I had started working on some posts last month after taking a break and then things just started to come up.
My father had been fighting cancer for several months. A year ago everything was fine - especially considering my parents age. Then as the 2024 progressed it went rapidly downhill. Over the course of six months we went from "something is wrong" to "cancer" to "hospice care" and a hospital bed in the living room as he could no longer climb the stairs. Then in early November he lost consciousness for a few days and left us on a Saturday morning. It's not an easy thing even when you know where things are headed. There's "this is going to happen" and then there is "it's happened" and crossing that boundary is big. I don't just mean myself here - my mom had to deal with this and after being together for over 60 years she gets to contemplate going on alone. It's a hard thing.
Yes, my parents got married a long time ago and stayed together for the whole ride - more than I have managed to do - and that means I have had both parents my whole life and my kids have had all of their grandparents their whole lives until this year. Now in 2024 they have lost both grandfathers which is not a great thing to look back on.
The main outcome of this day-to-day has been that mom needs more help with things, particularly all of the things dad used to handle around the house or with the cars or with the technology side of things. That mainly lands on me and so there has and still is some adjustment to how to handle those things and there are still all of the other things to deal with too - accounts and stuff and what mom wants to do with the house and the rest of her life. These are all new experiences but I'm trying to make it more of a positive by looking ahead to how I (well, me and the wife so "we") can try to make it easier down the road for everyone ourselves. I don't have to like it all but I can at least try to learn something from it.
