Mother’s Day…

My therapist said to write instead of buying fancy purses to mask coping skills. So here I go:

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I placed my mom on hospice care because transporting her back and forth to doctors had become harder on her than the actual medical care she received once we got there. The reward simply wasn’t worth the burden on her body anymore.

By “medical care,” I mean sitting in an exam room while a doctor stared at a computer screen, typed notes, asked a few questions, and sent us home exhausted. It would take mom days to recover from an outing.

Ironically, I had called her general practitioner a week before her appointment specifically to ask for help getting hospice involved after discussing it with Mom’s pulmonologist. I thought I was doing the responsible thing. Proactive. Adult. Organized.

Proactive, right?

Instead, I got a return call from his nurse saying, “Doctor wants to discuss that with you in person at your upcoming appointment.”

I was so stunned I honestly couldn’t speak for a second.

When she followed up with, “Do you understand doctor feels this should be an in-person conversation?” I finally said, “Yeah, I’ve come to expect nothing from this practice, and that’s exactly what I got.”

Then I hung up.

Because seriously… what part of “I’m calling to ask for hospice care” screams, “Please drag my elderly mother with late-stage COPD into the office”?

Later, the doctor apologized and said it was “poor communication” and that he “didn’t understand my mom’s condition.”

Maybe returning my original call would’ve helped clear that up.

The hardest part of that appointment wasn’t even the frustration. It was watching my mom say goodbye to office staff who had known her for more than thirty years. There was something painfully final about it. I refused to even look at the nurse who had previously threatened us over the phone with, “Doctor won’t prescribe medication if you don’t come in.”

Nope. She didn’t earn a goodbye.

My original goal with hospice was simple: comfort.

And honestly? It has helped.

But apparently hospice is one of those words that makes people wildly uncomfortable. I’ve gotten pushback from people who care about my mom. I’ve had moments where I was made to feel like I was somehow “giving up” on her or speeding something along.

Let me be very clear.

My mother has late-stage COPD.

Hospice didn’t create that reality.

At the time we enrolled her, neither I nor the hospice team believed she was actively dying. We thought we had time. Maybe months. Maybe longer.

Then this week happened.

A sharp decline.
Sleeping almost constantly.
Confusion.
Labored breathing.
And me sitting quietly nearby watching every breath while she sleeps close to twenty hours a day.

It’s strange how quickly caregiving shifts from schedules and medications to simply listening for breathing.

I knew this day would come eventually. Intellectually, I understood it. But understanding something and living it are two entirely different things.

And maybe this is just a bad week.

God, I hope it is. I got her the best Mother’s Day gift and I want to share it with her.

Say some prayers because we need them.