiting and decided she needed a doctor. The doctor arrived and said he thought she had caught one of those vicious viruses like the Norovirus - by 4am she was taken to the Great Western hospital and put in isolation.

On Saturday afternoon she was no better so they did a CT scan and found she had had a Subarachnoid Heamorrage! She should have died on Friday - it is a killer. However she survived - a miracle for a lady aged 77! The hospital decided to transfer to a specialist hospital - the John Radcliff in Oxford on Sunday lunchtime. That was the time I found out about the incident from my brother - he said he did not want to spoil Mother's Day for me!!!!! How's that for a family keeping in touch!!!!!!!!! (at least my brother let her open the Mother's Day card I and sent!) My daughter and I were close to the hospital at the time so we rushed over to find she had not yet been transferred and the ambulance that was due to transfer her as an EMERGENCY did not arrive until 7pm. I was glad I was there!! By this time she was extremely ill and we kept being told she should be dead! We eventually arrived at the specialist hospital where they at last started to do the right things - making her stable etc. She already has high blood pressure and has had several spontaneous pneumothoraxes (lung collapses) in the past ending with a lung re-section. She has also been in a near fatal car accident with a long spell in intensive care so the hospital had to take care of how she was lying - she needs to sit up for her lungs and lie down for her brain.

She had brain surgery on Tuesday afternoon - we were told the risk of her dieing without surgery was 50% and then the chance of death due to the procedure was 50% - as was the chance of stroke like symptoms. The procedure was Endovascular coiling. She survived with no side effects - except for general post op things - disorientation etc.

We have been visiting every day and we know that there is still a 50% chance of her dieing in the next few days. However she is still alive and yesterday seemed to be back to very normal. Which was fantastic. The surgeons have kept saying she may find the recovery slow going and we may find its 1 day forward and 2 backwards. Sadly today was a backwards day. Of our usual 6 hour visiting time we were only able to spend 10 mins or so with her. She was irritable, upset and definitely very strange. I found it very difficult seeing her so strange.

So there you have it - No sympathy please - I am very strong at the moment - in fact maybe too strong! I love her dearly and it would be horrific if she did die but I am almost resigned to it. After all she has made it to 77 and all people die at some point.