A woman who took drastic action in a desperate attempt to see her dying mum in the middle of lockdown has taken her experiences to the stage.
Alexandra Spencer-Jones, 38, disguised herself as a cleaner and even a nurse in order to see her mum Heather in the months leading to her death at Darent Valley Hospital in Kent in May 2020.
She said: "Darent Valley had a firm policy of no visitation, so I was only allowed 10 minutes on an iPad with my mum each day. But I couldn't really cope with being separated. We're an incredibly close family, it's just me, mum and dad. As an actor I started trying to dress up as a nurse, a cleaner, to get into the hospital. Once I got right up to the ward, but I didn't get in. They caught me.
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"Practically I understand the ethics being wonky now, given the circumstances. But I was desperate. She was failing. She lost the power to walk and the power to speak. To even get to the window to wave at me in the car park, she needed pushing.
"Sometimes the staff would forget to charge the phones because they were so busy, and there was no way to reach her.
"I used to sit outside the window of the hospital and cut out paper hearts and stick the hearts to the wall so she could see them. I did everything I could do, because even though she had lost her speech, she was engaged, she could understand what we were doing."
Heather, from Clubmoor, was admitted to hospital the same week Britain went into lockdown, in March 2020, after suffering months of health issues, including seven blood clots in her leg which eventually led to the limb being amputated. While in hospital, she caught Covid-19, and died of the infection in May - the same day then-Prime Minister Boris Johnson indulged in cheese and wine with 17 colleagues in the Downing Street Garden.
Alexandra, a theatre director and writer from Tuebrook, said: "The day she died, my father and I got a phonecall that said you need to come quickly - but you're going to have to choose which one of you is with her, because only one person was allowed in as she died. We had this terrible dilemma. The love of her life or her best mate and only child - who do you choose?
"I told my dad he had to go in. He spent 10 hours with her, and she seemed to be refusing to die until she saw me. The nurses made a deal with my dad than if he swapped, I could come in. I came in, and she died within 20 minutes."
Tragedy struck again just two months later, when Alexandra's dad Alan fell into a deep depression due to the loss of his wife.
Alexandra said: "My dad's mental health deteriorated, and within two months he was hospitalised. My partner and I broke up because of the pressure. I was left in this weird situation, mourning for my mother and handling the care of my father. It was what I can only describe as a hellscape. It was horrendous."
As the second national lockdown began in November 2020, Alexandra interviewed nurses that tended to her mother and fifty other NHS professionals who dealt with lockdown end of life care in order to create "Chopped Logic", a musical, Shakespeare-inspired production exploring the NHS’ struggle during the early pandemic.
She said: "I started interviewing NHS staff that dealt with both my mother and father, because it upset me how I had handled trying to get into the hospital. I never looked at it from their perspective. The stress they experienced was like nothing I've seen. How stressful it must have been for them to tell people they can't be with their dying family, and the abuse they must have endured.
"Some were deeply upset. They found it really difficult to endure the hypocrisy of the rules they were being forced to abide by while Partygate was happening with the people who made those rules.
"Though (Chopped Logic) touches on my own family's story, what it focuses on is the NHS perspective, the experience of different nurses, and how they dealt with families like ours."
Chopped Logic will play for one night only at the Shakespeare North Playhouse in Prescot on Wednesday, June 21 at 7.30pm. Tickets start at £3 and can be purchased online.
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