DEMENTIA CARE: SOCIAL ISOLATION IS THE NORM.

This has always been a sweary fucking place. Bear that in mind as we go on.

My last blog post was just a rant at the instant collapse of systems that keep carers going. The lifeline grocery delivery service is one example. I’ve heard of other, more obscure, examples, but we’ll stick with that one.

   Newsflash. My next online food delivery is coming up…we’ll see how that goes. There are more delivery slots in place. I’m hearing requests for people who can go shopping to actually go shopping so carers gain from the lightened online load and have food delivered.

   As I ranted, I knew something would be put in place to make shopping in a supermarket feel less like Russian Roulette played with a double-barrelled shotgun.

   What’s in place? Arrows on the floor. You can’t buy hand sanitiser inside the supermarket, but you see plenty of spray guns as you walk in the door. Keep those trolleys clean. I’m surprised more people don’t wear gloves.

   Yes, I go gloved-up. And I clean up when I’m done. It’s not enough to do one and not the other.

Okay. So what the fuck is great about dementia care? Turns out, the isolated world of the dementia carer is a world that trains you to deal with a global pandemic. Yes, the online deliveries fell to bits as everyone tried to use them. And yes, that alone forced me to be more social and less isolated.

   So for me…it’s different. I’m not having to deal with social isolation. No, I’m dealing with having to talk to more people until systems settle down. Day Whatever of Dementia Care: speak to two people in person. Contrast that with Day One of Social Isolation: forced to talk my way past almost a dozen people, out there in the wild.

   That was shopping and picking up pills.

   In the earlier stages of Dementia Care: around Day Three Hundred and Something, I’d speak to one body a day in person – the cared-for. Dementia care is about being alone, and about having support out there, waiting in the clichéd wings.

   One day, I was at my most isolated. This was back in January of this year, which feels like a decade ago. The cared-for was in respite. I had a few days to myself. There were packages inbound. I’d be home for them. Films I’d watch on my respite break, mostly.

   On at least one day inside that break…at least one…I spoke to absolutely no one in person. The food delivery was in. Fridge stocked. Chocolate treats laid on. I watched films, and no one came to the house.

   A break from carer routine. Just me and chocolate treats and coffee and some films. Random pizza. I played music. Human voices were cinematic or album-based. Absolutely alone that day, I was free from the randomness of being a carer and I embraced the different randomness of enjoying a holiday.

   Not a holiday on a beach or at a castle or in a resort. Just a break from being a carer. A break from the world, inside a larger longer break from the world.

Soon enough, I was back to caring. Health professionals turned up out of the blue or kept to appointments made months before. On a supremely busy day, I’d speak to half a dozen people, and on a mad day I’d be talking to twelve folk.

   And in quarantine?

   Now, shopping, early, with arrows on the floor and queues regulated by bars painted on the pavement, I can get through the shopping process without speaking to anyone. Dog-walkers mutter good morning from ten to fifteen feet away, increasing the level of contact. But not by much.

   An older woman, with a Helen Mirren thing going, says hello to me. She’s dressed for a meeting on the Riviera. At a guess, she’s seeing a movie director on his or her yacht. Anyway, she’s a good ten feet away. If she catches the virus, she’s at risk of death.

   But that’s true of everyone. There’s always a risk. No matter how small the risk lurks, it lurks. All it takes is a sneeze. I see people wearing masks. These are people who don’t wear gloves. I wear gloves, carry spare gloves, and now carry rubber gloves as well. Yes, those work on the terrible touch-screens.

   I don’t need to talk to anyone, while shopping. The latest innovation is the guy on the door using an app to keep track of the people in the supermarket and the intervals between admissions of individual shoppers.

   That guy will tell me it’s okay to go in. And that’s as much social interaction as anyone needs.

Enough of here and now.

   What of my vast experience? Social isolation hints and tips? That’s what you are here for. You’ve been through this for a short time and it is driving you up the wall. Well, I’ve been at this for nearly seven years.

