Boyfriend on a Short Fuse Calms Down with Valium Sandwich

This morning I discovered a small stash of Valium pills I bought off the Internet years ago, just in case I needed them in the event of Nutty’s demise. I took a Valium once and while I loved the way it took the edge off my anxiety, when it wore off I felt strangely tired and jaded. I suppose there is always a trade off.

Although I have thought about taking half a pill myself, I have been OK today. I am coping just about. Since Nutty’s cancer diagnosis I have been wracked with sobbing many times in a day and I never know when an emotional surge will come. I’ve stopped wearing mascara as there is no point. The shadows beneath my eyes are black enough without adding streaked makeup.  

Boyfriend on a Short Fuse veers from being loving and indispensable and shouty and abusive. I offered him half a Valium, thinking it would calm him down as irritation was fizzing out of his ears and nostrils. Almost instantly he was being sweet and kind. My God, I will have to order a shovel load.

After a certain age I think there is no point getting too hung up with special diets etc. If a pill or two helps you get through the day, why on earth not? Now Shouty and I are over 50, how many good years have we got left anyway? And look at Ronnie Wood, all the pills he has taken over the years and OK, he looks fairly ravaged, but he doesn’t look half bad for 96. And hello! What about Jo Wood? Glamorous and gorgeous, looks half her age and she has had her share of this and that (though not for many years according to her autobiography, which I thoroughly enjoyed, btw).

My God, sometimes I think it is hard enough just to stay alive, I think these people who give up caffeine, alcohol and chocolate or whatever must have nerves of steel. Isn’t life hard enough already? And how long do they really want to live for anyway? Think of being `good’ all your life and dying of cancer anyway. Nutty has had a wonderful dog diet for the past 4 years since we adopted him on my Mother’s death, and look what has happened to him. Organic veg, walks, love, love, love and still he succumbs to the beastly disease. OK ,he is 15 so one might argue he has to die of something.

Today I have cried twice I think. That is less than usual and my face is slightly less ravaged looking, although rather thin and drawn. Despite copious amounts of pasta with cream and butter I cannot put on weight. I wonder how these people on `special diets’ (about as special as a `special bus’ which is not very special at all), don’t fade away into the ether. Being thin after a certain age isn’t so great although women in the west are weight obsessed. You have to choose between your face or your body, so they say.

Back to the point in hand. We took Nutty to Richard Allport, the homeopathic vet, today. He is a kind man (although his prices are rather breath-taking at £80 a consultation), and one always leaves reassured, no matter how bad the prognosis.

When he came to the reception to greet us his expression was very grave, he later admitted, `I thought Nutty would be barely able to walk but he is just the same as always’. My God, he was probably preparing to put him down ,now I think about it.

Nutty was perky, tail wagging, curious as ever. `Yes the growth has got bigger since I saw him a month ago’, he admitted, ` but if you can syringe enough water into his mouth he could survive months like this…. From now on it is all about the nursing’.

Which made me feel better. The one thing I can do is nurse him, my diary is clear, all I have to do at the moment is look after him. That is Shouty and my biggest, most important duty. Nothing else matters more to us than keeping the Beloved healthy and happy and alive for as long as possible.

It was amusing driving to the vet. Usually Shouty is rule obsessed, in all matters of bureaucracy. He has a working class dislike of authority but a weird need to kow-tow to it too. Whereas generally I only follow rules I can see the point of, usually I get away with quite a bit because if you are nice to whoever catches you out, they usually let you off.

But on the way to the vet, he drives The Wrong Way Down a One Way Street! This is most unusual. It was a quiet street and no danger really and meant we got to our destination much quicker. But this was so unlike Shouty. Hurrah for the Valium! I cheered. Shame I only have such a limited supply. I am going to send him to the doctor to get some more, or the equivalent. It makes my life so much easier.

I welled up a few times in the vet and once this morning. There have been no bouts of uncontrollable sobbing, so it has been a good day (for my face anyway). Talking to Richard helped me collect my thoughts. I’ve been thinking a lot about bereavement and now realise that what I’m going through isn’t unique or unusual. Nearly every sentient person with a bit of a heart will go through one or several episodes of untrammelled grief (surely). Every day I read of appalling tragedies and those affected pulling through, somehow.

My night-time terror is that I will stay at this level of unsustainable grief forever. Like when I have toothache or cystitis (my two worst pains) I always fear that the pain will never be cured. But it is always is sorted. I know emotional pain is unquantified but I have to trust that one day Nutty will be dead but I will be living a good life, not slain by grief.

So tonight I feel philosophical (it feels like I have taken the Valium not Shouty).

But I am emotional and I don’t know when the terrors will return. Terrors of the unknown, of being unable to live without the creature I love more than anyone in the world. All that is uncharted territory.