I didn't realize until today that my last update was in May. I kinda like having this blog as a history of all we've been through. Maybe it can help others, maybe it's just cheap therapy for me. At any rate a lot has happened and I have a lot of updating to do.
Back in May my mother was at VBPI. They ended up keeping her for over a month, only releasing her when funding ran out. It is completely ridiculous that in this country you can be denied care because of inability to pay. But I digress...
A doctor at the facility determined her unable to care for herself or make decisions regarding her care about a week into her hospitalization. The logical next step was to file for Guardianship and Conservatorship, but with the lawyer fees running about $5000 just for my lawyer it was an expense I simply couldn't pay. I considered begging family members for the money, but really, then what? There would be no money to pay for her care or anything else she needed. So I decided to file for Guardianship and Conservatorship pro se (legal speak for without a lawyer - I only learned that because they kept calling me that at the court and I had to ask what the heck it meant). I spent countless hours online and finally discovered this booklet http://www.courts.state.va.us/courtadmin/aoc/cip/programs/gal/adult/guardian_conserv_proceedings.pdf put out by the Virginia Supreme Court. It made it sound pretty simple, but I was scared to death to try. I headed up to the Chesapeake Circuit Court to ask the Clerk's office for help, but they directed me to the library across the street. As luck would have it it was "free law day" at the library and I was able to talk with a lawyer and he assured me I could just follow the booklet and if there were problems the Guardian ad litem would take care of it for me. Funny fact - I discovered only last week that he was my father's divorce attorney. How weird is that?
So my mother was still in the hospital as I started writing my petition. The lawyer suggested getting letters from family members stating they didn't protest so I started asking all the closest relatives to write the letters. I couldn't find current addresses for my mother's half-siblings so I asked her two full siblings, mother and my siblings to sign the letters. My aunt was the first to send hers to me and my siblings slowly got theirs done. But my uncle protested. He didn't understand why she needed a guardian. I guess since he hadn't seen her since the early 1980s it was a bit of a shock. But he convinced my grandmother not to sign her letter, either. Then my uncle suggested he be guardian. Considering he lives like 10 states away and hasn't seen her in over 30 years that did not sit well with me (and the reason why I had to stop writing my blog so I didn't "tip him off"). I worried I would have to come up with the money for a lawyer in case he chose to fight me. In the end another lawyer (giving me some free advice) mentioned I only needed to contact 3 relatives (4 siblings = done) and that the court wouldn't really care what a relative thought that lived so far away. So I filed my petition. I thought my heart was going to explode it was beating so hard the day I went up to the counter and paid my $20 and filed my petition. The Clerk even took pity on me and assigned a Guardian ad litem for me since at the time the rule was I had to find someone first. The rule changed July 1st.
During this time I was in daily contact with the social worker at VBPI and my mother's regular case manager at the CCSB. It was determined that she needed an assisted living facility. Well she actually needed long term hospitalization, but since she was only 64 3/4 years old and the only people who can be admitted to the under 65 year old mental hospital are prisoners. And due to bureaucratic garbage she could not get a nursing home evaluation so, an assisted living facility was our only choice. My sister and I visited dozens of places. Her more than me, but I spent more time working the phones. So many of these places were horrid. One reeked of urine in the room they happily suggested our mother move into. Finally we brought our list down to a few we liked, but would have to have family pitch in to help pay for. Then they all started saying they couldn't accept her because of her schizophrenia diagnosis. This is despite telling them when we first spoke with them and having them tell us it wouldn't be an issue. Then we lowered our standards and tried others who denied her. Then we lowered our standards again, but this time were told that because she was not receiving Medicaid she wasn't allowed to go to these facilities. We heard through the social worker that the dr said we needed to "step it up." I was livid. My sister and I were living on almost no sleep getting the run around every where we looked. There wasn't anywhere to "step up" to! So basically we were screwed. Luckily my sister stopped me from heading to an assisted living facility (run by Sentara) to let loose some verbal frustration and found a facility in Norfolk. The night before discharge we also found one on the Eastern Shore, but when we visited it was definitely not somewhere we would like our mother to live. The Lydia Roper House in Norfolk is a beautiful Victorian Home. They have really been wonderful to her. It's clean, sunny and bright. I think I want to live there when I'm old.
Mom was settled and a week later we had the court hearing. Mom had her own lawyer, Colleen Dickerson, who was awesome. She was as helpful as she could be. She met with my mom and agreed she needed a guardian. She walked me through the court hearing and even complimented me on my petition. The judge said I did better than some lawyers he sees. I had to pay Colleen's fee of about $1500 and post my bond (insurance in case I screw up my mom's finances) of about $700 and there it was. Less than if I'd hired my own lawyer, but still wiped out a good portion of our savings (my brother helped and later my older sister did as well). My sister and I were co-guardians and I was sole conservator. At that moment I really wondered why I had done it. The work was overwhelming. But then again my mother did carry me for 8 months, give birth to me and fed me from her breast for the first year of my life so I guess I kinda owe her.
But that day I had scheduled a visit with an eye doctor for her She had a weird eye discharge that wasn't responding to antibiotics. There was no time to celebrate a legal victory. My husband picked her up and drove her to the appointment so I could head over straight from court. I sat down next to her in the waiting room waiting to be called back and she started to call me every awful name she could remember. She fought me through the appointment. I paid the bill with more money from my savings and drove her back to the assisted living and got her up to her room. I stopped by the office to give them the med orders and headed home. I started to cry. Now I'm not much of a crier. I've spent the past year fighting them because I just simply don't have the luxury of time to cry. I crank the stereo up to make them stop. But this time they didn't. I cried the whole way through downtown Norfolk traffic. They finally stopped when I was almost home, thankfully. I didn't want my kids to see me cry. Especially about something they didn't understand. And God I hope they never have to understand.
We found out a few days later that she was suffering from side-effects and the VBPI doctor failed to put her on the medication that would control the side-effects. It took some time, but she stopped calling me a B**** so much. There are good days and bad days. Many times the bad days outnumber the good. She sleeps a lot.
Life is hard right now. But I choose to help my mom not because I love it, not because I feel it is my duty to her, not because I owe anyone anything. I just don't think I could live with myself if I didn't. So much of life is doing things because they matter to others. I tend to forget myself. But when there's so much need it almost feels selfish to do something for myself. But last night, after the kids were in bed, I crawled in the tub and read a book. That was just the right amount of selfish I needed.
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