Sorry folks, I realised I'd made a major cock-up in the latest episode of The Joiners, so I have largely rewritten it and offer it for your perusal, which means you can read it all over again and compare it to what you saw yesterday.

Yesterday, was rather difficult my ageing next-door neighbour has become increasingly confused and with her declining mobility was finding it difficult to cope with things like washing and dressing and getting food. I spent about six hours with her yesterday, scribbled The Joiners in between and was called back to her by the careline service to say she pressed her emergency pendant. She had got herself stuck in a doorway and couldn't move for fear of falling. It's really horrible to witness. I rescued her and told the careline people what had happened and they decided to call an ambulance for her to be assessed by paramedics.

I sat with her until nearly midnight waiting for the paramedics and she was getting very tired, so I helped her up to bed whereupon, she managed to fall in the bathroom and cut her arm above the elbow. I managed to rescue her but it took her nearly three-quarters of an hour to shuffle the ten feet from the bathroom to her bed. I asked her if she wanted me to call and cancel the paramedics but she said she was okay if they woke her up.

I got to bed about 1.00 am and to sleep about two as I suppose I was still dealing with the adrenalin of responding to her fall. I'd dressed her arm so that shouldn't bleed in the bed. I also think I was half-listening for the ambulance. I heard it at just before 7.00am and threw on some clothes to see if I could help. My neighbour was very upset and confused but I helped her use the commode and the paramedics took her off protesting on a stretcher chair. After they'd gone I tidied up her place and came home, I felt exhausted. She'd been falling again for the past few days and the night before I'd picked her up and calmed her down before helping her up to bed it took me 90 minutes because of her mobility problems.

She's in hospital now and I hope they don't try to discharge her to her house because she can't cope and I have my university course to deal with. I know she feels guilty because she's had so much of my time for the last year or two, but I'm very fond of her and hope she can spend the last of her days somewhere comfortable and caring.

I'm not offering any of this as an excuse, but you see what I mean about being busy in my previous blog, plus my course is now running two modules instead of the one we started in October. Pressure doesn't start to describe it.