TX Observer: “My mom looked on with a smile, then bit into her taco. Wrapping love in a warm tortilla and handing it to me, my dad, or my brother always brought her comfort. If you visit her house, she’ll ask if you’re hungry and hand you a plate of food before asking your name. She loves caring for people. A few days earlier, I had told my wife that I was going to stay with my mom so she wouldn’t be alone. But the truth is that I was terrified of what was waiting for us in the darkness of COVID-19. I needed my mom to take care of me.
The previous 43 days felt like a stretched-out panic attack. Every day, we waited for a call from the hospital. We usually got the same disappointing news: “He’s still getting max ventilator support. His lungs are very stiff. We had to flip him on his stomach to help with the oxygenation. We’re worried about bacteria. His blood is starting to get a bit acidic.”
Months earlier, despite the world being on fire, I felt unstoppable. I was a reporter at the Dallas Morning News, my hometown paper. I covered the pandemic and the George Floyd protests. I just had my most successful year yet as a journalist. But the pandemic humbled me. It turned my emotions inside out. I left my job in November to take care of my mental health, just two weeks before both my parents got sick with COVID-19. (My mom fared much better from the start; her symptoms cleared about two weeks after my dad was hospitalized.)
Now, my mother and I sat at this table just as we’d done thousands of times before. Only this time, we were both at the lowest point either of us had ever been”.