Caring – Page 2 – Well Eye Never

Carer’s Journal – August 2025 – Part 2

In my recent post about the situation in early August, I recalled how my mother had been hospitalised for 6 days after falling and breaking her wrist (which followed on from the various other events I’ve written about previously).

She has now returned home, and naturally it’s been a difficult couple of weeks since then, because she hates being in a cast and unable to do much. But there has also been some help from carers, my aunt and a mental health specialist.

So here’s my latest update on how things have been going during the second half of the month, and I hope you find it insightful.

Carer’s Journal – August 2025 – Part 1

It’s time to bring things up to date in my journal posts about being a carer. Having rambled on at length about my mother’s struggles since the start of the year, including a collarbone fracture in July, there’s been another big development this month, with Mum sustaining another serious injury, resulting in almost a week spent in hospital.

There are thankfully positive signs emerging in the latter half of this month, which I’ll begin to talk about in my next update. But August so far has been our most stressful period yet this year, which isn’t ideal when we’re both meant to be celebrating our birthdays this month! So here’s what’s been going on lately.

Carer’s Journal – July 2025

Continuing with my catchup of events from earlier this year, in relation to caring for my mother, I’m now going to share my journal from July. And things took a more serious turn this month, as she had her first (and sadly not last) fractured bone as a result of a fall, which didn’t do her anxiety and poor confidence any favours at all. It was the sort of thing that I’d feared coming, hence I also tried to request a carers assessment this month. And we were able to arrange appointments for other forms of help as well that might be useful.

So again, I really appreciate you looking through these diary entries for awareness, even though it’s not an easy read. I’m just glad I’m getting all this stuff out there so people know what’s going on.

Carer’s Journal – June 2025

Following on from my post looking back at May, we now move on to June for the next in my series of journals about my life as a carer, showing how things have evolved during the year with my mother’s physical and mental health (and again, please do read those posts if you haven’t already, to put everything here into context).

These entries are not comfortable to read, I know,, and nor were they to write either. But as I’ve said before, I want to be open about things to help raise awareness. So I appreciate you taking the time to look through them, and I hope you find them interesting.

Carer’s Journal – May 2025

Having recently explained the complex situation regarding my mother’s declining physical and mental health, and the impact on my own wellbeing, I’m going to document how things are going as time goes on, to keep you up to date.

It seems easiest to do this in journal form, which I think will be more insightful anyway, as things keep changing so quickly that trying to do a summary roundup every so often would be rather difficult. I’m already keeping a personal diary anyway, so rather than writing something new, it’s much easier for me to just adapt my journal entries for public viewing, taking out details that are private, intimate or irrelevant – just like I did for my Devon journals from the early 2000s that I posted during lockdown, which proved to be surprisingly popular. It also gives me the flexibility to post whenever I need to, depending on how much there is going on.

To start with, therefore, I’m going to share more detail about events from earlier in the year, so you can get a sense of how things have progressed up to this point. This will help to add context to my previous trilogy of posts as well – so please do read those first if you haven’t already, to fully understand what I’m talking about here.

The months of January to April weren’t without their issues, as Mum did have a couple of falls in that time, which led to us having telecare installed. But it was in May that things really took a downward turn. So I’m just going to quickly summarise the key points from the first 4 months of the year, and then share my journal for May. In subsequent posts over the next few days, I’ll then take you through June, July and August so far.

So I hope you find it interesting, and it gives you a sense of how hard it can be as a carer for a loved one who is struggling and acting in unpredictable ways. As strange and difficult as it is to share such details sometimes, I think it’s important to be open to raise awareness and to let others know they’re not alone, as it’s nothing to be ashamed of.

Caring For Mum – Part 3 – My Wellbeing

As explained in my last couple of posts, my elderly mother’s physical and mental health has declined significantly in recent months, as she’s been struggling with the impacts of going blind and having falls, including anxiety, panic attacks, sleep disruption, confusion and visions.

