Many of you know that Packrat and I raised our niece, Kali, from age 14 to adulthood. Last week Kali’s mother died of COVID-19.
My sister-in-law was a warm, funny, kind person. She was such an optimist that she got married four times. Even when she wasn’t able to take care of her daughters, she made sure they knew they were loved. I see parts of her in the woman that Kali has become: caring, empathetic and idealistic.
Because someone always wants to ask: yes, my sister-in-law had underlying medical problems. That doesn’t make the time stolen from her any less precious. And the question is often motivated by the idea that we could just quarantine vulnerable people like her, and everyone else’s life could go back to normal. It doesn’t work that way.
When my sister-in-law got sick, her nursing home had already been on lockdown for a month. She didn’t leave her room, and no one was allowed in except staff. Which means that someone on the staff had the virus without symptoms, and unknowingly passed it along.
I hate the isolation that this disease forces onto people. I hate that Kali and her sister couldn’t be there to hold their mother’s hand, and the best Kali could get was a few minutes of facetime. I hate that Packrat and I can’t go across town to give Kali a hug. I hate that we can’t have the whole family together to ease each other’s grief. I hate having to hope that my sister-in-law was too drugged on morphine to know that she had to die alone.
More than anything, I hate knowing that mine won’t be the last diary like this. Please do everything you can to stay safe — not just the individual precautions, but pushing our leaders to do the right thing. My sister-in-law deserved better. My family deserved better, and so do all of yours.
UPDATE: Thank you everyone for the kind and supportive comments. I tried to respond to everyone individually, but am headed off to bed now. As I said, I don’t think I’ll be the last person here at dailykos to go through this, and it’s good to know that the community is always here to support each other — even if we have to do it from a distance.