(no subject)
I just found out some big news. I have been estranged from my mother all my life - as I noted in a post I made a couple weeks ago, she was out of my life the year I was in kindergarten (and she may as well not have been there before then, because she ignored us kids so much.) At any rate, apparently, on Weds. she went to a hospital for a blood clot in her leg that apparently she'd been ignoring. She finally went to a neighbor who took one look at her and dialed 911. She had hemochromatosis, a hereditary condition common in Caucasian people that can lead to liver problems/failure if not treated, and had let that condition go for years without treating it. (yes, there was a definite pronounced pattern of not taking basic care of herself there.) Anyway, her liver finally failed somewhere in among all this, and my little brother opted to take her off life support after she'd been unconscious a few days, bless him for having the intestinal fortitude to do that. When I found that out I called him back to let him know he did the right thing. She died this morning, right after being taken off. I didn't know about any of this until about four hours after she died.
So I'm just in shock right now. Yeah, I didn't know her, I didn't -want- to know her, so I don't quite know why I'm so shaky.
It does mean though that along with my brother I need a crash course in how to handle this sort of thing. There will not be a funeral or service - she has no friends, nobody to come to it anyway - so nothing needs to be done right away. Ben (that's brother) and I are fortunate in that Grandma has a very good lawyer who's going to help us with this. We don't know -anything.- Our mother had quite a bit of trust fund type elaborate financial stuff going on, on top of all the usual stuff like (chaotically, disturbingly messy, not cleaned in twenty years) house, so his input is going to be very helpful in untangling all that and figuring out what to do with it.
It looks like a trip to Richmond to sort through the house is inevitable. I don't want to do it but I just cannot dump it all on Ben. She was a very heavy smoker, and I am not kidding when I say the house wasn't cleaned in 20 years. (Not that I've seen it, but Ben was there last spring to pick up Grandpa's ashes from her and he attests that the house still looks like the set of the Addams Family, complete with black cobwebs hanging down, books piled everywhere, and still hasn't otherwise changed a bit since I was in kindergarten and Ben still wore diapers.) I'm going to need a gas mask or something to go in there.
Wishing won't change anything, but how I wish I'd been born into a normal family.
So I'm just in shock right now. Yeah, I didn't know her, I didn't -want- to know her, so I don't quite know why I'm so shaky.
It does mean though that along with my brother I need a crash course in how to handle this sort of thing. There will not be a funeral or service - she has no friends, nobody to come to it anyway - so nothing needs to be done right away. Ben (that's brother) and I are fortunate in that Grandma has a very good lawyer who's going to help us with this. We don't know -anything.- Our mother had quite a bit of trust fund type elaborate financial stuff going on, on top of all the usual stuff like (chaotically, disturbingly messy, not cleaned in twenty years) house, so his input is going to be very helpful in untangling all that and figuring out what to do with it.
It looks like a trip to Richmond to sort through the house is inevitable. I don't want to do it but I just cannot dump it all on Ben. She was a very heavy smoker, and I am not kidding when I say the house wasn't cleaned in 20 years. (Not that I've seen it, but Ben was there last spring to pick up Grandpa's ashes from her and he attests that the house still looks like the set of the Addams Family, complete with black cobwebs hanging down, books piled everywhere, and still hasn't otherwise changed a bit since I was in kindergarten and Ben still wore diapers.) I'm going to need a gas mask or something to go in there.
Wishing won't change anything, but how I wish I'd been born into a normal family.