Prior to 2015, my mother had been seeking various treatments for a plethora of maladies. She was trying to control her diabetes with the help of a certain medical organization who essentially promised she could eventually be in control without the use of medicine or insulin. This was supposed to be accomplished through extreme dieting and deprivation, supplements, and various other methods. The only useful thing to come of the experience was learning that she had Celiac disease & she had several allergies she had never been aware about. The worst experience at this time was the radio frequency treatments which consisted of rod-like needles that were inserted into her body and discharged what felt like low to moderate doses of electricity. This accomplished nothing beneficial whatsoever and instead was quite detrimental to her health. It caused great pain, swelling, and discoloration. It caused bruising. It caused painful sciatica episodes that left her tearful wailing. Every time she stood, she would experience severe lightheadedness and dizziness that would cause her to pass out. Prior to falling, her face would distort and she would become unresponsive and then gravity would just take over. Witnessing this was so scary; I didn't understand what was going on. With time she needed a constant guide to stay stable when walking sort distances and couldn't stand for long periods of time or she would pass out and fall.
One day in September 2015, my mother wanted to have a shower and I guided her as usual, but as she stood bracing herself at the sink while I positioned her shower chair, she passed out and fell straight down on top of her legs and ankles. I had my back turned for literally less than five seconds and there wasn't any warning, but down she went with barely any sound. when I pulled her off her legs, I saw her foot had dislocated at a right angle and part of her leg bone was stretching the skin from inside. She regained consciousness very quickly and said her leg was broken. Indeed, she had three very bad breaks in addition to the dislocation. It took six hours to get her out of the basement, up the stairs, and out of the house. she crawled up the stairs on her knees on her own because the people I called for help and I couldn't get her up all the way. She also had to get in the car to go to the ER mostly on her own, too. Unfortunately, the person who I called for help and his son just weren't capable and I felt bad that I couldn't do it on my own.
My mother ended up spending two weeks in the ER. The first night, the doctors put her to sleep and relocated her ankle joint which took less than 5 minutes. The second night, the doctors performed surgery on her ankle. Twelve screws and two plates were permanently. The third night, she had a heart attack from a blood clot that resulted from the previous night's surgery. The hospital staff was minimally responsive, telling her to relax- that it was only indigestion. By some miracle, she survived the heart attack, but as a result she was kept even longer for tests and observation. I had to rely on her incompetent acquaintance for transportation to the hospital and watch our special needs service pet while I would briefly visit her once each day for less than 15 minutes or he would complain bitterly about how much longer must her suffer- ironic considering he always saw her at least once a day, saw her before I did, and saw her for longer than I did. This... from a guy who left my mother after proposing to her.
When she was released from the hospital, my mother was told she would owe over $55,000. She was told they would help her with signing up for medicare or medicaid, but then changed their minds midway through the process. My great uncle visited from out of state to see if he could speak to hospital staff in a professional capacity regarding my mothers bill because as a reverend who works with people who live with challenging circumstances. the hospital was not only unwilling to listen after agreeing to a meeting but they were rude with him as well, which I thought was absolutely appalling to treat a man of the cloth poorly. So no agreements were negotiated to any extent even though they reneged with their offer to assist with starting my mother with retroactive coverage, even though their surgery caused her to have a blood clot which they said they could avoid, and even though they almost caused my mother's death through negligent reaction to her heart attack.
Upon my mother's release from the hospital, she was restricted to temporary wheelchair mobility and virtually round the clock bed rest. Our home was no longer conducive to her resuming living with me on the basement level so it needed some major renovations to the main floor to make it possible for her to live there instead so we found a hotel about 35 miles away that was affordable without getting ridiculously far away, however with all my other chores and having unreliable transportation to get anything done, getting out to the house occurred infrequently. There was so much to do and I was the only one doing it so it became stressful primarily because of the guy providing the unreliable transportation. Again, it was my mother's ex and he frequently made life difficult for both of us. he owed my mother a lot of money which he never paid back, he talked about being with her but didn't want to be there to be with her, he inserted himself at times when my mother an I were going to celebrate times alone as a family and if I complained he would have a snit about it. When my mother no longer required the cast or braces and completed her physical therapy she took care of my transportation needs since I wasn't driving after two back surgeries and a series of scratched corneas. This did allow me to get to the house more often but there were still occasional obstacles...
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