Hospitals

I am now the woman who takes care of her mother ("mom take all of those pills out of the various wal-mart sacks and put them on the counter so that I can see them.") and her children ("what are we supposed to bring for your basketball team party?"/ "are your grades going to be good enough to graduate?")

My mom was admitted to the hospital within 30 minutes of our arrival Friday. The doctor told her that she was going to die within an hour of our being there. Of course, this meant that she tried to stand up and grab her purse to go. "Fight or flight" as they say. Maybe in her case it was both. Her heartbeat is irregular and the pacemaker cannot fix it. They cannot fix it. She also has spots on her lungs that 'may be cancer'. She has smoked for 50 years and is not about to stop now.

My sisters did not like the hospital I chose to take Mom to. So, they decided not to visit her to punish me. Hence, leaving me in charge of our mother's care. I was so angry, I just cried. Our mother was not a great mother. I earnestly believe that she did the best that she could. Abortion was legal when some of us were born (out of her nine kids) but she chose to have us and raise us, mostly single handedly. This means that we do not leave our mother in the hospital and refuse to bring her clothing. She was rinsing out her underwear in the sink at the hospital. I assumed my sister (whom Mom lives with) brought her some of her things. NO. My mom was so embarassed to be 'bothering me' that she never asked for her things. So she is there at the hospital rinsing out her underwear and wearing pajama bottoms that the nurses donated her. I found all of this out at discharge, of course. My heart hurts.

She does not have a primary care doctor, because it is nearly impossible to find one that wants to take Medicaid. I literally called 12 doctors before I found one. I was hysterical on the 12th call. I think she made the appointment in an effort to get me to stop crying. Hopefully she still accepts Medicaid when we get there (smile).

I don't know why I am going into all of this. I guess because I am WORN OUT. And I hate my sisters. I am trying to give up cursing, and this is not helping!

On the bright side, I sat down to dinner today and yesterday (two days in a row!) with my seventeen year old and my eight year old and just enjoyed the meal. No one makes me laugh like my son. I have to throw my head back to let out the laughter. He is the greatest. And Anna- every day is a new day, even when the day before is really crappy. I love, love, love that about her. She still loves me with her whole heart, you know, the way that only elementary school kids do.