Time Continues

It’s been one and a half weeks since my father died.

It’s been 4.5 months since my mother died.

I last posted on June 29th, 2023. An update post on the continuing saga that I was dealing with. I never expected my father to be gone three days after that post.

Financial

I have dealt with my father’s stuff as best as possible. I did the funeral home with my sister, where I splurged on a nice urn, credit card debt be damned. I did so many phone calls based on places he told me I would need to do just two weeks before his passing. Like the DMV, Comcast/Xfinity, a cell phone account, and the three credit cards (thankfully, I didn’t need the physical cards my brother had stolen from him).

I did hear back from the bank, sort of. Legal is still “reviewing” my documentation. However, I did get a phone call from a man, his role is that of a regional manager, who explained that the way my brother did things with the bank account, my sister and I were completely fucked. That without a will, there’s not much we can do besides haul him to probate court. So I am looking into that. I did get more details of what happened. My father wanted him on the account purely to be able to write checks if my father couldn’t. He was put on the account sometime in 2021, and my father had no idea what secondary meant; he thought it was like an authorized user on a credit card.

I found out the IRA being wiped out had nothing to do with Medicare, it was partly to pay for the facility out of pocket, but it was also used to pay my brother’s bills, tickets, mortgage, etc.

We don’t know if there’s a will; my father said he didn’t remember but that it would be within the paperwork my brother stole if he did have one.

Brother

To be clear, I no longer have it in me to protect my brother. He’s 40 years old now. He chose this path. As much as I worry about his destructive behavior, it doesn’t mean I can let this go. Not yet. It’s too soon after Dad passed away for me to let time heal this.

For those of you who have reached out to me about my brother and if we have heard from him, nope. Nothing. Social Security is getting involved due to the fraud issue with the bank account. That was in part triggered when they found out that all these years the rep payee wasn’t correct, it was never supposed to go to the bank account, it was supposed to go to the facility.

We found one of my dad’s old cell phones, with texts my brother forgot to erase. This is the one I found to be the cruelest, but there were many of them just like this. No wonder he deleted all of his messages from the newer phone.

Finally, after five weeks of dealing with the email service, they approved my documentation and reset the primary email account. It was bittersweet. It meant I could email multiple of his friends, though. I organized the emails into folders and found some Discord accounts he didn’t use, another one he did use, and various other things.

But then the emails from my brother where he discussed his drug usage and drinking while driving (he had a DUI years ago); he put me down repeatedly, put down my uncle and one of my cousins about how much they use him, negative emails about his closest friends, and emails that put down my sister. It was very eye-opening.

Or like this one, which I thought was the worst of the bunch, where my father had been in his facility for over a year and was a wheelchair user.

He was not there with us when Dad passed away. I tried calling him multiple times on Friday, the 30th, but there was no response. I know he went into the facility on July 2nd, ironically, which would be Dad’s last day on this earthly plane. No one had any idea that after 6 pm, things would have drastically turned for the worse. And even then, before he passed, the hospice nurse told us he had 24-72 hours. It was more like an hour. It was that fast.

We, that being me, my twin sister, and my brother-in-law, all tried calling and texting him to get him to show up, but again there was no response.

I finally started blowing up his phone on Monday, which gave my sister and me a group text, “So sad about Dad, I saw him last night. Please keep me informed about arrangements.”

If it weren’t for me figuring out and contacting the funeral home just a few weeks prior, no one would have known what to do because his facility was never told that information. We believe he called the facility to confirm his suspicion of why we were all reaching out to him, and I’m sure someone offered their condolences, which would have done just that.

I responded to his text, again asking for the laptop, code book, paperwork, and possessions. I explained that I needed to get Dad’s affairs in order and fulfill his wishes. I asked him to please work together.

No response.

And it gets to me deeply that my brother might think he’s punishing me and my sister, but he’s also punishing three grandchildren who lost their maternal grandparents in four months. My oldest son especially had a special relationship with my father, as we lived with him from when he was ten months old until he was six. They spent a ton of time together. All of the grandkids emailed and texted my father frequently.

It’s hard because even though my brother was cruel and abusive to our father, my sister, and me. It doesn’t mean he’s this way to others. He can be the most handsome, wittiest, polite, and engaged person, drops everything and helps others, will hold your baby, help you build a new brick patio, take you out to dinner, repair your vehicle, and come across as a funny and nice guy. The other side comes out when he feels you’ve wronged him somehow. And that’s the version we are dealing with. I’m unsure how he’s been wronged, but here we are.

Random

As I did with my mother, I wanted his medical records just to have in his folder. I called his nurse practitioner, who told me the facility would have them, then said, “Your father… he was difficult, wasn’t he”. Like, WTF am I supposed to say to that? I reached out to his facility, and it will be $35 to get a copy of them. I’ll have to charge that, too.

I reached out to my Dad’s sister, his only sibling, on Facebook.

I got beautiful flowers from Patty and Crystal.

My friend MJ gifted me amazing coffee beans from a local roastery. I love good coffee beans!

It’s been a bit weird seeing how many people, especially local people, have been coming to OSN by Googling my name.

Emotions

I’m walking on eggshells. Even taking a few days to try and process what had just happened after my second parental death in four months was too long, and I’m told I was being selfish.

Sometimes, more like all the time, when I try to attempt sleep, it spirals into my brain. If the situation were reversed, if I did and said all the things that have been said and done to me and my Dad? I would have been absolutely crucified. Hellfire would have rained down upon me. Friendships would have ended. I would have had the police at my door within a day if I had been the one to steal the wallet and all possessions. I can’t fathom it.

I am unable to perform my pain to the satisfaction of others, which gives off the appearance that I am not hurting as much as I am. I am exhausted.

I know my situation isn’t all that unique, but how often does someone go through everything I have with this situation? In June, I had almost 100 hours of only phone calls. It hasn’t ended. I finished this post on the night of July 12th, and I’m at 44.5 hours of just phone calls. Not the texts, emails, faxes, postal service, etc. JUST PHONE CALLS.

It’s surreal to look at the urns of my parents and wonder, how did we get here so quickly? I don’t think I would have survived a single week of this year if it weren’t for my twin sister and brother-in-law.

I sometimes want to scream into the void, “For fucks sake, how much can one person take?!”

And then the universe laughs at me and throws a 4″ nail into my tire while going 80MPH on the tollway. Sigh.