And Then There’s the Money

The author in her youth with her family: James Sr., Barbara, Jimmy and Missy

Today Missy and I went to look at a new nursing facility. It is close to our home. Missy has so many medical bills and  she hasn’t worked for the last few years because she is taking care of me. We would of been OK but Missy’s MS drugs are over 3500.00 a month, her insurance will not pay because they are considered preventive, so for 3 years she has paid for them. Then when her insurance denied her surgeries because of the cancer clause. We were up a creek.

I am going to have to move to a nursing facility, not real soon, but soon. The place was nice, all the people were nice and smiled at me.  Afterward, we went to McDonald’s and took our lunch to the river. We sat in the car and watched the barges go by. I started crying, and told Missy,  “Don’t make me go yet. I will be good, I can stay by myself all day till you get home. I will be OK.”

I told her I was scared to go there and be with strangers, that it wasn’t time yet, I was still me. Missy started crying and told me that I didn’t have to go yet, that she would work something out, that she never wants me to be scared. She told me that if she had to sell her car, and all the furniture in the house that I didn’t have to go yet…that she would work something out. I believe her, she told me that I was the most important thing in their lives.

Missy reminded me today when she was little, I had to work so much, my husband worked out of town most of the time so my mother cared for her. When my mother would go on a trip I would take Missy to my mother-in-law’s house in Illinois. Missy hated it there. She remembered me taking her there one summer and her crying telling me she didn’t want to go, that she could stay by herself till I got home from work, that she would be good. I remember crying with her and telling her we will work it out, don’t cry. I turned the car around and we came home…we worked it out. She kept telling me all the way home today,

We will work it out, don’t cry Mommy. We will work it out…I promise.