LATE BREAKING NEWS

 73 of #100daychallenge

So, here I was, about two hours ago, sitting here feeling pretty chuffed that I had managed to get a post completed in a reasonable fashion. I was about to relax into an hour or so of streaming (Baptiste) when I got a phone call with no id. Normally, I don't answer calls like this, but for some reason, I did. 

It was from the Murray Utah Police telling me that my niece, Anita, had died today.

I am still in shock.

I have just been sitting here, ripping music for Jeanne's wedding, watching Baptiste in a state of unknowing. Will I be able to sleep? Even the sadness has not hit me yet. Anita and I texted every day, sometimes getting in long text streams.

I didn't even go mix a drink although I think the occasion calls for it.

I called my brother David. I think we will be driving to Utah later this week, likely with Janet in tow, if I can find someone to watch the kitties. Anita's surviving sister hated her, so I wrote to Anita's niece and brother-in-law to tell them she had died. 

Anita had a very unhappy life, as did her mother. Generational misery, not because of poverty, but abuse, neglect, and general misguidedness, not to mention oxycontin, although I don't think that is what killed her. I have listed her ailments as best I knew them: lupus, diabetes, some myocardial thing, prolapsed female organs, obesity, edema, cataracts, just to name a few. She was massive depressed (who wouldn't be) and subject to migraines. Being housebound, she had not been able to make actual visits to her doctors and had not seen her cardiologist in over a year.

When her mother died, she took the money she inherited (not much) and moved to Utah as it was cheaper and we all thought she would get support from the Latter Day Saints. Turns out, they weren't so supportive and that she was contemplating leaving the church. She had not been active there pretty much since she moved in 2017 (?). I had been somewhat estranged from her for a few years but re-established contact when my sister died and continued to be in contact while she was getting settled in Utah and beyond. 

Her situation deteriorated over time in Utah and she became increasingly isolated as her health worsened. She almost died a year ago, just when I was about to finish yoga teacher training as I thought I would miss my final. She pulled through, but the year has been nothing but hell.

The rehab facility they put her in was one of those nightmare hellhole places. Even though she was diabetic and ordered to have diabetic meals, she would send me pictures of her meals with cornbread, corn-on-the-cob, mashed potatoes, and fruit punch. I raised a certain amount of hell. Then we got her out of there, but she didn't exactly thrive at home as she needed lots of rehab to get her to be able to walk at all (she could take about three steps with a walker). She had to have people come in to change her diapers a couple of times a day. She had frequent incontinences. She ate crap like tv dinners as she couldn't even get into the kitchen. Hired assistants stole from her. 

According to her, one of these hired people walks on the shady side all the time. But she needed him because he knew how to clean her up and take care of her. She thinks he stole her cat from her and wanted to ransom it. Eventually, they turned it into a shelter and it was returned to her, not in the finest condition. 

She loved her kitty. The worker who bought her groceries found her today. She had been dead for several hours. Rebecca took Katie home for safekeeping. 

Writing this, the sadness begins to creep in. It may be terrible to say, but there is a blessing here. Anita had actually spoken of suicide in the last couple of weeks, although that is not what happened. She knew she wouldn't live long. 

I just didn't know it would be this soon.

Now to bed, perhaps to cry, to figure out how to pay for cremation, what to do with her stuff, what to do with kitties and Mom so that I can go to Salt Lake City with my brother David to settle affairs. Nothing I can do now.