Mom Goes To Rehab III

BudLiteGood morning, y’all. My recording device seems to be working very well and I was able to download and translate my story yesterday in my alloted fifteen minute time slot. There are a few issues with the software not speaking “Southern”, but according to the package, it will get smarter as time goes on. I hope I do too.

When we left off yesterday, I’m in my first week of serving time, Mom’s in her third week of rehab, and everybody else is fretting about us. Mulva comes to see me every day and brings me the latest emails from my idiot sister Charlotte. The folks at the jail allow me to write my responses on a legal pad for Mulva so she can respond back to the tribe in Asheville. From the tone of the emails, Mom is just being herself and the “Golden Girls” are trying to figure out their best position in the new reality. The new reality is that Mom is being controlled rather than her controlling everybody.

I forgot to mention before, that when I got all of Mom’s financial stuff back to TackyToo, it took me three solid days of going through the trash bags of records to get them sorted. Three full 40 gallon trash bags reduced down to one average pendaflex file box. Those files were sorted by payee, and chronologically for everything Mom had of consequence. I did have a second box filled with blank checks. Mom had literally thousands of checks. I guess she had a fear of running out of checks before she ran out of money. Most of us have the reverse phobia.

Anyway, while I was getting Mom’s finances in order, I set up bill pay for her monthly items and setup a transfer from her rental account to her everyday account to keep it funded. Mom had some bizarre charges on her debit card and her Walmart card that looked out of the ordinary to me. I also happened to notice that the only people who got Christmas checks were Edna, Charlotte and Lucinda. The signatures looked legitimate enough, so I let it go. It did look like Mom was buying groceries for more than one person, and maybe that’s ok. It did establish in my mind an ongoing dependency that Charlotte and Edna had for Mom’s cash.

Since Jackson had taken Mom’s purse and hidden all of Mom’s credit cards, and I had confiscated all of Mom’s checks and bank information, we felt like we had covered the bases in case someone was trying to take advantage of Mom. We certainly knew Ann Wallace was a bad apple. I was now starting to think there might be more suspects. Emails like the following one from Charlotte could be construed a multiple of ways:

I had the thought just before or right after I spoke with Maggie yesterday about where Mother’s purse is, that perhaps, rather than wanting her Driver’s License for ID in “case there is a tornado out there so someone could identify her” that may have been a ploy to get some money so she could call at taxi cab to come get her. I am going to have to start screening her phone calls and letting them roll over to my voice mail.  So many of them are very pitiful and tear at my heart strings.
Charlotte

This email had been entitled “Mom’s mental health”, don’t know why. Following along behind was this email:

Do you know at this time who has keys to the condo?  I do, since my name is on the Original Deed. Mother told Maggie to make keys the morning just before Mother went to the doctor and then to Mission on Dec. 31. Edna told me she does not have keys. So, do you? Jackson? or who else might have keys that you can think of?
Yes, we may get some ice or snow.
Charlotte

Charlotte seems to be solidifying something, but I don’t know what. I had found in Mom’s information where she had made a living trust of the condo for Charlotte when Mom passed. What this means is, that the condo is Charlotte’s when Mom goes, but not until then. It also means that the condo can be used like any of Mom’s other assets, to take care of Mom. So where the interest in keys comes from, I’m not sure.

Meantime, Jackson is working like a bear to get Mom setup to go into Mountain View. Jackson took over for me with the social worker in Asheville and explained that we were trying to transition Mom to Mountain View. The rational was simple, Mom couldn’t take care of herself, one of Mom’s “caretakers” was 80 herself with high blood pressure, and the other caretaker was bat sh*t crazy, and had the papers to prove it. Jackson nor I were interested in taking Mom in, so, managed care seemed like a no-brainer.

Imagine my surprise when Mulva told me about a voicemail Mom left on my phone. I crafted the following email to update the tribe:

All,
I currently have a voice mail from Mom that she wants me to be guardian and that she wants to go to Mountain View. I don’t know what happened, and I’m waiting for the other shoe to drop.
Hopefully Jackson can get the paper work done without too much more drama.Thanks everyone for hanging in there. The light at the end of the tunnel might not be a train after all.

Bud

So it seems like we’re all on the same page. Mom wants to stop being a burden on her sister and daughter, her sister wants to live out her days in peace, and her daughter wants to throw off the yoke of oppression and become the beautiful butterfly she was meant to be.

Until;

WTH!!!
How does Mother even know about Mountain View when the other day when I was visiting her she asked me where The Facility is located and how to get there.  I explained how to drive to it past where you turn to go to Maggie’s house.
I think this is somehow the work of Ann Wallace!
Charlotte

So it seems like we’re not all on the same page. As previously explained, The Facility can only hold Mom for thirty days for physical rehab, after that, to stay, Mom has to be diagnosed to be basically in a vegetative state. She is not in a vegetative state, as evidenced by her measuring out grief to everyone on an hourly basis. It seems that Charlotte has decided she can “manage Mom’s case” and she fires back:

It seems to me that Mountain View requires more independent living than she is capable of at this time. Remember, Edna, you told her if she couldn’t do her exercises, then she was not strong enough to go back to the condo and live alone.
Charlotte

As it turns out Edna is very opinionated about where Mom lands. Charlotte had forwarded me an email from Edna that responded to my suggestion that Mom needed to go into managed care. “Oh, no, don’t do that, they’ll keep her alive forever”, was what the email said.