   For the first four-ish years, there was no help during the day. We managed without. At first, my friends would still get me out and about to the movies. That became more challenging as time passed.

   It was easier to go to the movies myself. I chose the time of departure and the moment of return based on an experienced health and safety evaluation. And I was the only one who voiced an opinion on the movie I should see.

   The last film I saw with friends was ROGUE ONE, in 2016. Here we are in quarantine and you are asking yourself what the last film you saw with friends was…and did that give you the virus at the movies?

   As a dementia carer, I had to plan every trip out of the house – even to the bins at the bottom of the garden. Yes, even to the bins. Just to take account of the randomness of dementia. If you plan a trip to the bins, it’ll be to make sure no one is walking by, coughing, as you recycle your cardboard.

   Manage your time. Choose your time-management battles. For me, a trip to town takes the same amount of time as going by bus – if I just miss the bus. So I almost always walk to town. That way, I save money and get exercise from the walk.

   And I still reach my destination on time.

   Not true today. The buses are on restricted timetables, and it is now far quicker and safer for me to walk to town. I’m looking after a woman with dementia. She has a mild underlying health problem that’s respiratory. If that virus lurks on the bus, the bus is a death-trap. And I can’t bet on the bus being virus-free. I won’t bet on the few passengers. It only takes one. Bad enough that I’m gambling in the supermarket.

   Gambling in the supermarket in the first hour of opening is playing poker. But gambling on a bus is roulette at the edge of a cliff. The bus needs to be twenty feet wide so we can all avoid each other as we embark and disembark. Like I said, walking is exercise. Bussing it in is torture.

   Is your journey really necessary? It’s a question I’ve asked myself constantly over these near-seven years of caring. There are three pieces of business in town this week. What to do? Bundle those pieces of business into one visit. And execute those problems swiftly. It’s all done inside an hour.

   That’s how I’ve been operating, until now.

   Now I have three pieces of business in town. Shopping, shopping, and shopping. Dementia destroys the interest in savoury foods. Sweet stuff rules. If it weren’t for strawberry milk, we’d be fucked.

   And now, here’s the problem. My last online grocery order was in March, pushed all the way back to fucking April. Perishables are perishable, damn it. I cannot conduct one massive shopping-spree.

   It’s too much to carry home at once, initially. And I do walk it. Tempted by a taxi on the day that I carried the heaviest load home in driving rain, I plodded on. I’m sure the taxi is sprayed clean after each trip. Risking that level of closeness to a driver is like gambling by playing roulette in mid-air – the edge of the cliff is far behind.

   Needed the exercise. Tempted. Overcame the temptation. Took the food home. Made it. Had a coffee. Took it easy, for a wee while. Been buying chocolate treats for myself. Anyway, there are limits on purchases. I can’t buy a week’s supply of milk in one go, these days. There is no reason to go to town, except for food.

   In the early phase of buying food, I slowly stocked the freezer. Those heavy loads lightened as I bought in frozen food on one trip and varied frozen food on the second trip. It’s getting under control now.

   I wish people would adopt IS YOUR JOURNEY NECESSARY as an attitude to thinking about going out. Wishes are wishful. I see people in the street being total Coronacunts about this. For now, I shop during the dedicated MORNING ELDERLY HOUR days specified in an e-mail from the supermarket boss. He’s smart enough not to go door-to-door.

   Joggers. Stay home. Don’t throw your sweat around me as you huff past. Just exercise at home. Dog-walkers. Your back garden is for dog-shit. As for people on bicycles. Ring your fucking bells as you approach me, you cunts. If we collide, I don’t want your bike wheel up my arse or your virus in my fucking lungs.

   And children. Shouldn’t be seen or heard during all this. Luckily, I haven’t had to dodge away screaming from an overenthusiastic child playing outside. Those fuckers can run. I’m carrying cans of soup and as much milk as I can heft, and I’m never going to outpace a sneezy six-year-old who clearly has utter cunts for parents.

