Well, the inevitable happened. The doctors had no choice but to take my mother's left leg below the knee. The surgeon told me that he attempted to just take part of her foot, but that the tissue had already started to deteriorate and the circulation was very poor. I was grateful that she would no longer be prone to deadly blood infections as a result, but I knew she was going to have a long road to recovery ahead of her.
Having no car, I had to rely on my best friend to take me to see her. I only got to see her twice in the entire two weeks she was in the hospital. The first time, she was sound asleep and I wasn't about to wake her. The second, they had her so drugged up that it was difficult to talk to her. I couldn't tell if she even realized I was there. She was released back to the nursing home less than a week after the surgery; Medicare was having an absolute cow that she had been in there as long as she had already. I swear to god if they'd had their way they would have booted her the same day as her surgery, never mind that she worked her ass off for over thirty-five years and earned every penny of her retirement income. She contributed to it her entire working life, but they don't want her to actually use it...it's just for show. If they screw around with their BS long enough for her to kick the bucket, they'll save even more money...funny how that works...but I digress.
I got to see her for a little bit on New Year's eve. She was very tired, but not in pain. Thank goodness for that. I went and filled her pitcher with fresh ice water and poured her a cup. Underneath the blanket, I could see the outline of what was left of her legs. I took a deep breath and sucked it up, for her. But on the inside, I had flung the pitcher of ice water against the wall, fled down the stairs, ran outside and vomited until I couldn't vomit anymore. I was ripping entire shrubs out by their roots, destroying everything I could get my hands on while crying and screaming in helpless agony. Mom was being taken away from me a piece at a time, slowly suffocating to death, and there wasn't a damn thing I could do about it... I gave her a kiss on top of her head and promised her I would see her on Monday.
Unfortunately, I caught a miserable cold and haven't been able to go anywhere near her. I've had to settle for talking to her on the phone, which is better than nothing, but it's just not the same. It doesn't help that Mom doesn't have her own phone to use. This nursing home has one cordless phone for the entire second floor. You get through when you get through. It doesn't help matters much that I can't just call her when I want.
It's heartbreaking when you reach out to people, desperate for someone to lean on to help get you through one of the worst experiences of your life and they either ignore you, don't bother to answer you for some reason or just plain don't remember you well enough to give a damn. Whatever their reasons, shame on them all. I get that their busy with their lives and that time is a precious commodity, but for the love of god, show some compassion for crying out loud! I am not handling this well at all. It's ripping my guts out. No one should have to go through something like this alone...no one.
