Funeral arrangement and household assistance

Hello,

My name is Tashira McCoy and my mother Tracy Johnson passed away in the early morning hours of Thursday, June 29th, 2023. My mother has had a pretty extreme track record when it comes to illnesses. In 2008 she suffered from the complications of a subarachnoid brain hemorrhage, which had her in a coma for a couple of weeks. The most peculiar thing about it though, was that her eyes would be closed shut and the doctor would come in and call her name and would not get a response, then my aunt would do the same still no response. However when I said "Mommy" her eyes would open up real wide and then close back. We did this a couple of times just to make sure it was not a fluke. My mother always fought to come back to me, her love for me put doctors' medical hypotheses to shame. She recovered from that and we went on with our lives. Then in August of 2015, due to a pulmonary embolism caused by her sickle cell disease, she suffered over 30 mini-strokes that left her in a coma and on a ventilator for 3 months. All of her doctors were telling me that she would not make it through and if she did she would not be who she used to be and that she would never be able to live on her own again or take care of herself. On the day that I was going to allow them to take her off of the ventilator, the neurologist on her case came into the room and said that he wanted to try putting a trach in her neck, to see if that would help because it would allow more oxygen to go to her brain. He also said he did not know if it would work or not, but he wanted to try and at that point, I did not have anything to lose so I allowed it. Two days after the trach was put in, my mother began to become more alert, trying to speak, recognizing myself and other family members, blowing kisses at me and mouthing Muah! This is something that she had done with me since I was a baby and it was such a joy and a blessing to have her do that again because I went without it for months. We went through occupational, physical and cognitive therapy. I resigned from my job to assist her because she needed full-time around-clock care. I assisted her in learning how to walk again, talk again, and use the restroom on her own, she had to relearn all the everyday things that healthy people take for granted daily. Between 2015 and 2017, while going through the rehabilitation we went through being evicted and had to stay at an extended stay for a couple of weeks It took some time and we both had many stressful moments but at the end of her rehabilitation, she made a full recovery. She was my walking miracle. There were lots of long and sleepless nights from falls or incontinence incidents in the middle of the night, and a lot of tears but we made it through. She was able to go back to work, as was I and we returned to our lives. By 2018, we were back to dominating the world as we liked to say. However, towards the end of 2020, she began to have Sickle Crises more frequently, and they were so bad that she was always admitted to the hospital and each crisis was a 4-day minimum hospital stay. She began to have really bad pain in her right knee and hip even when her body was not in crisis, and that's when we found out that she developed Avascular Neurosis which exasperated her sickle cell and rheumatoid arthritis, which made her physically unable to work. We finally find out that the crisis was becoming so frequent and painful because of Avascular Neurosis, which is when the cells begin to eat away at the bone from the inside. So combined with the sickle cell, the sickled cells would clump together to further assist with attacking the same areas as the avascular Neurosis, causing further degeneration of bone. She also began to have blood clots. There was one in her lung one hospital visit, one in her leg on another and one in her arm on a different visit. Subsequently, she had to be put on blood thinners, and each prescription cost $510. In the beginning, she was able to receive them because she was working at Amazon and had health insurance through them, but due to the repeated hospital visits she had to go out on disability and once her short-term disability ended, all of her health care benefits ended as well, as any life insurance she had set aside for me to take care of her final arrangements and to at least leave me something behind. Amazon cuts off benefits after short-term disability and does not offer it for long-term disability and denied her claim for it. Before all of this happened she was working at Amazon and as soon as her short-term disability was over they took away all of her benefits and denied her long-term disability saying that the Avascular Necrosis was a pre-existing condition which it was not. My mother went two years without an income and was not able to pay the premiums, there is no life insurance to help with her final burial arrangements or anything for me to handle her final wishes and business. Before she passed she was in the middle of repealing it even in the middle of the sickle cell crisis, the blood clots, and her steady health decline. For two and a half years my mother dealt with frequent sickle cell crises, blood clots, and the degeneration of the bones in her body,all the while appealing her long-term disability while dealing with multiple hospital stays and constant pain. However, she kept fighting until she couldn't anymore. On the morning of Saturday, June 24th, I woke up to my mother in a very confused state of mind, it took several minutes for her to tell me the correct