The Caregiver Chronicles: True Stories of Life with Mom

This year has been a hot mess.  COVID19 has not gone away and in fact is on the upswing again.  Campus did make it to our predetermined face to face stop point which was amazing.  We did not have a massive outbreak throughout the system really.  We did have people get sick but to my knowledge we haven't lost anyone on campus due to COVID.  I am counting down my days till my quarantine ends.  Thankfully it started as we were already planning to be home so next week when classes start again I'll be in the clear.  Navigating this with the nice lady who lives here has been tricky as I thought it would be.  Mostly because I still have to interact with her a bit to make sure she's eating, has the groceries she needs and gets her insulin once a day.  Insulin you may be asking.  Well yes because in addition to my close contact, we are almost four weeks out from mom's last hospital stay.  She's fine and I am not sure she'll need the insulin ...

As someone who works in academia, this time of year is usually a mix of trying desperately to relax and preparation for the next term.  It looks like we have two or three weeks off but we only do in theory.  Meetings will start again shortly after the first of the year.  Students will be clamoring for course content and we will want to go back to sleep.  Doing all of that while taking care of another human being, other than yourself, is a different kind of challenge.  Thanksgiving was our normal standoff of well we've eaten let's go shopping--nope.  Christmas was great but I realized that was because I spent most of the day doing things I enjoy.  I woke up and baked and made Belgian waffles until midday when I switched gears to make dinner.  I gave mom her literally hard to find gifts and some other things she said she needed last minute.  All was well until about 8 that night when she asked for a gift she can't actually describe well was....