This is an article in a series of articles I wrote, it’s not everything, but I’m still putting together everything from Sept 2021:

I’m happy to write the whole story if needed, but that will take some time …

With all that said, I want to tell my Dad’s story.

On the week of September 6th after my Mom went into the hospital my dad fell and hit his head on the tile floor. He couldn’t get up on his own, so we had to get him to hospital. He was placed in the covid unit a few doors down from my Mom. I joke that he just wanted to go to see my Mom because he missed her, but I know there’s truth to that one and the fact is they were not allowed to see each other in the hospital except for about 20 minutes before my Mom died.

My Mom died on September 10th.

When I was told to leave the hospital before my Mom died and as they were wheeling my Dad back to his room, I didn’t know it yet, but it was the last time I would see my Dad alive.

The next day he called me and told me that the world was mine now and I needed to take it on. I wish I had paid more attention to what he said. I wish I could remember if he gave me any instructions on how to actually live in a world that was mine now. I wish that I somehow could go back and ask him for some pointers, some advice. But he made the conversation short and to the point and then he hung up.

Within hours his oxygen plummeted and he was on full Oxygen protocol. Within the day he was pulling at his oxygen mask and scratching his face because his beard was itching him. It was early afternoon when I got a call from a nurse telling me my father was restrained in bed and was not being compliant.

I needed clarification of what restrained meant. I demanded to see my Dad. They video conferenced me from his room. His limbs were restrained to the bed he was writhing and screaming and cursing, the wild look in his eyes and the constant plea for open widows and fresh air were all I needed to see. I told them to take the restraints off, that he was a veteran of Vietnam and had PTSD from his time there. He was on steroids and a myriad of medications that my Dad had previous hallucinogenic reactions to. I was told that the only option I had was to keep my father restrained because he needed the oxygen or to put him on Hospice.

Those were my choices.

I knew what Hospice meant. I knew what my Dad meant when he told me it was my world now. I put him on Hospice.

I never head from him again. For the remainder of the week I texted him pictures of myself, my kids, each sunrise, messages of love. They all remained unread. I had no contact with my Dad and wasn’t allowed to visit him.

The last time I saw him, was the morning of September 17th three years ago. The Hospice nurse FaceTimed me from her phone. She said I could tell my Dad I loved him while she stroked his hair and it might help him, so I did, grateful to see my Dad before he died. I just kept saying I Love You. I think he twitched his eye as I said it. I know he heard me. I let him know that it was okay for him to leave and that we all loved him. We hung up and he died a short while later.

The weather was just like this morning, gray and bit chilly – not much of a sunrise.

I spent the afternoon on the phone with the funeral home and finding pictures of my parents. Calling my dad’s brothers and sisters to let them know he died.

And that was it.

I have so many questions about his experience. If you’ve read the Substack I wrote on my Mom’s death just seven days ago, you read that my Dad was wheeled in to say good bye to my Mom while I was there, but he had no idea what was happening and he was in plexiglass glass box on top of a wheelchair (which I find so inhumane). Throughout both of their times in the hospital there was radio silence from all ends. They were kept in the quiet about their own health and each other’s health, I was kept in the quiet about what was going on, in fact, I found out a lot more information once I was able to get their medical records months later. I wasn’t able to get in touch with them. There was so much that happened behind closed doors and as far as I can tell, no one tried to engage my Dad after my Mom died. No one tried to hold his hand, console him or give him an avenue to express what was happening. It was just back to his hospital room.

Is this the Medical system that we all seem to hold in such high regard? I’ll have more to say about this in another Substack.

For today, I think I’m going to take my kids out to the water, to float some flowers for my parents. I’m going to take them to get something to eat and toast with Shirley Temples to their Pop Pop and Mimi ~ The Best Grandparents <3 and maybe we’ll write them letters and burn them under the Full Moon, send them to the other side and wait for Mimi and Pop Pop to blow the Love back.

It has been a hard week. There’s no nice way to put it. It’s just been a hard week.

Link to Diane Bates story here: https://chbmp.org/cases/murdered-by-fda-death-protocol/diane-p-bates/