Mom

Alice at home in our kitchen

On July 11, 2022 my mom died. It was sudden, she had a massive stroke on the 9th and then she was gone. I have been unable to write about this until now. We held her memorial this past Sunday and that has helped a lot.

For having a sudden stroke while driving, my mom was actually really lucky and I actually describe what happened as miraculous. First, she was driving over Highway 253, where she easily could have gone over a cliff and been lost for hours. Instead, she was able to pull off the road in Bell Valley - way off, it turns out, so that people stopped to help her. The first person on the scene was a flight nurse who was driving over the hill to work; she likely was the last person to speak to my mom - she asked her what happened and mom said she didn’t feel well and pulled over. The second and third people were our own Angela De Witt and Clay Eubank, both on separate trips over the hill. Mom was rapidly air lifted to Santa Rosa Memorial, where they administered the anti-coagulant. Unfortunately, instead of reversing her stroke, it caused a bleed in her brain. Memorial then sent mom to Mills Peninsula Hospital in Burlingame, where they have a stroke specialty center.

My husband and I had taken Cookie, the motor home, to the coast for the weekend. I had a few bicycle related events on both Saturday and Sunday, so we thought we would enjoy a brief getaway. I was out of cell range all of Saturday morning and most of the afternoon and evening. I had about an hour of service and I did get calls from the AVVFD, but I was in the shower and no one answered when I called back. Thus it was not until about 7:30 PM that evening when we got into cell range again that I was called by my sister in law asking if I knew where my mom was. While I was on this call, I received another, out of area call - this turned out to be the doctor at Mills Peninsula.

The rest of that evening were a whirlwind of packing up the motor home in record time and flying, as much as one can do, back to the Valley. We decided to pile my brother, sister in law and nephew into Cookie and to make the drive to Burlingame in her. It turned out to be yet another part of this whole miracle. Without Cookie to stay in, we likely would have been in separate cars driving to Burlingame and later, trying to find hotel rooms in the middle of the night, none of which were very close to this hospital. Instead, we were together on this weird voyage through the Bay Area in the middle of a Saturday night and when it came time to crash, we had beds.

I want to give a huge shout out to everyone at Mills Peninsula Hospital. Except for one uptight security guard, everyone there was incredibly helpful, kind and went above and beyond to help us through this ordeal. We arrived around 1:30 AM. From the emergency room entrance we were allowed not only to bring in three more people than they normally would allow in, we also could bring in my minor nephew. Once in the ICU, they allowed all five of us to come in and look at mom through the glass windows separating her from the general population - because, to add insult to injury, mom had tested positive for Covid 19. We do not know if this was a positive from her having had the virus in May or if in fact she had a new infection - the scans of her lungs indicated there may have been a new infection. Covid may also have been the cause of the clot that caused the stroke and ultimately her death; we will never know for certain.

After we visited mom we met with the doctor who explained what had happened and how mom had ended up at this particular hospital. He also let us know that they wanted to do more scans the following morning when the neurologist would be in and that we would do best to get some rest and come back in the late morning to get a new briefing. So that is what we did - we found a quiet, relatively dark part of the parking lot (we had been assured we could park in the lot for a few days) and we got a few hours of sleep; it was about 4:00 AM by this time.

The next morning we found a sweet cafe and I will always remember the kindness of our waitress. She quickly grasped why we were there and took extra care of us. We then headed back up to the ICU and the briefing. At this point, we were allowed in two at a time to see mom. We were allowed to suit up - gowns, caps, masks, face shields, and gloves - and be in the room with mom. It was hard to see her like that - she was not aware that we could tell, but she grasped our hand in her good one and we talked and talked to her.

The briefing was thorough and the doctor was patient and kind. He explained what they had found, shared images with us so we could fully see what had happened, he explained what would happen and gave us the information to make the decisions we needed to. Ultimately, knowing her wishes, we asked that she be extubated and that she be given palliative care only. We were told that she likely would not last a week.

The next hours we spent taking turns with her or trying to sleep or getting food. I think Sunday night we all got some sleep just because we were exhausted. By this time she had been moved to a regular room though the Covid protocols were still in place and we could only be two at a time.

On Monday we spent more time with mom and it was in the middle of the day, while Van and I were with her, that she took her last breaths. We had found a way to get music into the room and we were chatting and I did a crossword puzzle “with” her. It was very peaceful and we were just happy to have been able to be there with her at the end.

The following days were awful. A lot of time was spent making calls to family, spending time together, crying and trying to wrap our heads around this. The hardest time for me was dinner, which had been our time together, when we would share a meal and often a television show. I broke down regularly each evening. It was about two weeks later that we took the trip I outlined in “travels with Cookie” - it was time to get out of the house and out of our routines and try to come to grips with this new reality.

The past two weeks have been hard - first mom’s cat had to be put down. That brought up all the grief all over again, plus it left mom’s rooms feeling even more empty. Then there was all of the coordination for the memorial service. In the end, it was beautiful. I have so many people to thank who helped that whole day be what it was; it was a wonderful way to remember a truly wonderful woman. And with that behind us, I do feel like we can move forward; it won’t be painless, but there is that sense of closure that is much needed.