The story so far

As posted to Twitter and expanded on Facebook:

Well, COVID finally got my mom. After three years of keeping her a prisoner in her own home, a week in the hospital after her leg broke, a month in the rehab center, and five days back home - all without contracting COVID - she finally got it after a return trip to the hospital. She went to the hospital last Wednesday, was sent back to the rehab center on Sunday after multiple negative COVID tests, and then had one more test taken at the rehab center come back positive on Monday. Tuesday morning - Valentine's Day - she had a stroke, apparently caused by blood clots being shed by COVID while it interfered with her blood thinners. 

She is probably never coming home again.

I'm glad she got to reunite with her beloved cats, if only for a few days. I'm glad she got to see the Super Bowl - the first half plus the halftime show, at least. I'm glad I took up a bouquet of fake plastic roses and baby's breath with a "Happy Valentine's Day!" balloon on Sunday, rather than waiting until today. I'm glad I got to hear her rail against COVID last night in our final conversation. I'm glad for all the time we got to spend together, at home and on  hundreds of trips to see various doctors. But now it looks like that is all drawing to an end.

I really want to document and detail all of the above.

On Tuesday, December 27, 2022 my mom was going out with my sister to meet a friend at Red Lobster for a late lunch/early dinner. I disapproved of her leaving the house to eat in public due to COVID exposure risks, but she was OK with taking her chances. This was my first day back to work. They left the house around 1:30 PM, and I stepped into the kitchen to make myself a ham sandwich before starting work. A minute later my sister came back to tell me that my mother's leg had given out as they walked down the steps. 

My mom has had both of her knees replaced over the past few years with artificial joints. She's been very happy with her new knees. It turns out that the new knees were so strong that any stress applied to the knee was being transferred to the leg bones the knee was anchored into - causing her femur to shear, as was determined after she was rushed to the ER. She had surgery to repair her leg and replace the knee joint two days later on December 29, 2022. She was transferred to Allied Rehab (known by its old name, "John Heinz") a few days later - Tuesday, January 3, 2023 I believe. She fell out of bed a day or two later - I need to verify these dates - and wound up spending a day back in the ER on January 5. She returned to John Heinz and resumed her barely-begun physical therapy on Saturday, January 7.

Rehab was a long, slow process. My mom went through three roommates during her time there. The first was released just a few days after my mom arrived. The second one was there about two weeks before being discharged. The third, an avid FOX News watcher, was there for the end of January and into February.

My mom was in rehab for my birthday. A bunch of food milestones were piling up: we traditionally had lobster tail on New Year's Eve, and a dinner of pork on New Year's Day, and a cake for my birthday. Now we had lobster tails in the freezer, along with 2/3 of a long pork loin cut into thirds. I made a note to order a cake for her homecoming.

She was finally cleared to come home on Friday, February 3, 2023.

Unfortunately things were not ideal as soon as she came home. The cats took most of a day to forgive her for being away so long, and she was happy to have meals cooked by me, but she was showing signs of difficulty walking. Every morning she would get up and make her way to the bathroom with  her walker, and get dressed and out to the breakfast table without a problem. But as the day went on she had a harder and harder time walking without assistance. (We later learned this was because she was drinking far less than she had been at rehab, so she was getting dehydrated throughout the day.) The first weekend was bad, but after Monday I felt comfortable resuming my work-from-home shift. 

Tuesday, February 7 she had an issue minutes before I was to start work, so I called in an emergency FMLA day. Wednesday February 8 looked more promising. We coordinated her day better: breakfast around 8:00, lunch (a stew I had just made, one of her favorites) at noon, bathroom time at 1:00, then going down for a nap as I began work at 2:00. I woke her at my first break at 4:00 and asked if she wanted something to eat, and she said yes. I set her up at the table and served her a partial dinner before I returned to work at 4:15.

I don't know why she got up from the table at 5:50, but she did, and was about two steps from the table with her walker when the phone rang. For her, the phone is always the top priority, and this time was no different as she stopped to turn and answer it. She lost her balance, fell in slow motion, and hit the back of her head off the wooden chair at the dinner table.

I called 911. They advised me not to try to sit her up. She was cognizant and coherent the whole time. The ambulance crew arrived a few minutes later - unmasked - and they quickly raised her into a seated position on the chair, then got her on a gurney and out of the house.

At the hospital they determined she had no head injury from the fall - no neck fracture, no internal bleeding - but also determined she was dehydrated. They got her into a room and, based on poor performance on tests of her walking ability, made plans for her to return to John Heinz. I packed up the necessities we had just brought home a few days before, along with a week's worth of clothing, and got it to my brother. I was unable to visit her in the hospital until Saturday, February 11, 2023. We watched the Mass together, something we have done since the beginning of the pandemic. By this time she had tested negative for COVID once, and her return to Heinz was dependent on negative results on another test.

I left her on Saturday night at about 7:30 and stopped at a dollar store where everything costs $1.25. I have come to be amazed at the quality and detail of the artificial flowers available at this store, and had assembled several household decorations for her previous homecoming from flowers purchased there. I decided to assemble a Valentine's Day bouquet: roses, baby's breath, some onion grass as a background, a vase, some glass pebbles for weight, and a balloon on a stick.

Sunday morning, February 12, 2023 the results of her COVID test came back clean, and my brother transported her to Heinz. She was back in her old unit, and everyone was happy to see her again, though not entirely happy she was back. I went to see her that afternoon and presented her with her early Valentine's Day present. She looked fantastic. A nurse checked her temperature and found it to be slightly elevated - 100-101 degrees. She ate dinner and we watched the opening of the Super Bowl. Before she got out of the bathroom and ready for bed, the score was tied, 7-7. By the time I left it was 14-14. My mom is a huge football fan, and I hoped such an evenly-matched game wouldn't overstimulate her.

I called her Monday morning, February 13, 2023. Mondays are my day to work from the office, and I had preemptively taken it as an FMLA day. I asked her about her therapy schedule, and she told me that, because of her elevated temperature, they were isolating her until they got the results of another COVID test.

That test came back positive.

Now everything changed. My brother recommended that no one visit her until they released her from COVID isolation. I confirmed with the desk that I could visit but would have to follow COVID protocols - in addition to the standard mask requirement, I would need a gown, gloves, and face shield. I visited her for a shorter time, just a half hour. She looked absolutely fine. I called her that night after she was in bed and she was cursing out the bad luck of having avoided COVID for so long and then finally catching it. As I ended the call I told her I loved her and she returned the sentiment, as we always do.

The next morning, Tuesday, February 14, 2023, at about 7:00 AM, she had a massive stroke.