Back home, back to normal??

Mom is in a nursing home in Napa now. But I guess she has a roommate
that doesn't sleep and tends to scream and throw things. The social
worker at the home is working on trying to move her but nothing will
happen immediately.

It sounds like mom has settled in except for the roommate thing. She
was trying to sounds pretty upbeat but she is very upset about the
financial situation. She has no money basically. All of her Social
Security goes to Medi-Cal that is paying for her stay in the nursing
facility. I forgot to ask the social worker about an allowance. My
aunt said there was some kind of allowance but it's not much. Mom was
complaining that she thought she was supposed to receive money from
Arminda who was selling the furniture or something. But when Mark and
I were there, she said she had something set up with Arminda so I
didn't go into it with her. Now she doesn't remember that. I told her
AGAIN, if she wanted something to let me know and we would work it
out, send money, send it to her, whatever. I think she just wants to
buy 'stuff' and doesn't like not having access to money, which I
understand. But she couldn't manage money when she was living alone,
so I'm not inclined to give her an allowance she'll just blow.
Besides, she can't keep a lot in the nursing home.

We had set aside some of the hand-stitching that mom was still working
on thinking she could at least work on the in the home even if she
couldn't have access to a big sewing machine. But then Aunt Lucia said
they wouldn't let her have sharp objects, it was an insurance issue.
So I did ask the social worker to look into that.

I'll give mom a little more time to see if she settles in. Mark said
every time we talked about moving her to OC, she got tight lipped. Not
sure if I should push it or let her settle in where she is. I keep
telling her it's her choice. If she wants to stay, we're ok with that.
She does have more of her brothers and sisters near Napa.

But I have to say... I was annoyed that only my uncle Ben and his wife
came to visit for lunch one of the days we were there. Besides Aunt
Lucia, I don't think any of the myriad nieces, nephews or siblings
visit her at all. And mom has gone out of her way for years to do
things especially for the nieces and nephews. She's made everyone in
the family a quilt that represents something about their personality
and likes. It's very sad, but once a black sheep always a black sheep.
And mom was mad at me for not inviting all of them to my wedding.
Hell... only one of those cousins bothers to send me a Christmas card
and I sent a bunch to all of them for years.

I much prefer my 'chosen' family over my biological one.