So, on the day after Thanksgiving, Mom got sick. Well, sick-er. She already had Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis, and Dementia. But it was late evening, and we noticed her legs were really swollen. Like, ridiculously so. I took her to the ER - they admitted her, and the Pulmonologist and Nephrologist tried to figure out how to regulate one system without screwing up the other. And then, they decided she had congestive heart failure. After a week at the hospital, she was released to home hospice at her Assisted Living Facility.
And then, about a week after that, on December 17th, she died. It wasn't unexpected, but it wasn't exactly how I thought it would go, either.
The next morning, I drove back to Nashville to get Matt and the dog. We decided to get a dumpster, pick up an air mattress, and spend the holidays in Atlanta getting her place ready to put on the market, seeing our hometown faves, and enjoying Christmas with Mom's boyfriend and family.
And that's what we did. We met my local bestie for a Chinese dinner at China Garden - my favorite of all Chinese. We completely filled a massive dumpster, and politely made our way to the dump where we were told that even though we weren't residents of the city, we could leave a load of Mom's stuff there - just this once.
I was able to pick up Mom's remains and a pile of death certs, but I will have to go back and probate her will - I tried last week, but we were short a notarized waiver. Which, whatever. I don't mind going, because there are still a small pile of things we need to get out of the house. And I'm telling you, we had the truck completely loaded down.
All of that to say, it was our last Christmas with/first Christmas without Mom. I am sad, I assure you - but I have also had time to incrementally grieve, so I frontloaded much of the process. But in terms of celebrating, I did get my Christmas cards out with several minor glitches, like calling Brett's wife Michelle, and not Stephanie. Sending Frankie, Kristy, and Erin's cards to the wrong addresses. I regret nothing. Matt managed to put some lights on our house, which I think let us move through the month without the house looking abandoned, which it briefly was.
We're attempting to reacclimate to our new normal, but as always, there are unforseen twists and turns. Saturday, I cracked a tooth while eating a wasabi pea. It's charitable, really, to call it a tooth. It was more metal filling than anything. As a result, that tooth, and its next-door neighbor (molars, both) were evicted. The neighbor was removed because it was a root canal from 30 years ago and wasn't looking too stellar, either. This was all done within a few hours of the break at an emergency dentist. Should I have had a second opinion? Probably. Will any of it be covered by insurance? I sure hope so. Will I ever eat wasabi peas again? Not in this lifetime. In fairness, I have known this molar was one errant chew away from disaster for years. But let's say I've been busy, I'll get an implant next year and we'll move on.
I am sure that in time, I will want to talk about Mom in detail. We're going to have a memorial in the spring, and by then I'll have enough distance in the rear-view mirror to not be mired down in the last few weeks of her life, and more focused on the bigger picture. Anyway, that's me, that's my story for the past few weeks.
Let's hope that 2025 is different. And hopefully by that, it's better.
ae
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