Ros Coward: We are sitting in an office having our six-monthly visit to the bit of Mum's care that addresses her dementia

Ros Coward Mum had been told she would be staying in hospital for "about a week" while they put her on warfarin and sorted out her blood

Ros Coward: Appointments may be routine for the hospital, but not for the patients' relatives

Ros Coward: So much care of the elderly depends on women who are poorly paid and juggling complex lives

Ros Coward: Mum's not the only one repeating herself. I too have become a serial repeater

Ros Coward: Without going into details, let's just say it became rapidly evident that my mother's "case dismissed" diagnosis I described previously was premature

I need to go to the dentist - my tooth broke some time ago

Ros Coward, her mum and the potatoes which set off the smoke alarm

Ros Coward takes her mum to the gastro-pub for lunch

My son calls. "Our ex-neighbour has just phoned," he says. "Gran has turned up at our old house."

Mum said: 'I've got a suggestion for how you could improve this place. You could give us all a glass of sherry before dinner.'

My heart is sinking. Is this going to be another frustrating encounter with NHS emergency care, where Mum is chucked out with a load more un-joined-up appointments?

It's 7pm on Saturday and John and I are on our way out of London. My brother rings. He had been planning to go over to my mother's to spend the evening with her. "She's not back yet," he says. "There's probably no reason to worry, but what do you think?"

Ros Coward: 'I was having a good laugh at these," says my mother when I pop in on my way to work. She's on the sofa, surrounded by heaps of paper, mainly fading pages from exercise books

'That's a nice haircut," she says, not for the first time. We're in a car travelling down to Kent and my mother has a good view from directly behind me. "Who did it for you?" I give her the details for the third time. "Sally. At the salon on Lavender Hill."

Ros Coward: My mobile rings. It's my mother's carer. 'Is your mum with you?' she asks. 'I've been waiting an hour.' It's drizzling, dark and 8.30pm, way past the time Mum is usually indoors. I tell the carer to go home

Ros Coward: How can she remember the doctor clearly but not remember a thing about going flying on our last visit? How can something so traumatic at the time and so relatively recent not register at all?

Mum's memory for quotes is still incredible, far better than anything I could ever manage

Ros Coward: My niece phones to say she has found Mum in a worrying state. Mum had been stumbling and tripped over. It's possible she's broken her ankle.