Catching up

Boy, have I been slacking. To start. I got a phone call late on the 13th from my mom that said my grandma wasn't doing very well. (Back story: my grandma has had Alzheimer's disease for years. Her mind was completely gone. She has been unresponsive in any cognitive way for a number of years. Physically however she has been fine. So sadly, there has been nothing to do but wait for her body to catch up to her mind. We had to put Grandma in a nursing home I think nine years ago this past fall. A number of years ago she stopped being able to chew so all of her food had to be pureed and everything had to be made the same consistency for her to be able to swallow. So water or juice had to be made thicker. She had some weight loss at that time and we had some rather heated discussions on what we would do IF her weight loss continued. Mind you, Grandma was gone at this point, just her poor body remained. We had three for no feeding tube, one adamant for a feeding tube and my sister wavered back and forth). So back to the call from my mom. The nurse at the home thought that Grandma had may have had a stroke on the 9th I think. Grandma stopped being able to swallow anything at all. She would just choke. So my mom said Grandma is now dying and they weren't sure she would make it through the night. I don't know what I am supposed to do at this point. Grandma is 650 miles away.

My sister and I talked that night because she was in Nashville and was to fly home on Sunday, but where should she go now? We went to bed and waited for the update on Sunday morning. No change. My sister asks me how long I think it will take. I told her I didn't know for sure but she hadn't had any food or any sort of hydration since the Tuesday before. I said it can't be long. Even though Grandma's requirements were minimal, your body still has needs. People dehydrate so quickly, but not poor Grandma. My sister went there instead. I couldn't go because I would only get three days off of work for the funeral. It would take one day each way for the drive. My sister actually got to my aunt's house (same town as the nursing home) on Monday because of the crappy weather and another aunt got there the same day. They sat and waited. My mom couldn't take the wait any more and drove on Tuesday. (We were supposed to go together). Grandma died mid day Wednesday the 17th and the funeral was on the 20th. I left to start the drive on Wednesday after work. The plan was I would go about 200 - 250 miles and spend the night so my trip wouldn't be so long on Thursday.

I only made it 100 miles. I got hit by a deer. I saw it coming straight at me and there was nothing I could do about it. It slammed into my driver's side door then went along the rear door and back end of my car. I think the damn thing ran off then. Fortunately, the damage wasn't too bad. My side mirror was hanging by its wires though and needed to be removed. I called my father-in-law because he has lots of family in the town I was closet too. I had to drive into town with the window down to hold the mirror so it wasn't slamming into the side of the car. It wasn't 20 degrees out so that sucked. I got into town and parked in a well lit parking lot to assess the damage because I couldn't even see it before. Body damage, nothing functional but my mirror. I didn't know where to go and I called my FIL again and every ten seconds he asked me where are you now? I didn't know where to go and that is why I asked HIM! So I just pulled over into a parking lot at a motel and said you tell me where to go when you get a hold of someone. I sat there and cried. I was so tired, upset, and not feeling well. It was only a little after 6pm and I had wanted to go farther. I picked my head up and looked around. I saw a van parked in the parking lot that I recognized. It was a business vehicle and I know there is only one person that covers the entire area. I called my friend and asked her if her husband was in this town. Sure enough. At least something was going my way. This man was a groomsman in our wedding. I was so relieved to see someone I knew. He cut my mirror off for me and offered to get me a discounted rate at the motel. I wanted to go farther and went to fast food place to eat. I then called my husband (hadn't called him yet because there was nothing he could do - he was on a train in the middle of Wyoming). He flipped out and insisted I stay the night. So I went back to the motel, and did get a good rate by the way.

When I woke up the next morning and threw up of course, I looked outside and saw it had snowed. Great. The first 50 miles was hell but after that it was much better for the rest of the day. I made it to my aunts before dark, but I was so tired. That was the worry because I get so tired and take a nap every afternoon. I did stop for a long lunch or I would have been there sooner but I did need that hour break.

Everything went well. I got to see a lot of family I hadn't seen in years. Almost ten years actually. My Grandma had remarried after my mom's dad had died. This was before I was born and her new husband, who was the ONLY Grandpa I had, had a large family of his own. Two of his kids were still at home when they married and they both lived in my Grandma's house at some point (I don't actually think it was at the same time though). Anyway, I hadn't seen any of this family since my Grandpa died in 1997. It was good. I have been sad that I haven't seen them or been back to the town where my Grandma lived when I was growing up. I spent many, many summers at my Grandma's house and I have a fondness for that town.

My sister and I left after we got everything done after the funeral and drove to Omaha to spend the night on Saturday 20th. The weather was bad that weekend and my sister's flight left early that morning. I wanted to split my drive up again and it would have been a lot farther if I had gone up to my aunt's house and across South Dakota like when I came. So the weather sucked. The roads sucked. I drove from 35-75 miles/hour on the trip. Not very much of it was at 75. The worst part was my last 200 miles of interstate 80. There was so much ice and the wind was blowing very hard. I saw about 100 cars off the road and 22 semis in the ditch on my trip across the entire state of Nebraska. I was so sick the whole trip. I knew this couldn't be good for the baby, but I had to be back at work the next day. I had my first OB appointment too. The trip was horrible and I was so lucky I made it home. The last 40 miles was about the easiest of the trip and I think I cried the whole way.