Tonight's picture was taken in September of 2003. Mattie was a year and half old and was given this fire engine as a gift from his paternal grandparents. Mattie loved all kinds of vehicles, so this gift made sense for Mattie. Though it was a ride-on toy, Mattie preferred pushing it himself or washing it! As a new mom, my first attempt was to lift Mattie into the seat and show him how it moved. NOT A GOOD PLAN! I learned quickly with Mattie.... he wanted to explore the world in his own way. Therefore I learned to follow his lead. When I say he was my greatest teacher, I am NOT kidding.
Quote of the day: Just as despair can come to one only from other human beings, hope, too, can be given to one only by other human beings. ~ Elie Wiesel
This morning, my dad and I had a conference call with his neurosurgeon nurse. She has been following my dad's case since December of 2025. Last December, my dad had a brain bleed. I can't account for how this happened to him, as he did not fall on my watch and his memory care center doesn't report a fall either. My dad had no marks, scratches or bruising. Nonetheless, I brought him to the ER last year because he was slurring his speech and was more disoriented and confused than normal. They did a CT scan in the ER, and that was when we found out about the pooling of the blood in the brain.
Since that time, we have been getting CT scans every three months, to track the blood/fluid, it the hope that it will all get reabsorbed. Today, the nurse explained that the amount of fluid pooling in the brain is the same in comparison to his May CT scan. I believe she and the doctor were hoping that more fluid would have been absorbed by now. Yet given my dad's age, she says it is not unusual for the fluid never to disappear. The goal of course is to have no falls or injuries which could cause the pooling of fluid to increase. She also mentioned that patients in their 80s and 90s, can have spontaneous bleeding, as the skull remains the same shape over time, but the brain shrinks. As it shrinks, the blood vessels in the brain can get stretched and pop, causing pooling of blood. Any case, they want my dad to have another CT scan in January of 2027. So the process continues.
Later this morning, I called my mortgage company. NO this issue hasn't been put to bed yet! It feels like it will never end, nor will the stress of paying for this hateful process. Naturally whenever I deal with this (which is daily and for months), it makes me reflect on my hateful divorce. Any case, once I assumed the mortgage, I had to purchase a whole new home owner's insurance policy in my name. The insurer sent the policy paperwork to my mortgage company, as this yearly insurance fee gets wrapped into my escrow. Now there is a word, I despise with grand proportion. Why? Because the escrow NEVER stays the same. The only consistent thing for my escrow is it goes up in price significantly every year.
If you are like me, you are asking, what is an escrow and what is an escrow shortage? I know I always heard these terms, but since I wasn't the financial person in my family, I didn't understand the full ramifications. But just like everything else, I have had a crash course in reality. A mortgage escrow account stores and collects your estimated property taxes and home owner's insurance from your mortgage payment each month, and pays them when they are due. This process protects both you and your mortgage lender from the risk of your taxes not being paid. An escrow shortage is when your mortgage company finds that your account balance has dropped below the required minimum cushion. This occurs only if you have an escrow account tied to your mortgage, and if local tax rates or insurance premiums go up. Homeowners who pay their own taxes and insurance premiums directly—or those whose local costs remain completely flat—never experience an escrow shortage. I would LOVE, LOVE, LOVE to have completely flat local costs. It NEVER happens!
All I know is after this hour long call today, in which I spoke to an escrow agent and an agent from the department that oversees homeowner insurance payments, my head was spinning. Both women were lovely, but provided different information. Needless to say, I am glad I called, because the mortgage company was unaware of my new home owner's policy and this policy definitely changes my escrow and the shortage. DELIGHTFUL. So now I wait a week, to get new correspondence from the mortgage lender about my updated escrow shortage. Just like with my mortgage assumption, I was quoted a vast range of fees. So I remain on pins and needles until the exact escrow shortage amount is calculated. Seriously, the financial pressures are overwhelming and this isn't the only thing I face on a daily basis. Each way, I always say to myself.... may tomorrow be a better day. Fortunately I am not holding my breath, because if I did, I would be dead.
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