Our neighbour from our previous house has experienced an awful run of bad luck throughout her life.
When 18 she was diagnosed with a rare hereditary blood condition which would transmit to any children. So she took steps to not have any
Her first marriage was as far as she could see – very happy – until her husband came out and she divorced him.
Later she re-married a widower sports injury therapist who had three young children who she got to love and brought them up as if they were her own. Her husband ran his Sports Injury Clinic in an annex to their large family house.
4 years ago he was diagnosed with terminal cancer and she was his home carer until he died 9 months later.
She now couldn't afford to keep the house and her step-sons had left home. She couldn’t find a buyer and finished up selling it to the eldest step-son who took advantage of her and persuaded her to sell it to him at a very low price because no viewers had so far shown interest and he intended to move his own business there. This was the only "help" she received from the boys and they have remained conspicuous by their absence ever since.
She eventually bought the house next door to us. It was clear she was mentally frail and totally unaccustomed to domestic admin routines. Libby and I made friends with her and helped her all we could.
A few months after moving house she was diagnosed with advanced breast cancer - had a few months of chemo then a double mastectomy.
The trauma had caused her to start to sleep walk and it was not rare for her to ring our doorbell during the night sleep walking unaware she was hardly dressed – Since it was my job to get up and see who was at the door - I saw a lot of her which was embarrassing for her and me.
She was very upset when we moved house a year ago and until lockdown one of us would see her regularly and help with any problems. Fortunately, the guy who took over my directors position in the retirement estate picked up where I left off and has been very helpful. Two weeks ago he phoned me to say that she had sleep walked again and fallen down the stairs. In the process breaking a wrist, four ribs, a bone in her neck, damaged her pancreas and bashed her head. She was concussed and when she came round managed to use either the phone or her emergency pull cord to summon an ambulance and crawl to the door to let them in. It is not known how long she had laid on the stairs semi-conscious. She spent 3 days in the local hospital before being released home.
My colleague phoned me today to tell me that she was unwell last week and had lost her sense of smell so he took her for a covid test. The result came back this morning – it was positive. It is almost certain that she caught covid at the hospital which has a reputation for it. (I wonder how many of the 100,000 covid deaths resulted from people visiting or being admitted to a hospital for other reasons)
As yet she is not seriously ill with covid but she and my colleague and his wife must now isolate for 10 days just in case.
The poor lass is 70 (ish) and this is the latest "last straw" on top of a lifetime of disasters.
