Catherine, Montebello

“On March 18th my 88 year old grandmother suffered a heart attack, because of restrictions my aunts and uncle couldn’t all see her in the hospital. When the Dr. decided that she most likely wasn’t going to recover he did allow her children a few minutes with her, only after we reached out to some personal friends that worked at the hospital. She passed away on March 21. My aunts and uncles couldn’t gather together and mourn as a family, they all left to their own homes to deal with this totally unexpected tragedy. My family is very close. Her funeral looked a lot different than what we all had imagined. Only 30 people were allowed at the memorial, and only groups of 6 can go in at a time. Masks had to be worn. The cemetery was probably the worst part, the county had closed down all cemeteries for services, so we had to watch from the other side of the fence along the street. We were grateful to just have a view. The priest was kind enough to walk down with us and hold the service there at the fence. Traffic was quite loud and some cars were stopping to take pictures, something we weren’t too upset about because like us, it’s probably something they have never witnessed. The funny thing is my grandma was a private woman, and we joked that she probably waited for this exact pandemic to pass on. She wouldn’t have wanted a big service with extended family, so although we felt like we didn’t get what we wanted, we know she did.”

Catherine, 37
Montebello
4/18/20

 

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