In loving memory of Penny Carpenter

They say to make these short so people will be more likely to read them and not get bored and scroll away. For those people, here's the condensed version:

My Momma, Penny Carpenter, lost her battle with lung Cancer on 1/28 leaving myself and my StepFather Skip Carpenter with her final expenses. Momma had no income, life insurance, savings, etc. I've been out of work to be home with them and take on the role of her primary caregiver since December. We are financially crippled at this time and asking for any financial assistance anyone could possibly offer. Thank you!

For those who would care to know more of her story:

My Momma kept getting sick. Pneumonia. Back and forth to the Dr or the ER when it would get really bad. Admitted a couple of times. Pneumonia, just takes a long time to heal from. December of 2023, admitted with Pneumonia. Starts to consistently have low blood pressures. Comes home a few days later, as usual. We both catch the Flu in spring 2024, both diagnosed with Pneumonia. Takes me a month to get over it. Momma isn't getting over it.

Skip has a heart attack, gets admitted, treated, I pick him up and bring him home. A few days later, he takes Momma to the ER while I'm at work, Pneumonia, admit her.

Finally some scans are done and we're told they'd like to biopsy one lung because there looks to be debris of some type in one of them. They say she needs a colonoscopy and endoscopy at some point as well because with her low blood counts/pressures they believe she may have internal bleeding going on somewhere. She was up walking and talking with blood pressures in the 40's at this point. A GREAT day was 80/60ish.

We show up for the biopsy spring 2024. Stage 3 Lung Cancer. Bottom lobe of left lung was collapsed so he added a stent in it and regained 3 of 5 airways that had collapsed. We never even left the building and had to wait for results. The surgeon came out of the OR and followed her to her recovery room and waved us in. I will never, in a million years, forget how small her little voice sounded when she said, "I have Cancer?" And I had to look at her and confirm the horror, "Yes Momma, I'm sorry".

Now, here's where you'd think that all these Dr appointments would start happening and treatment options would be discussed. There's where you'd be thinking about our healthcare system some years ago. Now, if you don't do most of the legwork yourself, you're not going to get anywhere.

We finally get her in with Oncology in Easton only for her to be chuckled at, belittled and not listened to in the least during that appointment. We then waited weeks for them to respond back to us on her next steps towards treatment options she had chosen to pursue. During these weeks, the surgeon who did her biopsy called several times to check on her. She expressed her exasperation with the team in Easton and he asked her to please give him an hour and he could have her scheduled for initial intake to start scans and treatments.

We moved her care to Salisbury. She underwent scans, had a port placed in her chest and started both Chemotherapy and Radiation treatments. Chemo every Monday and Radiation every day Monday-Friday. The Doctors told us the treatments were working! We couldn't believe it. Momma was going to get better. She was losing weight, tired, vomiting, in tons of pain but that's par for the course on the treatments...right?

By November she had to have a chest tube inserted because of fluid build up in the left lung. I could write a novel on how they inserted it then left it there and didn't drain her lung until her Radiologist called him asking when that was going to get done since it was filling up. I get a frantic call the day before Thanksgiving at work. Hi, we can't find a home health agent willing to travel to Linkwood to drain your Mothers lung so can you come now to our office and we'll teach you how?

Wait a minute. You told me to talk my Momma into this chest tube because it would require home health to drain it twice weekly keeping Momma more comfortable and not need needles through her back and it would give me peace of mind and she'd be better managed and NOW it's my problem?

The Doctor who put the drain in had to accomodate and come to the Cancer center and drain it on her next Chemo day.

Meanwhile, I get a notice from our Mobile Home Park. We need to fix our roof or they will begin proceedings to evict us from our home. I email that we please need more time as my Momma is healing from the chest tube and still going to treatments 5 days a week and it's Thanksgiving. We receive extra time.

She finished treatments at the tip of December 2024. Fantastic! Brings home her little certificate of completion and happily doesn't have to return until mid January for new scans to see what kind of continuing therapy she'll need. Her last appointment with her Oncology team mid-Dec, she brings up a new pain up under her ribs. He says, your lungs sound okay so if the pain gets worse just go to the ER.

