Taking Grandma Home

The past year has been a hard one for my family. It all started at the end of May of last year, 2017, the night after I received my Bachelor's Degree from CSUN. After helping my mother take care of her parents since 2010, my grandfather passed away. It was not only sudden and unexpected, but it was also the first close death we had ever experienced as a family. Over the span of the next few weeks, my mother and I planned two wakes and two funerals (in California and in Florida, my grandparents' home) and although insurance covered the basic funeral costs, I spent the last of my money, mainly student loans leftover from school, on our travel and other related expenses - totalling roughly $1500. It left us in a hard place financially, but we were hopeful to recoup as things finally settled down for us to grieve.

Sometime in November of last year, my grandmother was admitted into the hospital due to issues with her dialysis access - a common problem in renal patients that a relatively routine surgical procedure could fix. Upon developing complications from this procedure and lack of proper care in the hospital, she also began to develop more problems than she initially came in with, making it harder for her to recover from the original issue. She remained hospitalised for sometime, in and out of the ICU. This was all very hard on my mother, who began to spend nights at the hospital with my grandmother in order to be her voice when she couldn't speak for herself.

During all of this, my own father, who had been diagnosed with cancer, had a surgical procedure in order to remove the mass. At the beginning of January this year, he developed pneumonia and was put on life support. Although his pneumonia was able to be treated and he was taken off of life support, the cancer had progressed. My dad passed away three weeks ago on February 10th, 2018 in Missouri. In the midst of our shock, my mom was eager to find a way for us to go to the Midwest for the first time, so that I could see my dad one last time. Although my grandmother was still in the hospital, she seemed to be improving, so we planned the trip. Still not recovered financially from my grandfathers services, this trip was entirely funded by a loan. It wasn't the best option, but we were just thankful that we had the option.

Upon arriving back in California from my father's funeral, it was only just under two days before my mom received a call early in the morning that my grandmother's heart stopped and they had to perform CPR. They were able to get a heartbeat back, but the CPR had tired her out. In another unexpected manner, my grandmother's condition had changed. On February 24th, 2018, my grandmother passed away. Only two weeks after my father and 9 months after my grandfather.

I am making this GoFundMe for my mom and I. After a service in California, we are taking my grandmother home to Florida to be with my grandfather and her family. I am currently in school, so I am not working enough to contribute much of anything to the trip. My mom is now figuring out finances not only for the funerals, but for bills that need to be taken care of on my grandparents behalf. And after the travelling expenses from the past year, as recent as last month, we are cleaned out. If you could contribute absolutely anything to our travel costs, we would appreciate it more than you know. We ask for your help monetarily, but also spiritually and emotionally to help us through this difficult time.

Please and thank you so much. And thank you for taking the time to read this.