That’s required me to be much more attentive as her carer, which in turn has had an impact on my own wellbeing, as seeing her change so quickly has been heartbreaking and a shock to the system, and therefore difficult to come to terms with. And even though I know I’m one of 6 million unpaid carers in the UK (many of whom are in far worse positions than me), it still feels like the loneliest job in the world, because I’m having to do it all by myself, unwitnessed in secret behind closed doors.

I have now started to reach out for support, both for myself and for Mum, and consequently I’m feeling a bit better than I was, because I know that help is on the horizon. But it is very much a waiting game, during which we have no idea how long it will take for help to arrive, what support we’ll be able to get, and how useful it will turn out to be.

I’m also very fortunate to have close friends who are keeping in touch to see how I’m doing, allowing me to sound off to them about what’s happening, offer advice, provide information and meet up occasionally, despite having issues in their own lives that they’re dealing with. I greatly appreciate that, as I don’t feel so isolated and it’s comforting to know that people care.

So here’s an insight into what it’s been like from my perspective and the support I’m trying to get. I hope you find it interesting, and again feel free to comment here or contact me if you have any help or advice or just want to be supportive.

Caring For Mum – Part 2 – Mental Health

Yesterday I started to open up about how things have become more difficult for my elderly mother, and by extension for myself as her carer, since she went blind last year. That first post was about her physical health and sleep, including the fact that she’s having falls regularly.

So now I want to talk about the changes to her mental health, which I’m finding the most upsetting thing to witness, because it’s distressing for her and I feel powerless to fix it. We have reached out for support, as I’ll explain during this post, but until any help arrives I just have to be as patient and supportive as I can for her.

She naturally has quite a lot of anxiety and some panic attacks as a result of her blindness and recent accidents, which is difficult enough for her to deal with, and consequently she’s become very emotionally dependent on me. But her brain has also been messing with her by making her think there are multiple versions of me in the house, or getting her confused in other ways, which we hadn’t anticipated.

There are plenty of times when she’s relaxed and clear-headed as well, fortunately, but every day there are at least one or two instances where she’s not thinking straight, usually due to tiredness or stress in some way.

So I’m going to explain things as best I can here. As I said last time, I’m very open to any help or advice if you want to offer it in a comment or contact me in other ways. But in general I hope these posts help to raise some awareness of what it can be like as carer, and how unique our particular situation is.

Caring For Mum – Part 1 – Physical Health

I’m an unpaid carer for my mother and lately we’ve been struggling to cope. We need help.

It sounds like I’m introducing myself at some kind of group therapy session. But then this series of posts is a form of therapy for me really, to open up about what’s been going on lately.

After all, being a carer does make you feel anonymous, as you’re leading a secret life behind closed doors, even from your own relatives and friends to some extent. And I haven’t felt the need to write about it here before, because my mother and I have had a healthy balance to our lives with no major issues.

But developments over the last few months have proven too overwhelming for us to deal with by ourselves, because Mum hasn’t adapted well to going blind for various reasons, plus she’s having falls quite regularly. So I’m having to do a lot more for her, and it upsets me to see her struggling so often. It’s been a shock to the system for both of us, because it’s a new, confusing, emotional and somewhat frightening journey that we’re being forced to embark on. We are now starting to reach out for support, which has given us reason to be hopeful. But there’s a lot of waiting involved.

So bear with me while I ramble my way through what’s been going on to bring you into the loop, because there is quite a lot. I’ve split this up into three posts that I’ll be posting over consecutive days, to focus on Mum’s physical and mental health issues in turn, followed by the impact on me as her carer and the support I’m trying to access. Then I’ll share regular updates as to how we’re getting on, alongside the other types of post I usually do.

Mum knows I’m putting this stuff online, as it’s nothing for us to be ashamed about, it’s good to raise awareness, and it might help us to find extra support. Indeed, I’m very open to any help or advice that people are able to offer as a result of reading all of this stuff, so feel free to comment here or contact me by email or social media if you wish.

But even if you can’t help or relate to what’s going on, I hope you find this interesting. If I can use this situation and my platform to help raise awareness of what it’s like being a carer, then that alone makes this worthwhile.

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this: