Rant #3,036: i Just Don't Know What To Do With Myself

When it rains, pours …

My mother has now gotten COVID, and it is bad enough when someone like myself gets it at age 65, but when someone like my mother gets it, at age 91, it is that much worse.

What makes the whole thing really bad is something that I haven’t spoken about, and only alluded to, during the past few weeks, but due to the circumstances, it is something now that I must speak about without any hesitancy.

My mother is in almost a full state of a progressive age-related dementia, has been going through this since late summer, and even separate from the COVID, she appears to be getting worse by the day.

Starting in late August, her behavior changed to one that no one could fully understand.

We discovered several things that were going on involving her that made no sense at all, the tipping point being when she was throwing out family mementos because, she claimed, “I will never watch them and don’t need them anymore.”

This included things like videotapes and DVDs of major family occasions during the past 30 or more years, such as birthdays, anniversaries and other special occasions that she once cherished.

God knows how many things she actually threw out over the period of time that we didn’t know she was doing this, but upon discovering one garbage bag chock full of this stuff, I salvaged through it and came out with a messy, but salvageable dozen or so tapes and DVDs that are part of our family history. Heaven knows how much else she discarded when we didn’t know she was doing this.

And almost immediately afterward came the real harbinger of the onset of the dementia.

I began to receive phone calls and letters directed at me for my mother’s non-payment of bills.

This started in about October or so, and included everything like water bills, electricity bills, credit card bills, property tax bills … you name it, and she stopped paying everything starting in late August.

I was receiving the calls and the threats and everything else because my name was put onto all of her accounts earlier this year, so after not hearing from her, they went after me.

Over a period of time—about two months—that all was resolved, but early on when we discovered what was happening, I asked her why she had not paid the bills, and she said to me in a completely child-like manner, “I guess I forgot” as she flung her hands in the air.

You don’t forgot oil bills, you don’t forget school tax bills, unless you are not of your right mind, which she is not.

And then comes eating … my mother was never a big eater, belying her very slight frame, but she always had something to eat for breakfast, lunch and dinner … which is not the case anymore.

She does not enjoy eating anymore, does not remember to eat, and has to be reminded to eat or she simply won’t.

Before we realized this, I am sure there were days where she hadn’t had a thing to eat—or drink—over a 24-hour period, and even when we became aware of this non-eating phase, I know of at least one day where she had absolutely nothing—and I mean nothing—to eat or drink at all.

One doctor that I took her to relayed to us that something had to be done about this, because she lost 19 lbs, over a year, plunging from 112 lbs. down to 93 lbs., which is not a way to diet but at her age, such a fall could irreparably harm her.

And my mother looked terrible, had absolutely no energy, almost as if she had purposely let herself go.

But her mindset was not allowing her to have a good quality of life, so the family has literally taken over her affairs—including financial—and since I am handling the money matters, I have found things that she did with her money that were questionable—if only for her and my late father’s finances, nothing illegal or below board here—when she started to enact them decades ago and are completely unacceptable now that he is gone and she can’t handle them anymore … but there is little I can do to undue 50 or more years of financial quagmires she created for herself at this stage of the game.

We brought in some outside help to tend to her needs, and they have been helping her eat a decent meal and in other ways, including companionship, but now that my mother has COVID, the women won’t be coming over for at least two weeks or perhaps never again … we just don’t know yet.

She is also under a neurologist’s care along with her other doctors, but since she now has COVID, we have to wait on completing the tests that the doctor asked for to better assess her mental condition (i.e., is her dementia age-related, it is Alzheimer’s, can any medication be given to help her, etc.).

So my mother is alone once again, save for me, who will tend to her needs even though I am not myself through with COVID.

We have no choice in the matter, so I was elected to make sure she takes her medicine, takes her other pills, eats, and simply stays alert.

At this point, that is just about all we can do with her.

She cannot go into a nursing home because of her malady, and we have another problem that she and my father got embroiled in years ago, not really understanding the future consequences, that pretty much forces her to stay where she is, not for her betterment, but for the betterment of our family:

A reverse mortgage.

Once she leaves the confines of her house for good, the terms of the mortgage are over, and my family—my wife, my son and I—will have major decisions of our own to make about our own living quarters, as the bank will take over full ownership of the house, and since we cannot possibly repay the mortgage, they will look to sell the house and make whatever money they can off of this dwelling.

So whatever reasoning my parents used for going into a reverse mortgage—there were many reasons, we have found out—it is the glue that ties my mother to the house forever, almost a Super Glue that prevents her from really getting the care that she needs as she lives out her life.

Believe me, I have thought about this since Day One of the reverse mortgage years ago, and I feel almost guilty now that we cannot provide her the real care she needs to handle her dementia.

But at this point, with COVID thrown into the mix, things are even worse than I could have ever imagined years ago when my parents went into this agreement.

So there you have it.

I hate to sully what should be a joyous holiday season with this horror story, but that is how it is for my family during Holiday Season 2022.

It isn’t good, and 2023 doesn’t appear have the potential to be any better than 2022 was, it only seems to be have all the earmarks of even a worse year.

I have to have hope, though, and when I look at my family’s Hanukkah Menorah in the window, I have to believe that its lit candles represent a beacon of light that will help us through these very troubled times.

Like I said, I have to hope … .