‘Believe me, relatives of patients have done worse. I’ve actually been punched before when presenting a diagnosis that someone’s husband didn’t want to hear.’

‘No!’

‘Yes! I looked really professional wandering around with a black eye.’ I took a sip of my drink and gave her my finely-honed empathetic smile. ‘I have to say the word, Jemma. You’re worried she might have dementia, aren’t you?’

She lowered her eyes and nodded. I wanted to reach across and hug her and tell her it was going to be all right, but years of medical training coupled with my own personal experiences told me that it often wasn’t.

‘First thing to say is don’t jump to conclusions. I’m assuming your mum has been demonstrating unusual patterns of behaviour for you to have gone down this path, but it’s possible that it’s just a bit of forgetfulness brought on from the stress of the diagnosis.’

‘I wish it was.’

‘Can you give me some examples?’

She reached into her bag and pulled out a notepad. ‘I thought you might ask me that so I wrote them down as I was bound to miss one out otherwise.’

Her voice shook and I could see she was on the brink of tears. I wanted to give her a moment to gather herself. ‘How about I get us another drink, then you could run through the examples for me?’

While I stood at the bar waiting for our drinks, I hoped that she was going to run through a list of everyday stuff that happens to us all like losing keys or walking into a room to get something then completely forgetting why you’d gone in there. I’d be able to smile and reassure her that there was nothing to be concerned about and these things often happened more with age.

Unfortunately, when she ran through her list, I couldn’t give her those reassurances. The stealing example and the knickers in the freezer were worrying incidents, although they didn’t necessarily signify dementia.

‘It gets worse,’ she said. ‘Some friends joined me back home for my birthday in June. Mum was tired and asked me to look after my brother. She suggested we went to the lido, but it closed when I was little. I asked her if she meant the slide pool on North Bay but she insisted she meant the lido on South Bay and she was talking as though it was still there and… What’s up?’

I stared at Jemma, mouth open, my mind racing. Jesus Christ! What were the odds? ‘You’re from Whitsborough Bay!’

Her eyes widened. ‘How did you know that?’

‘The lido. The bear shop. I’m from there! Your mum’s consultant is Dr Steadman, right?’

Jemma nodded.