Alternatives? The contactless payment rose. It didn’t fucking work for me at a distance of two days, so I keypadded the fucker in my gloves. I’ve been asked to use the government’s home delivery service as a last resort. If I can go to town and shop at a social distance, then I should reduce the burden on the system. I order pills on a monthly basis…that’ll come up again in a few weeks, and I’ll have those delivered. Too many zoomers and wheezers in the queue, last time.

   The prospect of standing in a socially-distanced pharmacy queue doesn’t appeal to me. It’s not the prospect of being there with sick people. No, it’s the thought that, after another month of this, I might still be standing in a queue full of absolute fucking zoomers.

   There’s always a zoomer in a queue. You, chatty guy. Laughing and spluttering, playing the comedy clown. Stop being a fucking giraffe and wind your fucking neck in. Eyes front, mind on the job, mouth clamped, everyone’s a disease-carrier unless proven otherwise…

   I can’t shop in one massive binge. So I can’t parcel my town business items into one neat package. But when I am in that supermarket, I bundle the shopping items into one efficient list. It’s milk products first, and, weighed down, a short trip to pick up microwave burgers.

   For a dementia carer, there are many golden fucking rules. But a big one is this: the microwave is your fucking friend. You won’t see many people in person on a typical carer day. But there’s always time to hang out with your bestie, the microwave.

   Fuck the notion of what’s good to eat in a crisis. You eat what’s there. My shopping list is tackled quickly. I’m slowed by the need to wait to let people pass. But I’m not slowed by purchasing decisions.

   If I see a battered can of soup in a flavour I’ve never heard of, I’ll give it a go. There isn’t time to hunt for the exact thing I am after. Strawberry milk is in plentiful stock, and it pains me that I can’t take the week’s supply away with me. But if strawberry milk vanished from the shelves, I’d take whatever milk was there.

   Shopping is time spent in exposure. I must minimise that risk. Soon, I expect to minimise that risk by switching to government help. There are people out there…who aren’t out there, they are indoors…there are people out there indoors who face difficulties a hell of a lot worse than the ones I tackle.

   And there are Coronacunts out there who shouldn’t be out there. Let’s talk about the Coronacunt in Chief. Scotland’s chief medical officer Catherine Cunterwood – I’m having a wee bit o’ trouble wi’ the spellin’ o’ that – who tells us all how to socially distance, and then drives aff tae the saycunt hoose in the Historic Kingdom o’ Fife.

   THE CHIEF MEDICAL OFFICER FUCKS OFF TO HER SECOND HOME DURING A FUCKING LOCKDOWN. ARE YOU TAKING THE FUCKING PISH? Asking on behalf of a scunnered nation.

   There’s a saying for arseholes like that.

   The nearer the kirk, the further frae grace.

   Aye, it’s nice tae huv a saycunt hoose. Let’s hear from Catherine Caldwerwood hersel’…

This is a vital update about coronavirus. To help save lives, stay at home. Not your second home. Your main home. Anyone, even Scotland’s chief medical officer, can spread coronavirus. Only go out when absolutely necessary for food, medicine, work, or a walk with your family thinly-disguised as exercise. Don’t allow yourself to be photographed with the family. Stay home at home, not your second home. Protect Scotland’s chief medical officer’s job by not following me around and photographing me as I breach the rules I’ve set out for the peasants to follow. Save lives. Oh, how unusual. A knock at the door. Surely that journey can’t be essential. Why, it’s the polis. Whatever could they want of me?

That’s not a word-for-word quote. But you get the general feel of a nation’s mood from that. Unlike Catherine, I wasn’t trained in gynaecology. However, I, too, know a total cunt when I see one.

   Her excuse. She was checking to see if her second home was secure. Here’s a top tip. If your main home is secure, that’s all that fucking matters. Fuck your second home up the arse with a spike-festooned lump of wood turned sideways for maximum effect.

