Lost in Just in Case

That’s how I feel. I just feel lost. I’m writing this for me, using it as my journal. Hoping it helps me get my head right.
Life has gotten complicate and has dealt me some blows that I am reeling from. I’m still technically homeless. I’m staying with a friend. It’s time to move on, but being here has saved me. I have no doubt about that. On the positive front, I’m looking at a house tomorrow. If I like it, I’m making an offer. Losing the rent house and being homeless has been tough, but I could have handled it fine if everything else hadn’t happened.
When Laura hit, my world exploded. Things happened with the family. I had driven over to check on the rent house, and got the call from my sister. A horrific fight had happened between her and my mom. I was standing on the side of road, trying to find my water meter so I could turn off the geyser in the yard, crying because I couldn’t get to the house to check on the cats, and got the call that it had happened, that my sister and oldest niece had gotten in the fight, they were gone and Daddy had left. Mama had accused them of something that I know didn’t happen, but she truly believed. So, for two months, I heard nothing from my sister or niece, other than 2 curt messages that I was wrong for cutting them off. I tried to find some sort of peace between my mom and dad. I moved out of the rent house completely on my own, other than my dad coming t help with the heavy things I couldn’t move on my own. I was…alone. I desperately tried to fix things, but I couldn’t. For quite a while I had noticed things about Mama, but wouldn’t accept it. Not long after Laura hit, my best friend’s husband called that MD Anderson had told him that there was nothing else that they could do for her. Her last scan had shown 4 more tumors on her brain. So, he brought her home to die. We did everything we could for them, while keeping our distance due to her immune system being non-existent. Around the time Delta hit he followed MDA’s recommendation and started her on Hospice care. Christmas was almost non-existent. I did all I could to make the holiday work for Mama and Daddy, but it was awful. Then in January covid caught me. Mama was getting worse. Daddy was struggling. I didn’t know how to fix any of it. Jan 25 my friend’s husband told us that Hospice had told him that she wouldn’t make the weekend. We went to see her. She was sleeping around the clock. They were keeping her medicated for pain. I prepared my coworkers for me to get the call. Wednesday, I got a call from my niece, but I was in the middle of teaching, so I sent her to voicemail. Then I got called down to the office for a call. They were bringing Mama to the ER. She didn’t know anyone and couldn’t walk. I left and flew down to get there. I missed her going in, but my sister had helped bring her to the hospital. Only my dad was able to be in the hospital with her for the first day, but I got to go in the next day and she was definitely not herself. She’s had UTI’s before, several in the past few months, along with being severely dehydrated. She was confused and pulled her IV out and demanded to go home. Friday my world imploded. Around 4:45 my sister called and told me that they had diagnosed Mama with advanced dementia. What I had been thinking, but I didn’t want to hear. Her doctor spoke very frankly with my sister and Daddy that he had serious concerns about Daddy being able to take care of her. Two hours and lots of tears later we got the call that my friend had passed. The next week was a blur. Trying to spend time with Mama and with my friend’s husband. In the past, Mama always bounced back from UTI’s or dehydration within about 24 hours of treatments starting. This time she didn’t. A week later and she was still confused. She pulled her catheter out. We made the heartbreaking decision to allow her to go into the nursing home for rehab to give us some time to figure things out. There are moments where she seems more like herself, but most of the time she doesn’t. She thinks she’s renting a room from someone. She gets agitated and confused. Her moods change from minute to minute. I got to see her for the first time today in 3 weeks. Daddy is able to see her almost every day, for between a half hour to an hour. She has fallen several times, tried to escape twice. She now spends most of her time in a wheel chair because she’s such a fall risk. They also have a band on her ankle that sets off alarms if she gets close to an outside door. She swings from being sweet and cooperative with them to being hateful and uncooperative. It kills me. We watched Gram go through this, and Mama told me so many times how terrified she was that this would happen to her. (It definitely runs in the family. Aunt D, Mama’s sister, had it and passed from complications from it 4 months ago. Gram had it. Both of Gram’s parents, and two of her 3 aunts had it. I just wish I could have protected her from it. I have prayed more than ever before and cried more than I thought I ever could.