DEMENTIA CARE: SPARES FOR EVERYTHING, AND SPARES FOR EVERYTHING ELSE.

Once you turn into a carer, you become more aware of the need for spares. What should you have spares for? Arrange spares for spares, and spares for the spares for the spares. That’s a start.
   Your activity as a carer is random. This is the business of dealing with dementia and handling the lack of concentration in someone else’s life. Anything that saves time is useful. Periodically, things break. What are you going to do about that?
   Replace those broken things. Or repair those broken things. I kept a dead washing machine going long enough to arrange for the arrival of a replacement.
   I used tools to keep the machine alive. It fell apart in four billion different ways at once. Tools are in the toolbox downstairs. And upstairs, there is that separate toolbox for fixes up there.
   There’s no racing to a different floor to grab the tools. That is inconvenient. It wastes time in an emergency. So. There are tools. And there are spare tools.
   If a fire breaks out upstairs, there’s a small fire extinguisher to assist me in escaping from the building. And there’s a small fire extinguisher downstairs for the same purpose.
   Now that I’ve miraculously found space in the kitchen, there’s a second fridge. It’s hard to replace a fridge quickly if one dies on you. If it were just me, I’d get by without one for a short while.
   But I am looking after someone. We’re already on a priority register if the electricity goes off. But what if the fridge dies? There’s always fridge number two. Why this crushing need for a second fridge?
   Milk supplies. As the cared-for is down to a more-or-less liquid diet thanks to not liking any food in the supermarket…we need the milk. It is strawberry milk. Well, what if it isn’t available?
   I must have that spare supply. And I do have a reserve of milk waiting there on the off-chance that the supermarket doesn’t supply any on that week’s delivery. Now, the reserve supply sits in the second fridge.
   Why? If I discover the main fridge died overnight, the milk in there has been left unrefrigerated for hours. And that means it can’t be trusted. What my stomach endures is my business. But I am in charge of a frailer stomach that couldn’t cope with the slightest reduction in quality when it comes to taking in meals.
   Spare fridge for spare milk in the event that the supermarket fails me. And spare fridge for spare milk in the event that the main fridge fails me.
   There are spare parts for machines. I see spare bottles of this or that sitting around, taking up space. Spares for all sorts of things. Sometimes, I’m sent ridiculous amounts of spare parts for assorted medical items. No complaints there.
   Spare cash. This is the spare that solves problems in front of you. Whether I am a carer or not, this is good advice: always carry cash, in the event that your bank card is refused. And always be prepared to spend cash to solve a problem in front of you.
   Last week, there was a problem. Late delivery of food from the supermarket. I’ve been to that circus before. Typically, a text message tells you that the driver will be an hour late – just as the van pulls up outside.
   Or the driver is an hour late. Where is he? What is he doing? As a carer dealing with morning carer routine, I am always here for the delivery. If the driver is late once in a blue moon, that’s okay. This is more than made up for by the early arrival of many a delivery.
   Is it okay to deliver now?
   Yes, it is. Gets things out of the way.
   Advice given to me by a supermarket driver: try to arrange your delivery from Tuesday onwards. If the system is going to mess up, it will mess up on a Monday once the weekend is over.
   He gave me that advice during one of my Tuesday deliveries. So I didn’t have to change routines. So far, just in the last week, I’ve faced one abruptly-cancelled order. Not bad going, in almost a decade of dementia care.
   We’re leaving aside the mad scrambling I had to go through when Covid convinced everyone to buy their shopping online – destroying the whole system for a wee while.
   Your delivery will arrive far later than expected.
   I was given the blast-off time. Yes, that was a bit late. Instead of taking in the shopping and having something to eat…I’d need to rummage around in my own spare food selection and concoct a meal while waiting.
   Then the bomb dropped in. They just couldn’t deliver my order. It was cancelled. The end. Well. That was fucking inconvenient.
   What were my options? Weep quietly in a corner of the kitchen, solving no problems. Not really for me. Go into town at short notice and buy a few essentials. Also…not really for me. Covid hasn’t gone away. We’re boosted to hell, and must still take our chances like everyone else. But in the situation of being a carer, it’s best to minimise the risk.
   Have a delivery driver come to me. Don’t walk into town. Definitely avoid taking the bus. What was the weather like? Okay. Not great. But this was workable. Did I have to go into town on an ad-libbed shopping spree?
   No. I had a reserve of food for myself. And a whole spare fridge sat there with enough supplies for the woman under my care. I didn’t really have to go. The whole point of spares saved me the journey.
   At least for that day.
   So much for text messages. I checked the e-mail. Yes, there’d be no delivery. Rarely, usually through vehicle accident, deliveries were cancelled. So they told me. I suspected vehicle failure. And a further failure to replace the van. Shortage of drivers could be an issue.
   No point triple-guessing this. At least there was a handy link to re-order my food. Off I went to the handy link. Okay, there I am, back on the regular page. Re-order. Done. Now choose a slot.
   Obviously, no slots for today.
   Except for…EXPRESS DELIVERY. Two slots. One just two hours in the future, by this point. And in comes our old friend, spare cash in the system. For EXPRESS treatment, cough up the coins.
   I thought about this from the viewpoint of a Scottish miser and decided that when cash solves a problem right in front of you, treat that cash as spare cash and spend the fucking money you fucking Scottish miser.
   The day was thoroughly scrambled. I had to arrange this, shuffle that, move those, and wade my way through the ripples in the pond caused by the dropping of a very awkward stone.
   One last surprise. The delivery was farmed out to another company – hence the charge. Circumstances beyond the supermarket’s control destroyed all hope of receiving the goods. The alternative was to sub-contract the job out, for a fee.
   There was no van. Just a car. And there were no crates of food. Just a large bag full of shopping in plastic bags. Now there’s a blast from the past. I stuffed the empty bags on a shelf. They’ll come in handy for something.
   Spares. What did I use that day? A spare delivery service, I guess. Order was restored to the world. I threw together home-made soup from the ingredients delivered by the guy in the car. My routine – which is flexible – flexed for a few hours that day. I’d used the minimum effort to obtain what I wanted simply by paying to make a problem go away.
   All for the cost of a few bags of coffee. You wrack up bills as a carer and you hope you’ve always managed the capacity for spare cash to cover sudden breakages or other disruptions. Never be afraid to spend money, no matter how little is available. It is there to solve problems for you. But always be aware of what you are spending, and why you are spending it. Try to build and maintain a reserve of cash.
   There is help in the system. Winter fuel boosts. Capped rates for local authority services. Things like that. I’ve always tried to maintain enough cash reserves to replace every main appliance in the house at once.
   In other words, buy in a cooker and a fridge and a washing machine at the same time, after a fire or flood renders these items dead…while you are waiting for the insurance money to come through.
   The cash reserves can cope with an additional delivery cost. Food was available without the delivery. But with the delivery, I stuck to my routine of making up a batch of soup that day. This doesn’t sound like much. But I’d decided to create soup that day, and I thoroughly enjoyed throwing it together.
   Small moments keep you going through the large ones, when you are a carer. The small moment that got me through the day was my first sip of some fucking amazing soup that night, at the end of a bothersome Tuesday. Sometimes, you just have to spend the cash. It’s not there for admiring, after all.