Thoughts of a carer

  It's been a while since I added to this blog. I’d like to write more often, but being a carer has its challenges - your priority has to be those you care for. Since my last update I’ve had extra caring work come my way; my mother moved into a care home in September, and I’ve been busy getting her settled in, and helping with some of her financial and administration work.  I’ve also been involved in my late stepmother's estate, and these new challenges have made me consider the contrasting attitudes that different generations seem to have, and to contemplate how these differences have arisen, and whether modern attitudes actually represent an improvement on those in the past.   *** My father didn’t talk much about  the war. Like many of his generation, he witnessed some pretty horrible things - I know he saw burning enemy tanks with German soldiers stuck inside ( 1) , and he was also involved in the clean-up at Belsen. I do, however, remember him saying, on mor...

 As a child I was encouraged by my parents to trust 'knowledgeable people' - teachers, vicars and the like. Growing up I noticed that many of these people had achieved great things, for they tended to display an alphabet of post-nominal initials; I also noticed, though, that many of them seemed to be lacking in aspects of knowledge that other, more 'ordinary', people seemed to take for granted. Recently there was an example of a mother who, faced with looking after her disabled son unsupported during lockdown, had a mental breakdown and killed him. In order to protect us (or the NHS) from the effects of Covid, our leaders, on the advice of highly qualified experts (in SAGE), had set up an environment where the most vulnerable could not cope. To me, and many like me, it was obvious that this sort of thing would happen - and that it will continue to happen for years, long after lockdowns, as a result of the measures that have been implemented. Surely, in a civilised soci...