Number of days since lockdown: 58

Number of hours I was awake in the night worrying how I am going to manage to look after my mother when she comes home from the hospice: 4

Number of times Brian has been in touch: still zero

How dare Boring Brian from the creative writing class seduce me with his website wizardry and his allotment bouquets? How dare he spend the last two months inviting me on walks and pouring me tea from his little flask and listening to me really intently like no-one else ever has and making me fancy the very sensible pants off him, only to dump me after our first and probably only night of passion? How could he do that to me? What a complete and utter bastard.

And to add to my woes, last night’s Zoom call with Nurse Constance was rather more worrying than our previous discussions. Don’t get me wrong, Constance was still amazingly kind, but her honesty about what my mother will need when she comes home from the hospice made me reel. She reminded me that Mum is recovering from a fractured hip, Covid-19 and she has now been diagnosed with depression. I do know all this so I should not be surprised. The hospice staff hope she will be able to manage the stairs by the time she is discharged, otherwise I will need to move her bed downstairs. She will need help with washing, dressing, going to the toilet, eating and drinking. And she shouldn’t be left alone for more than very short periods of time.

I think I must have gone a bit quiet, because Constance then asked me if I was worried about whether I could do this. And I said, is there any other option? And she said, only a care home. And I thought, I cannot do that to my mother, not now with my Dad in hospital and her having nearly died herself and now so sad and low and still grieving for my sister who died all that time ago. I’m a retired nurse, for God’s sake. I don’t have any responsibilities other than the cat and the dog. If I can’t look after my own mother at such a time, who can?

So I said don’t worry, Constance, it will all be fine. I just need to get organised. And she said good, because we need her bed by Saturday.

To take my mind off all the above, I went to give blood at the Community Centre this afternoon. I’ve got my 50 donations badge. It’s an easy thing to do, if you don’t mind needles. The tea and biscuits afterwards may look quite ordinary but they feel like a massive treat. Plus they tell you to take it easy for the rest of the day, which for someone like me is welcome advice.

Actually, small confession, there is another reason I like to give blood, which is that the staff make you feel that you really matter. Right from the minute you arrive, they are asking you questions and nodding and smiling and being incredibly professional and solicitous. The whole thing makes me go into a sort-of trance. I have been known to leave my plaster for on for up to week, like a talisman.

The staff were as lovely as always today, even when asking me at the door if I’d been in contact with anyone who might have Covid 19. It was all very jolly and normal, with Radio 2 playing loudly, and only the spacing of the chairs and the fact that there weren’t any older donors to show we were still in lockdown. You could see the staff were smiling, even behind their masks.

My donor carer today was Sharon. She had lots of tattoos and a very gentle voice. It was all going well until I was nearly at the end of my donation and she asked me how I was doing. It must have been something about the way she said it because the next thing I knew, tears were pouring down my face.

It was really embarrassing. They had to help me out of the special tipping chair and find me somewhere to sit behind a screen. Sharon sat with me. She asked me if anything had happened to upset me today, and I couldn’t decide whether to tell her that my father was in hospital close to death’s door after a stroke, or that my mother had also nearly died after going missing, breaking her hip and catching the virus, and was going to be staying in my dining room for the forseeable future, starting on Saturday, or that the love of my life had ravished me in my summerhouse, then the next day had disappeared and I didn’t know if i would ever see him again.

So I said not really, it’s just that lockdown is getting to me a bit. And she said you and me both. And we had a bit of a laugh about it and I got to drink my tea and eat my custard creams in private with her telling me about her next tattoo, which was going to be a massive dragon on her side, but she would have to wait until the tattoo parlour was open again, which was very annoying, because she had got herself all psyched up for the pain. And I asked does it hurt a lot, and she shook her head and said you don’t want to know, Sadie, you just don’t want to know.

And then I went home and Marnie and Kezia called round and we sat in the garden and Kezia reminded me that she had eight grandparents (Marnie’s mother, her partner, Marnie’s father and his partner, me, Richard, his ex-wife and his soon-to-be next ex-wife.)

I said gosh, that’s quite a lot. And she said yes it is, but you are my favourite grandparent, Nanny Sadie.

And it was all I could do not to start crying again.

After they left, I went inside and moved some furniture.

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