Covid and the loss of a grandfather

 “Please help me!” I begged, “I can’t move him by myself and he is falling over, he is too heavy.”

The nurse in the blue dress just looked at me wide eyed.

“Please!!!” I begged again, “He’s having trouble breathing and I can’t push him back into a sitting position without help. Are you a Nurse? Can you help me?”

She continued to stare at me in surprise.

I was incredulous. Here I was in a Nursing home, December of 2020, and the nurse was staring at me in shock, like she was surprised I could see her. I figured she was new, especially since she wasn’t wearing the traditional scrubs and hazmat suits I had seen on everyone else in the COVID ward. She had on blue but she was wearing a modest gown tied at the waist and no other protective gear. 

My grandmother, Aunt and I were only sanctioned to be here because this was to be our good bye to my grandfather who had contracted COVID while in lockdown at this institution. 

“Please,” I begged again, “get someone who can help me.”

My grandfather was a big man and we had been alerted by the facility that we should come by soon and pay our last respects. I let my Grandmother and Aunt go in first, as policy only allowed two visitors at a time. After they came out, I removed my clothes, donned the garb, sprayed myself with disinfectant, put on the masks, hair covering and different layers of protective gear and entered the COVID ward.

It felt like what I imagine a detainment camp would feel like. Sterile, hopeless,… it hurt to think that my grandfather had spent his last few weeks here, no matter his mental state. He had been put in a home by the veteran’s association for dementia and had been doing fine until they decided to give him a new roommate who turned out to have COVID symptoms.

We don’t know if COVID killed him but it’s what’s on his death certificate… there’s a lot of politics and money behind that claim. I don’t know for a fact how it was introduced or to what extent it was responsible but that was what was stated as the main cause of death for my 93 year old grandfather.

All I know is I begged a small seemingly white woman with long brown hair to help me lift my grandfather up because he was falling over the left side of his bed and seemed to be having trouble breathing.

“Get someone who can help!” I demanded exasperated as I tried to push him up. He moaned, it broke my heart. I didn’t want to be rough with him but he needed to him to be back up straight, I knew it, or he would stop breathing. A jolly Ethiopian woman came in and helped me reposition him on his pillows. She repositioned the bed so he was sitting at less than a 90 degree angle. She said he could hear me, and that he was a stubborn  and demanding man but still kind, just confused. She encouraged me to talk to him and assure him that Beverly (my grandmother, his wife) was doing well. He was very concerned about her. She said he was acting like a prisoner of war who thought his wife was also being detained. 

I assured him that Beverly was OK and that I would take care of her.