Final Arrangement & Expenses Support for Ms. Mel

My family & I would first off like to thank everyone for the prayers, calls, texts, visits & emotional support being shown to us for my sweet Mom, Melanie Lamb Baugher. There is absolutely no way we can ever thank everyone enough. Ms. Mel, as almost everybody knows her as, worked at the Eldorado School systems as a middle school & elementary school librarian and then as a Pre-K aide until her retirement in 2019. 

 

As most of you know, Mom has been battling Lewy Body Dementia with Parkinson’s since this past January when she was “officially” diagnosed by her Neurologist in St. Louis, but had began showing some signs of forgetfulness & confusion off & on for a few years before the diagnosis, but there really wasn’t anything that alarmed us for a long time until we all, even Mom, eventually began to notice something was just not right. Fast forward to now, suddenly, a very rapid & aggressive decline just within the past month (September 2021). Then, just this past week, it had been getting more & more difficult every day to change the wound bandage for that bedsore, to treat it & clean her because she was so tender & it hurt her when we had to roll her, to get her to eat, to drink or to coax her to swallow her crushed medications we’d mix with applesauce or yogurt, until finally, she just couldn’t do it anymore. So this past Tuesday, my sweet Dad, myself, and my brother Nathan, decided that the time that we all had been dreading had finally come & made the emotional & difficult decision to place her with Hospice of Southern IL for her comfort & care.

 

Mom had a life insurance policy but it doesn’t go into effect to receive benefits until January. Unfortunately, we do not have that much time left with her. After Dad & I met with the funeral home to make the pre-arrangements, we got the estimation that her funeral will cost approximately $8500. Dad had just planned on making payments on it....I was hoping we could ask upon our friends, family & those who would like to help out to donate to help ease some of that financial burden for my Dad. My Dad has worked so hard his whole life to provide for his family. He was a bricklayer for 50 years, never asking for anything, just kept working until he had to finally retire & turned around to start caring for Mom...and he does it all unconditionally & with absolutely no expectations.

 

We will never be able to thank everyone for all the love & support being shown to us and to Mom during this difficult time. But all we can say is “Thank You!” from the bottom of our hearts.