Two days later...she's in the ER in Cambridge. They tell her the tumor in her lung is bigger, not smaller as her Radiologist is telling us. Doesn't make sense, then we're told they're probably older scans as Cambridge wouldn't have access to any of Salisburys imaging. Momma comes home. She starts being unable to walk much, the pain getting worse and never going away. We're all waiting for phone calls from her Oncology team as Cambridge called to make them aware of ER visit.

Two days before Christmas, Momma wants to go to the ER in Salisbury to be closer to her Doctors and get some answers. The last thing her Radiologist had said to us was that he was very pleased with where we were in her treatments, that the tumor was shrinking and she wasn't going to need any operation to remove it. But now everyone is away on Christmas break and we're getting no answers.

Here's where things get really fuzzy. It's Christmas at this point. She's telling me that I'm fine to carry on with my shopping and Christmas plans because at most she'll be there a couple days and get blood and fluids and IV iron and vitamins. I even ask if she wants us to bring Christmas presents to the hospital. No, she'll be home in a day anyway.

Christmas morning I had to tell my quadriplegic Brother that our Mother had Cancer. I looked him in his face and told him it would be okay. That Momma finished all her treatments and that she would return in January for new scans and we'd take whatever came and get through it together. Momma was trying to avoid telling him as he had been abandoned by his wife in a Baltimore hospital with a fractured femur and had just come home to live with our Father and StepMother. She didn't want to worry him on top of everything.

Couple days later I talk to her on the phone in the morning before work and ask if she's sure she doesn't want me to make plans to come there after work. She replied, Yeah, maybe you should make plans to come up. So, that was the plan. Go to work then head up to see her and talk to her Doctor/Nurse. Take her Christmas present to her. The black sweater dress she had been wanting.

Next thing I know later at work, Skip is calling me crying saying Mom is unresponsive and he's gotta put her in Hospice NOW. I rush to the hospital. Momma is doubled over in half. She can barely sit up. Cannot stand or move much further than the potty. She's on Morphine. Seeing rats and traffic in the floor under her bed. Begging me to take her home. I had SO many questions.

For the immediate health and benefit of my Momma, we signed Hospice papers. That was the only way to get her medicated to a comfortable enough state in a short amount of time. Her blood pressures were too low for the ER to put her on enough meds to be effective. Hospice could medicate her comfortably until we could arrange her to come home and pass.

COME HOME AND PASS. But I just said she finished her treatments and things were supposed to be getting better?! Right. Exactly. It took a nurse and then her charge nurse to pour through all of Moms charted information from her care team to piece the fragments of it all together to try and bridge the gap between the tumor is shrinking and end of life care.

They lied. I'm sure they found some slice of the tumor that shrank so they could make a valid argument that they told the truth but listen, Cancer is big money. They sucked her state insurance for what they could and then she was left to rot away. All in all, they let her run out of all pain medication and go through withdrawals twice. They couldn't give her enough pain medication to even get her pain under a 7/10 due to her low blood pressures, insurance not covering certain meds. She suffered. Greatly.

She had Nurses who thought we were forcing her to come to treatments and talked to us awful. She had Doctors who looked at her chart, saw the Cancer and literally asked her if she'd just rather go home and die than get looked at in the ER because they hated wasting their time with Cancer patients.

She also had us behind her at every step trying to hold all accountable for their actions, both good or bad. We tried to advocate for her to the best of our abilities and were honored to be a part of her journey. We brought her home from Coastal Hospice on Friday, January 3rd, 2025 and she took her last breath yesterday Tuesday, January 28th next to myself and her beloved Granddaughter Kaylan. Our home full of her family who loved her beyond measure.

Momma will be cremated tomorrow. In her black sweater dress she asked for for Christmas.

Her final expenses for her cremation total approximately $2200. Her services are being provided by Roman Coale and his wonderful team at Mid Shore Cremation Center.

If you made it this far, thank you. Thank you for taking the time to listen to Momma's story. Thank you for your prayers and wishes and just caring about her and us in general.