date and day of the week. I told her we should go to the hospital, but she begged and pleaded with me saying she did not want to be in the hospital again and that she was just tired and needed some rest. The next day I woke up and she was more confused. I attempted to take her to the hospital myself but she was unable to sit or stand, she could not even hold on to her walker, so I called the paramedics. I met them at the hospital and they told me that it looks like she has sepsis which is a blood infection, and confusion is one of the symptoms she was having, test came back negative for any bacteria in her blood or urine. They also took a CAT scan of her brain and an EEG and both did not show anything peculiar. They did not perform an MRI when she first arrived because they are expensive and my mother only had Medicaid insurance and the MRI team is only at the hospital (Presbyterian Novant) during the week, but her cognitive state continued to decline. By that Monday she no longer recognized me and was mistaking me for my grandmother, there was nothing that I could do.Tuesday night they had to put her in restraints and have a sitter with her for 24 hours a day because she kept trying to get out of the bed and pull out her catheter and IV even though she could not walk, but she did not understand that. She did not know where she was or who even I was. On Tuesday I finally spoke to the neurologist who after caring for her since Sunday decided that they would have to sedate her in order to get an MRI because it was obvious at that point that something was extremely wrong. Even though I was telling both nurses and doctors about her health history they kept telling me it was a blood infection, until they realized the mental decline was real and ongoing. The neurologist scheduled the MRI and Lumbar Pncture for 2 pm Wednesday. On Wednesday at about noon, I received a call from an ICU nurse that my mother's heart had stopped and that they were doing chest compressions and that I should get to the hospital as soon as possible. As I was arriving I heard on the intercom that there was a code blue on the third floor which was the floor they were leading me to. I asked the nurse to check and the code blue was my mother. In between her heart-stopping those two times, her brain went without oxygen for over 12 minutes. She was on life support and medications were the only thing that were keeping her heart beating. They performed another EEG and the results were that there was no brain activity. The doctor on duty told me that at this point we will just have to see and wait. By 8:00 pm that evening I get a call from the night shift doctor telling me that they are not able to keep her blood pressure above 60 and that there is a very high likely hood that she would not make it through the night. I went up to the hospital to say the last goodbyes to my mother who was my best friend, my heart and my righthand. Even though everything was showing that there was no brain activity I still felt as though she could hear me. I sat down next her, held her hand and I told her I loved her more than life itself and that I knew that she was tired, that she had been fighting for so long and that she did what she needed to do to raise me and that I would be ok, and that it was ok for her to go home and get some rest and peace. Now it could have just been in my mind but I promise her face relaxed a little. I believe she was waiting on me to give her permission to go home and I obliged. I had to put in a DNR order in case her heart stopped again because I knew that she would not want to live the rest of her life in that state. My mother was always laughing and talking, she was so fun-loving and loved to laugh and make jokes. She had a fighting spirit that I have never seen and I do not think that I will ever see it again. Even with all the hospital visits back and forth over the last few years she never gave up and she never stopped fighting. Unfortunately this time her body was tired and she just could not pull through this one. God called her home so that she could be at peace and not have to fight anymore. She even got the chance to see that I would be able to take care of myself, with all of the things that she instilled in me and I think that is why she was able to let go. My mother Tracy Johnson, had the greatest laugh in the world, even if you did not know what she was laughing about just hearing it made you laugh. She had a heart made of gold and loved everyone just because they were human. I blame Amazon for not looking into her medical history further, and recognizing that she was the perfect candidate for Long-Term Disability.

However, with that being said, My mother, My Queen, My Lioness, My Best Friend, My sister, My lifeline and My heart deserve to have the going home celebration that she deserves. The complete cremation and urn and use of their space are going to be $2,000 plus tax. If the donations just get to that, it would be a blessing. However, my mom did keep certain things away from me that need to be paid expeditiously, so I am asking for $12,000 all together to be able to finish up her arrangements and be able to take care of all the things that she left thinking that she had more time.

Any amount will help, even if it's $25 at least it's something. I am asking for donations to help me make my mother's homecoming celebration what she deserves for being the best single mother that ever walked the earth.

Thank you for taking the time to read this, and please whatever you can offer will be greatly appreciated.