I thought caretakers were supposed to try to keep their charges alive. Imagine my surprise. Well, Jackson is working like a bulldog to get paper work squared away and I am offering my soul and everything else to the Georgia Court System to be allowed to help transition my Mom over the weekend. I finally get permission. I can help Jackson move furniture on the 31st of January. I give Mulva an update to be shared with everyone with all the particulars:

All,
Mountain View  is a very nice assisted living facility about 1.5 miles from The Facility. They have the ability to care for Mom from now until the end. There is a full time nurse that will be able to ensure that Mom gets her meds properly. They do 3 meals a day, even in her room if she doesn’t feel like going to the dining room. The grounds are gorgeous and they have raised beds so Mom can garden if she wishes.
 
This is a VERY GOOD THING, if Mom buys into it. Let’s please not fractionalize now and give her the ability to manipulate and bully her way back to making decisions for herself. She’s just not able at this time to make good decisions.
Mom is being released from the Facility on Tuesday, February 3 to go to Mountain View.  Jackson has this all arranged – she cannot continue to stay where she is.  Jackson and I plan to move a few pieces of bedroom furniture to Mountain View on Sunday.  

I would like to know if you are in agreement with my plan.  I feel like this plan will work for everyone if we all are in agreement. I am convinced that Mom cannot care for herself.  I cannot and will not manage her care from here if she moves back to her condo. Please let me know tonight if you are in support of the plan that I have outlined above. 
Thanks,
Bud

Well, like my Daddy Bocephus used to say, “it’s impossible to make a plan foolproof, because fools are so ingenious”. Here comes the proof:

Why have you stopped communicating with me?
You have not returned my phone message or sent me any emails.
Edna sent me an email or what you had emailed to her and her response.
I don’t have any issues or concerns about your moving Mother to Mountain View, but I am wondering which bedroom furniture you are planning to move there for her to use there.The guest bedroom furniture in the condo is mine, and has it has been mine for many years. Mother asked for me to let her use it to decorate the guest room in the condo, and I said she could. She has also told me, Edna, and she said also she had told you on the telephone that she was decorating the condo so that when she dies, all I will have to do is “bring in my clothes and a toothbrush. I am wondering if you all plan to move the bedroom furniture, etc. from upstairs in the rental house to decorate for her over at Mountain View. Please reply to this email.
Charlotte

I dictated a nice response for Mulva to email, ignoring the fact that Charlotte has never had two sticks to strike a match to, and that all of her claims of ownership are moot until Mom passes. Here comes Charlotte’s three responses, minutes apart:

It think it is safe to say that we all love Mother, and we all want what is best for her, even if she does not agree with what we think is good for her at this time in her life.
I think it is also safe to say that we are all very tired and worried if we have done enough, or could have done differently and could have helped her more or better, even while she sometimes continued to resist our best, loving, caring intentions for her.I hope that Mother will somehow be able to understand that I am nearing 72 and Edna is nearing 80.  We have really, really tried to help Mother during her various surgeries, very bad sick spells, and hospitalizations.  But, we have to also be realistic and realize that neither Edna or I have anyone really close by to care for us if we get down and can’t get back up to speed. So, we need to do all we can to try to stay positive and encouraging, not only to Mother, but to one another as well. None of us needs to get sick now from all the stress.

Charlotte

Email two:

Make sure Jackson doesn’t remove my furniture in the guest bedroom.  Mother asked for it from me to decorate the guest bedroom. It has been mine for many years. Edna and I can take Mother items she wants from the condo once she is re-settled at Mountain View. I see no point in moving and moving again, and again and again, as we have experienced here.
Charlotte

Email three:

Please ask Jackson if you speak with him today for the garbage can key. It is really needed by us. Edna and I have had to bring garbage from the condo back over here to put in the garbage. Having the key for The Clusters garbage can would really help us.
Charlotte

So just a little disconnect from reality, particularly speaking with Jackson about the elusive garbage key. Again, an empty condo generates no trash in my mind, so were did this transported trash come from? The biggest disconnect though, is the assumption we would take the guest bedroom furniture to Mountain View instead of Mom’s bedroom furniture. Even to the most brain dead, it should be obvious that if we wanted Mom to “feel at home” in her new home, having her own bedroom furniture was key.

There is clearly a plan afoot and apparently Jackson and I only play minor roles in it.

The plan unfolds tomorrow, same time same channel.

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