Debra Garza passed away suddenly on December 28th, 2021 at Saint Francis Hospital at the age of 61. She is survived by us, her children, Micaela Rena Eckett (22) and Nicolas Garza Eckett (18).

 

Our father is not involved in our lives, and our mom died with very little money and many debts we are now faced with. She did not leave a will, so we are not legally entitled to any of her possessions until we go through probate court. We have long term plans to be able to handle things such as her mortgage, but there are many short term costs of bills and funeral services that we cannot afford. We have had some help from family in covering her immediate funeral and cremation costs, however there are more funeral and memorial costs coming up very soon that we are not going to be able to cover.

 

The $10,000 goal above helps cover her memorial service in her home of Los Angeles, California, the cost of burial for her urn in the plot next to her parents in LA, and hopefully some of the immediate bills such as utilities that we are now left with. Additionally, we need to hire a probate lawyer to help us with her estate, and we don’t know how much that is going to cost.

 

We don’t expect this goal to be met whatsoever. We also aren’t asking that everyone who knows us donates as well. We are grateful for all of the love and support and messages we have received so far, and we never wanted to have to ask anyone for monetary help. To our friends and family, please do not feel obligated to donate if you do not have the means. To strangers, thank you for reading our story. Anything we receive will help us tremendously and will be deeply appreciated by my brother and I.

 

Our mother was the strongest, most loving woman that we knew. Neither of us has yet to comprehend or accept her passing yet, but because of what she taught us, we know that together we will be alright. Any battle can be won when we have each other, as cheesy as that may sound. Thank you on our mother’s behalf. God bless.

 

Debra’s final months:

She faced a short battle with cirrhosis of the liver which was worsened by chronic Crohn’s Disease (which she’d been diagnosed with since she was in her 20s) and chronic Pancreatitis (which she’d been diagnosed with about ten years ago). The liver failure quickly caused issues with her kidney and led to multiple hospitalizations over a short period of time, causing her to have to quit her job, lose to ability to be safely mobile on her own, and become unable to take care of herself for the final few weeks of her life. In the hospital she had hepatic encephalopathy twice which caused her to basically lose all brain function and most of her consciousness. The second time it happened was right before Christmas. The last time we ever spoke to her was on Christmas Day. She was barely able to utter anything until we left, and we heard the final words she would ever say to us: “I love you too.” Two days later, she lost the ability to breathe on her own and was put on a ventilator. After being on the ventilator for 24 hours, she went into cardiac arrest and could not be saved. She was heavily sedated and medicated, so the doctors have assured that she felt no pain when she passed. Due to the pandemic, we were not able to be with her in the hospital the morning she passed (though I visited her every day during visiting hours), but we were able to see her shortly after, which was important for us but at the same time very traumatizing to see. She suffered a lot during her last month, so we are very happy that she didn’t feel any pain when she passed and isn’t in any more pain now. We know she’s in Heaven smiling and smoking Marlboros with her dad.

 

Our story:

I, her daughter Micaela, came to live with her for her final month, assuming I would stay with my mom and my brother until she could take care of herself again. My brother works a minimum wage job, so he couldn’t be home with her all day. I recently quit my job and had been doing a small amount of freelance work remotely, but was in the process of finding a full time job near my apartment in New York City. In hindsight, I am very grateful that I hadn’t found a job yet and was able to spend the last month with my mom, despite the financial stress it has now put on me. Due to my mom’s passing, I am now going to be living in her house in Connecticut with my brother, where I will hopefully find a small job to hold me over while I fix the house up so that we can sell it. Our joint wages should be able to cover the bare minimum bills we are left with until we inherit our mom’s estate. After everything goes through probate, we anticipate most of her debts will be covered.