hospital 3, the main rehab centre,

I was placed in a nice side room, en-suite (not that I could use it), the room door had a singular pane of glass on to the corridor.

It became apparent on night one there that was a man elderly lady on the ward with dementia, I thought about her regularly, imagining that she was already being confused about the world then having a stroke: did she understand why her body no longer worked properly, how was physio with constant demands and intensity for her to experience? It felt exceptionally cruel for her, it played on my mind a lot

She had taken great umbrage with being on the ward, and most nights shuffled her way towards an exit, would hit the locked security doors and beg to leave followed by staff shouting her name , sometimes she’d ask for the police phoning as she thought she was locked in the ward against her will, despite my sympathy and being distraught at my own situation I did often have a wry smile at her antics

She regularly tried my room as an escape route but it didn’t go anywhere. Nightly I’d see her silhouette pass my door, then she’d appear, peaking in and breathing on the door so it misted over like the raptors in Jurassic park so she earned the name Jurassic Margaret admittedly not my most compassionate moment, one night she got in the room, clocked nurse kylie the life size cut out and like everyone else was startled by her so hit her with a walking stick, sacrilege! I buzzed a nurse who came and like a budgie at night threw a blanket over her head and essentially dragged her out of the room