I may have sealed my own fate by allowing myself to be a lawyer and a caregiver. People really like that stuff. One way or another, they are going to find a use for me. My sister is now in the process of settling her aunt’s estate and she needs a lawyer who understands estates and the legal ramifications of former caregiving. She took care of this Aunt for many years. Both because she’s her Aunt and because the Aunt successfully alienated every single person in her life. My sister is now left with a miniscule estate to administer to pay back the state where her aunt had nursing home assistance and get all her other bills taken care of. Sounds easy, right? Nope, this Aunt left “everything” to my sister AND four other nieces and nephews in a foreign country. Swell. Thanks. Because NOW, rather than wrap this up easily, which a joint bank account would have accomplished, it will require a small mountain of paper work to satisfy the bank, and the state, that no one is getting anything except those who are owed. But Aunt pain-in-the- neck didn’t want a joint bank account, which of course, is absolutely her right. But oh the trouble that now creates. And of course, corresponding with those in the foreign country that they are getting nothing and would they please acknowledge that so that we can all go on with our lives. Hmmmm. Wonder how that will work out?
Tag Archives: Aunt
How to ask for help
I haven’t really mastered the fine art of asking for help, which is probably why so many people keep ASKING ME FOR HELP. After a luscious week of time with my daughters both home from far away, and lots of time with visiting family over the 4th of July holiday, I was pleasantly exhausted and ready for the messy structure of my life. My 90 year old Aunt came to stay with us while all the family was here, and my sainted 84 year-old mother kept Aunt J at her house until I had more room. During that time Aunt J developed an indeterminate pain to go along with the continuing pain from her shingles that I discovered on her last visit three months ago. Ultimately, my Mom determined that a walker was in order, and it seems to have done the trick to keep Aunt J upright, balanced, and less whiney(also wine seems to help). We did a mani-pedi day for all the ladies as a treat, and now I pay the price. This morning, as I try to get back to work, laundry, phone calls, grocery shopping, appointment-making, etc., Aunt J comes downstairs with a finger the size of a sausage. WHAT??? The only thing we can think of is that she got nicked at the salon and has an infection. She was treating it herself, apparently, with Band-Aids and Neosporin. So off to the clinic we go, the walker, the Aunt, and the sausage finger. The very sweet doctor(who happened to be the shingles doctor as well) lances her finger, squeezes out all “the badness” as Aunt J calls it, and puts on a Band-Aid and Neosporin and gives us a prescription for antibiotics. But wait my cell phone is ringing and the number is eerily familiar……
“Hello?”
“Cathy?”
“Yes?”
“This is your brother-in-law’s caregiver. We are pretty sure he has a urinary tract infection”,
Yup…. you just gotta laugh.