Peg Leg

I sat on the couch.  My doctor texted me a few hours after my surgery to make sure I had gotten the opiods filled.  I hadn't.
"Hilary, please get them filled.  It is going to really start hurting tonight.  You have to get ahead of it."  he texted.
Alec went back to the pharmacy and got them filled. 

Moving around was incredibly difficult, even with crutches and a knee scooter.   I watched Martha Raddatz stroll by on the news.  

"Look at you!"  I thought.

"So spry, really moving along on TWO legs!"  

It already seemed novel and kind of athletic.  

Two days after the surgery my mom's dog had an appointment for his shots.  I had really overestimated what I was going to be able to do post-surgery and Alec ended up picking him up from the boarder's house and taking him to the vet by himself.  Hunter, my mom's dog, got scared at the vet and bit Alec.  The vet recommended that I take Hunter to a specialist the following week to discuss having a mass removed from his neck.  She said it could be malignant.  That it might spread.  I felt terrible for him. I also hate the specialist-vet.  The last time I was there they told me there was no hope for Lola.  

My mom started texting that she was being released from the physical therapy rehab.  I was shocked.  They were supposed to keep her two weeks but it had only been maybe a week.  She had spent two weeks in Grady before that.  I layed on my bed, filing a Medicare appeal.  Around the 25th, she announced that she was home.  I wanted to keep her dog at the boarder because my mom had been so unstable, but she had another dog coming for Thanksgiving week.  

My sister and I picked Hunter up a week to the day after my surgery, on the 26th.  The boarder had bathed him and washed his bed.  It made me really happy.  We took him to the specialist about the mass on his neck.  The specialist recommended a CT scan the following Tuesday and surgery that Friday.  Later that day, my sister and I returned to my mom's house with her dog.  My sister texted me from inside the house.  

"She bought booze.  She's on the floor again."

I heard yelling inside the house.

I clawed my way out of the car and hopped around on one leg, dragging the knee scooter out of the backseat while clinging to the side of the car.  When I walked in, my mom was laying on the floor again,  half dressed and drunk.  She couldn't stand.  She had literally ordered booze to be delivered while coming home from the hospital on the 25th.  I called 911.  I stood on the porch, one leg on the knee scooter, waiting for the paramedics.

I noticed them looking at my cast propped up on the scooter when they pulled up.

"It's not for me, she's inside!"  I called.

"We were the ones that picked her up last time...."  one of them mentioned.

The last time, on November 2nd.

They got my mom packed up and took her away.  

Later that night, she texted.

"Pick me up."  she demanded.

Grady was releasing her.

"Mom, I can't.  I just had surgery, I can't walk, I can't drive."  I responded.

A nurse texted me from my mom's phone, again demanding that I pick her up.

My mom told me to call her an Uber.  I did.  She didn't go out to meet it and he drove away.

Finally, Alec and I went to go get her.

We drove through the tunnel by Grady where the homeless people sleep.  It was freezing.  Any one of them could have been my mom at this point.

Alec went inside and found my mom while I waited in the car because I can't walk.  We left the knee scooter in our backyard so that there would be room for my mom in the backseat.  As the nurse loaded my mom into the car, my mom snarled at her in a sharp, mean tone because the nurse told her to put her seatbelt on.

"DON'T TELL ME WHAT TO DO."  she hissed.

"MOM."  I warned, staring forward.  

We drove to her house.  I didn't want to send Alec in there to get her inside, but I couldn't do it myself.  

"Don't let her boss you around."  I texted.

Alec finally came out of the house.

"She made me lock Hunter in her room.  He was whimpering."

I texted my mom over and over again while Alec drove us home, begging her to let Hunter out of the room.  She wouldn't answer my texts.  She could blow up my phone when she needed a ride, but couldn't be bothered otherwise.  

By my second follow up with the surgeon, I knew there was no way I could return to work less than two weeks after my surgery.  I was not allowed to carry ANY weight on my left foot.  My knee scooter was a rickety mess and even an uneven surface would send me flying to the floor.  I got some doctor's notes and began the process of asking for more time off.  

Alec flew to Connecticut on the 27th.  I binge-watched Yellowjackets, creeping myself out and worrying about Hunter and my mom.  My mom's phone had been going dead during this whole ordeal and I couldn't track where she was.  I sent four chargers to her house.  Thanksgiving morning, my sister broke down and went over there.  She found my mom lying naked on the floor, sloshing around in Creme de Menthe, the only booze left in her house.  They had a horrible fight.  My mom kept instructing my sister to call Grady again.  My sister told her to do it herself and left.

We wanted to have a decent Thanksgiving, but everyone was sad and stressed.  I made three dishes and it completely exhausted me.  My sister was cold and shaking.  My mom started texting late afternoon, saying she was back at Grady.  I just wanted her to leave us alone.  Hadn't she ruined enough?  My niece slept over and the two of us stayed up half the night, watching Yellowjackets in the dark of my living room.  

The following Friday, my sister and her husband visited Hunter multiple times.  By Saturday morning, I had a new dog boarder and my sister and I drove to Riverdale, an area about thirty minutes south from where we live to bring Hunter to her home.  

My mom remained at Grady for an undetermined period of time.