3.Today was a bad day: Benson's a proper c*nt

There are good days and bad days. Today was a bad one. I woke to Benson already at it, clipboard in hand, running a bloody audit on my brain, what is gone, what is going, what is next. He has his gang of ants crawling through it, checking the gaps, highlighting the cracks. It is not dramatic. It is worse than that. It is a fog. Soft at first, then suddenly everywhere.

In storms Mindset Maurice, not softly but loudly, as if noise can evict whatever is nesting in my head, singing badly like a broken sunrise alarm. Phzzz. Vitamin drink in hand. I hate that bloody drink. It is his way of dragging me into the light before Benson settles in. Annoying. Sweet. Exhausting. And some days, exactly what I need.

Then there are the pigeons. Jesus, the pigeons. Mindset Maurice is at war with them, full campaign mode, twenty of the bastards nesting next door under the eaves and he is not having it. Spikes everywhere, plastic owls on patrol, defensive lines drawn like it is Normandy.

“Bloody pigeons,” he says. “Two of them trying to build a nest over my bar.” 

Now that is sacrilege. You do not mess with a man’s bar. Especially not an Irish man’s bar.

Off to Woods we go after a row over my dressing ethitic. Left and right shoes are a mystery to me. They were even before Benson erected his castle in my brain. Maurice works. I sit. I drift. Election time flickers back into my brain..Karen4Cullercoats. Streets, doors, leaflets. Talking, arguing, believing, trying to do good. I knew every road, every face. I do not miss the pompous little politicians with their tiny power games and pension plans. Now I listen to Keir Starmer and switch off the sound of his drone. I might be fading, but he is in the toilet.

My brain jumps again. Virginia Bottomley at a Labour event in London way back in the day when Labour seemed to matter.

“How are things up North?” she asks.

“Constipated,” I say.

She laughs. Maurice nearly chokes on his pint. Well, she was Health Secretary. She should get it. Then Jeremy Corbyn, kissing my cheek, not sure I signed up for that, hands on my shoulders, repeating, “We’re going to win, we’re going to win,” like shaking me might make it true. I did win, national communications award. Jeremy lost. And thank God for that.

My mind will not settle now.

“Where’s my….eh.. hot thing?” I say.

Hot thing, not the fit bloke next to me….I meant Coffee. That’s what I meant. I pick up a cup.

“Jesus Christ, Maurice, what is this?”

“It’s my drink.”

“It’s like dishwater, that cannot be good for you.”

“It’s green.”

“Not everything green is good, you Irish green guru.”

Now, as I said, there’s a fit bloke sitting next to me. Maurice is on the other side. People smile, hand me things, pretend it’s all fine. It isn’t. Benson loves that. This morning I asked Maurice what we were doing today. Woods Coffee, Coop, lunch, hairdresser, glass of wine, dinner, bed, and then sex.

“Good, I’ll just have to figure out who I’m having the sex with then,” looking at the bloke next to me.

Maurice was fuming. He’ll be fuming again when he reads this. Good. A little jealousy goes far.

I wanted to drive today. “Why cant I drive Maurice. Why will you not let me drive” I can see he is agitated.  Don’t know why. God, I miss it. The road, the freedom. But they say I can’t. At the beginning it was my eyesight we thought. I got some sexy galssaes lost tem lost them got some more lost then and then Maurice bought 12 cheap pairs and then they told me it was not my eyesight but my brain. Sometimes I see the 12 pairs of gasses on dressing table and I cry for what I have lost. Benson steals Posterior Cortical Atrophy (PCA using its commander Benson the cint and his army of ants eat away atthe brain's visual processing center rather than the eyes themselves which then affects reading, judging distances, navigating spaces, recognizing faces/objects, and light sensitivity. Standard glasses do not correct these issues So my 12 pairs are a mounent to a lost part of me. Names go too. People I’ve known for twenty years, gone. Then, three hours later, in the shower,

“Ann!”

Too late… always too late. That’s the rhythm of it. Not loud. Not dramatic. Just quietly, consistently… too late. They tell me memory is often still there in the early stages. Reassuring voices. Calm tones. Like I should feel lucky. Then comes the small print. This damage creates a visual cognition gap. The brain cannot interpret what it sees. Faces blur. Names disappear. And people you love become strangers for a moment too long. A moment that stretches… just enough to expose you.

And that is the bit no one talks about. Not the forgetting… the pretending. The nodding. The smiling. Filling in blanks like a bad actor who has lost the script but keeps going anyway. Because what are you supposed to do. Stop the room. Admit it. Say, “sorry, I have no idea who you are”? No. You carry on. You bluff your way through your own life. Brilliant system. Lose your mind… keep your manners.

I worry about losing Ethan. Not in some dramatic way. Quietly. One morning. One look. One pause too long. That flicker of doubt where a mother should just know. That is the fear. Not death. Not decline. That. Benson you are a fucking murderer if you take my son away from me. You are not doing that.

And my house. My own house. Even that is turning on me. We named every room after ski runs. Val d’Isère. Chamonix. La Face de Bellevarde. Beautiful places. Little anchors of memory. Clever idea at the time. Now I walk in and think, where am I. What is this room called. France. Austria. Italy. Or is it just the kitchen. You stand there mid step like you have walked into someone else’s life by mistake. You look around for clues. Context. Something to tell you who you are supposed to be. Nothing comes.

You walk into a room. Stop. And think, why am I here. Is this a test. I think I am failing. Not loudly. Not dramatically. Just quietly failing in corners of my own life. And the clever part… Benson does not even need to speak anymore. The silence does it for him.

You walk into a room. Stop. And think, why am I here. Is this a test. I think I am failing. Not loudly. Not dramatically. Just quietly failing in corners of my own life. And the clever part… Benson does not even need to speak anymore. The silence does it for him.

But here’s the thing. Big news on a bad day. Maurice is setting up a podcast for me, Singing for Dementia. Because when the words go wrong, the music doesn’t. We’re going to read, sing, talk, real conversations, real moments, no pretending. A voice, even when memory fades. Somewhere in all this mess I can still find a tune, still find a rhythm, still find me.

Today was a bad day. Tomorrow Benson brings his clipboard.

I’ll bring my voice.