Sunday, September 11, 2016

My Molly

It is Sunday morning. Melanoma Man looked a little better yesterday, a little more color in his face. I spent the day with him. My Molly, who is my birth mother, arrived Friday night. I don't talk about Molly much because I almost feel as if it will jinx her and none of it will be real. More often I feel disloyal, like a cheating spouse, receiving kindness I don't deserve. She took the boys to the beach yesterday morning, while my friend Kris brought over every cleaning supply known to man and two friends to help. Kris, Heather and Stephanie spent 3 hours cleaning my house, even steam cleaning my rugs. They made breakfast for us before the cleaning began.

When awake Melanoma Man asked to go home all day. On the drive home Butter asked, " is Dad still dying?" Yes. The social worker came to see me and discuss Medicare criteria for inpatient hospice stays. She was nice, but some of what she said wasn't true. While Dr. O had said they would keep MM until the end, the nurses and social workers are ushering us out the door. iMac is anxious. He says he doesn't know how we could do it, perform the level of care that MM requires. Social work has talked about a long term care facility. Images of my mom, stuck in her non- working body and unable to speak in the nursing for 7 years pop into my head. I reassure myself that this can't possibly go on for years. I get out the calculator to try to figure out the cost of a CNA at home to help me, upwards of $500 a day. I can't move him on my own. It always takes two people to pull him back up in his hospital bed after his 6'4" self has scrunched  down to the bottom of the bed. I tell myself to just take things one day at a time. I am able to do that only about 10% of the time. It is 6:49 am. I am about to get dressed to go see him. When I arrive each morning he is usually a little frantic, wondering where I have been during the night. I have slept better this week than I have since August 3rd, which is the day he returned home from his last hospitalization. 

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