Obedient Children

My mother is in hospital!
That fills me with dread because not only is she in England and I'm in Australia, but she has a leaking heart valve and is on blood thinning medication. This means that she cant have the abscess drained or the offending tooth removed until they take her off the warfarin or she will bleed to death. While she is off the warfarin she could have a heart attack.
She had accompanied my sister and family on holiday to a little village miles from anywhere, in Norfolk for the pre-Easter week. She had the offending abscess before she left but had us all believing it was just a cold and sore throat. Like the obedient children she brought us up to be, we all did what she said. She had previously told me, my brother and her sister that she had been to the dentist and had the tooth fixed up to shut us up.
Of course, eventually the pain was unbearable and BIL had to drive around trying to find a doctor/dentist who would do anything. When they find out she is on warfarin and has a dodgy heart they wont touch her. So they ended up at the local hospital who put her on a drip with antibiotics in it. She is more comfortable now and is getting some much needed rest and sleep. My brother has driven up there from London ready to drive her back to Durham in the north of England. They will probably leave the tooth till she gets back to her own blood specialist at the hospital there. My other sister will go up to check on things in May. I am booked to go home for a visit in October but will change that if needed.
I know that I cannot do any more or any better than my siblings are doing but as the surviving eldest for fifty years I feel I ought to be there making sure. Quite likely, I'd be doing just what my 85 year old mother told me to do! It's reached the stage where we are all going to have to gently take over.
I know that she fears the loss of her independence terribly and that is why she misleads us about her general health. She wants to stay in her lovely little flat in Durham with a wonderful view of the Castle and Cathedral. You can hear the Cathedral bells every Thursday night and see it all lit up, and when I wake early with jet lag when I visit I can tell what time it is by the type of peal the bells give. Three fifteen is different from three thirty and again from three forty-five!
She wants to catch the little bus to the shops when she feels like it and chat to her friends and acqaintances. She wants to visit her sister and dear friends, Chris and Alan. She wants most of all to keep on doing it.
I hope she can for a lot longer yet.