Q&A: How do conversations go with your kids about what they’ve seen?¶
Day 4 · 3:04:41 · Dean Allison · Nicole Sedore · Glen Motz · Deanna McLeod
- 👦 Boys grew up fast under immense pressure; they rarely discuss it so she can preserve remaining joy with them.
- 👵 Parents keep a roof overhead; she wears her mother’s clothes and fears dying before them.
- 🚫 VISP and disability denials leave no option but to keep working despite doctors ordering rest.
Chair asks how sons process their mother’s ordeal.
← Single Mother Plans Will, DNR and 18-Year-Old Raising Brother | Q&A: What out-of-pocket medicine and treatment costs do you face? →
Transcript¶
Dean Allison · 3:04:41
I, you know, once again, I'm reminded that, uh, so many people that show up here have got so many things to juggle, right? You got to worry about health issues, You've got to worry about family issues. And, and, you know, probably more importantly, or most importantly, in the whole mix of that is, is financially, how do you keep everything together? So, you know, how do you— we talked about your younger boy, but as you talk to your kids in general, how, how, how do those conversations go in terms of what— how do they feel about what they've seen their mother go through?
Nicole Sedore · 3:05:20
My boys are, my boys are amazing. My, they've had to grow up so fast. Um, we don't talk about it all the time. We don't talk about it. Um, I don't want to talk about it all the time, but the pressure, especially on my oldest, is immense, you know. Um, my parents have, you know, they're hardworking Alberta-born, you know, they've been incredible. But as a 50-year-old woman to have to ask your parents, the only reason I'm here today is because of my mother.
Glen Motz · 3:05:58
I'm wearing her clothes, you know.
Nicole Sedore · 3:06:02
I don't want to die before my parents die. That's one of my biggest fears because they've already been through enough. My family's been through enough to witness this. You know, most days I feel okay, but a lot of days I don't. But I don't talk about it. Nobody wants to hear about my burning head, and you know, but some days it's unbearable. But you go to work because that's what you have to do as a mother to put food on the table. Like, I do what I can even though the doctors are, you know, you need to take it easy. There's just no other options. My doctors, I did the thing, I went to the doctors, they signed the papers, sent it off, and I got denied from VISP. It was a year ago. Oh, you can appeal. So it was appealed right away.
Deanna McLeod · 3:06:53
That was a year ago.
Nicole Sedore · 3:06:54
I don't know. My doctor made me fill out the paperwork for disability, denied. So I've just chosen to just keep on working, do what I can when I can. To try and help.
Dean Allison · 3:07:11
And I would also guess, because of what, what an elite athlete you were, you probably, you weathered some of this better than most. And that's not undermining what you have to deal with.
Nicole Sedore · 3:07:23
Yeah, like, I, I love to swim. Swimming is my thing. I'm scared to swim, to be honest with you, at the moment, um, because swimming, you're alone in your thoughts. And I'm scared to swim sometimes because, well, if something happens, then I'm really a goner. You know, even like my internal specialist and my vascular neurosurgeon, because at one point I was on two blood thinners, one for this and one for my head. And so they've had to come together. And the conclusion when they talked was like, she's on too many blood thinners because I was getting dizzy. And so my internal specialist, like, we've decided that we're going to put you on the one blood thinner just for your head, because if something's going to go haywire, we'd rather it go haywire with clotting, not with your brain. So, and my— I am on Alberta benefits, and they won't even pay for my blood thinner because the conversation was my vascular neurosurgeon is not educated enough to prescribe this medication because it's supposed to come from a cardiologist.
Nicole Sedore · 3:08:28
So I have to pay for that every month, which is $90. Like, it's just, it's just one thing after another. There is no help for people like me. For that, that's my voice.