If I could construct a flow chart of a phone call to an elder lawyer today, you would see circles and arrows and if-then’s and more confusion than you’d care to know about. Just envision your shoelaces tied into thousands of knots. That’s what comes to mind. That’s how I feel, like one of a thousand knots. After a bit more than an hour and a half on the phone, I am just as confused as ever. Perhaps I shouldn’t feel that bad―the elder lawyer had no answers either, just one possible recommendation: that my mother be moved to a … Continue reading →

Thanks, Keith Haring Last Thursday I was supposed to have a phone conference with a Florida elder lawyer in hopes of gaining some insight into my seemingly endless issues. Wouldn’t you know it: she was out sick with laryngitis. The appointment was pushed to next Thursday. I have spent over seven months focusing on my mother and her health, day and night, giving up sleep, food, my peace of mind. I walked around with my stomach in knots, I suffered from strange ocular migraines. In short, I was on the road to doing myself in. A few phone calls ago, … Continue reading →

I am so sick of writing checks to this place, I cringe when I take out the check book, what a waste of my mother’s precious funds that are draining like water from a holey bucket. I Wish I knew a lawyer with a big mouth and a mighty pen. There are so few truthful staff members. I just keep encountering one doublespeaker after another. Yesterday there was a rat that came out in the evening. It ate through a box of oatmeal and a PLASTIC container of cookies. A trap was set but it was too big and escaped. … Continue reading →

This past week will go down in my book as being one of the most surreal, odd, and disturbing: The tone was set by the horrific marathon bombings in Boston leaving us in disbelief. The events played out minute by minute by the media and as they unfolded I wanted to ask, “who wrote this story; it surely had to be made up?” It was the strangest five days of ghastly events, lows and highs, from explosions to veritable celebrations once the second of two suspects was captured. And let’s not forget the fertilizer plant in Texas that blew up,  … Continue reading →

An update on my life in the eye of a tornado … This series of blogs began when I reported that my mother had an accident and went to the hospital, was released to rehab, sent to the ICU back at the hospital, sent to another rehab (we thought was better from the ratings) and was neglected and diminishing daily. She was sent home at my request; rehab wasn’t rehabbing, she was just too weak. She was released to Vitas Hospice care. I thought it was the end. She seems to be rebounding. She currently has someone living-in with her. … Continue reading →

My days have melded, one into the next. The last six months have seemed lost. I don’t recall many details–wait, there was the great kitten rescue from October through December, but for the most part, I feel I have been battered by the endless stress of sorting information, of problem solving, of managing finances, of hiring aides, of standing up to some bullies, of dealing with people who have mastered the art of doublespeak. In the middle of all this, this meaning a phone that is rarely on the hook, of folders of information and data and details and notes … Continue reading →