   All the good work she’s sought to bring to the world of medicine, and she fucks off to the East Neuk of Fife to put property ahead of propriety. Does she even blaw intae her oxter when she sneezes? Asking on behalf of a beleaguered public.

So what do I do at home, isolated, besides rant at Scotland’s chief medical officer’s blatant hypocrisy? In the time it’s taken me to rant and publish this, she might have been sacked. Not holding my breath over that one. The polis dropped by to have a word.

   I’m not truly angry at the clueless. It’s the clued-up who need a smack on the heid wi’ a ten-foot pole. She’s the one who offers sage advice and then ignores it. Clearly, her shite smells of roses. Her rose-tinted view – of the rules as applied to her – is shite.

   Ne’er mind a’ that.

   I have caring to be getting on with. You’ll be looking after people, yourself. As a carer dealing with someone who’ll be angry for no reason, I know the value of leaving the room and doing something else like grabbing a coffee.

   There are movies on the shelves I still haven’t seen yet. Books I haven’t read. Hell, books I haven’t written. I hear people sawing and hammering. They are all into DIY, of a sudden. I use social media and Skype to stay in contact with people I can’t meet in person.

   No, I don’t have a second home. If I did have, I wouldn’t be fucking visiting it.

   The days are full. I’m not stir-crazy, despite what you may think of me after reading this. Time for a coffee. I’ve been living this life for the better part of a decade…and before that, it was a writer’s life anyway. You sit alone in a room and type.

   It’s not exactly social.

   So how do the rest of you cope with this? Just tell yourself that human contact greatly increases the risk of dying from that ghastly disease. And stay the fuck indoors. You have plenty to do. Fix the shit out of things. Tidy that area. Stare out your window and count Coronacunts.

   I did that, just now. Weather…sunny turning dull, rapidly, with scattered showers of Coronacunts. There’s a Coronacunt, now. She’s not been to the shops. No shopping. And she’s heading away from the shops.

   Is this person engaged in vital activity? Of course not.

   But she’s an amateur. Here’s a bunch of professional Coronacunts. Woman with (I’m guessing) a husband and a brother-in-law…and a baby in the stroller. Utter cunts, out taking a fucking walk while the sun still glimmers. Casually meandering around blind corners on narrow paths.

   Fuck.

   Not armed with shopping bags. Wouldn’t fucking matter. You don’t shop in groups – but alone. I considered heading to the end of the garden. Not for exercise. That Dyson needs emptying. Dyson. He’s been labelled a twat long before the virus crisis relabelled him as an even bigger one.

   Nearly go to empty the cylinder. But I listen out for the cries of children having fun as their irresponsible parents get sloshed on recycled vodka handwash. And I decide it’s not safe while the sun shines.

   Measuring the quality of light, and hoping desperately for rain. Too many people out there. Yes, okay, five people too many…that I’m sure of. Ready access to a sniper rifle is, sadly lacking. You laugh, thinking I’m joking.

   Fill your time with activity that involves talking to four walls in an empty room. Shopping is essential. Picking up pills is essential. Only go for medicine if you’ve had a text message about the arrival of your repeat prescription.

   Seeking medical attention is not essential. Minor ailments will get you killed if you expose yourself to a killer virus in the search for two hundred Paracetamol tablets that no one is going to sell to you anyway. There are laws against that.

I’ve been shopping in a socially isolated and distanced…responsible…way. This week I’ll see if online grocery deliveries are viable again. If they are, I can cut back on trips into town and I’ll avoid putting a strain on the government delivery system as well.

   It’s a balancing-act I haven’t cared for. But I’ve endured it. This week, I hope to make changes that isolate me even more. This protects someone far more vulnerable than I am. She was laughing and cracking jokes at my expense this morning, and that was fucking fantastic.

   In other news, I bought a huge pack of toilet roll ages ago and I haven’t even dented it. My coffee supplies will see me through another week. The lack of a sniper rifle is all that troubles me. Perhaps the streets around me are safer, for that lack.