0:00

The HoneyDew with Sickler.

0:07

Welcome back

0:14

to the HoneyDew y'all. We're over here

0:16

doing it in the night pant studios. I

0:18

am Sickler. Ryan sickler dot

0:20

com. Ryan sickler on all your

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1:00

no additional cost. And I'm telling

1:02

you right now, if you know someone, or

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if you have a story that has to be heard, please

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submit it to HoneyDew podcast at gmail

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dot com. Hopefully, we'll get to do an episode together.

1:10

Alright? And if you're looking for a new podcast to

1:12

just listen to, Go binge

1:14

the crab feast. It's a great library.

1:17

It's free. It's out there. You got

1:19

all kinds of crazy stories on there.

1:21

Today's guest had a wild story on there

1:23

if I remember correctly. Alright. Now

1:26

you guys know what we do over here. We highlight

1:28

the low lights. I always say these are the stories

1:30

behind the storytellers, and I'm very excited to

1:32

have this guest back on the Do ladies and

1:34

gentlemen. Welcome, Kelsey Cook. Welcome back to

1:36

the Honey Doo. Thank you. Definitely

1:39

check out Kelsey's crappy step. So

1:41

that's the original story. I

1:43

still get people leaving comments

1:45

on Instagram. Like fuck the crap feast

1:48

and to manage your tool and

1:50

all that

1:51

shit.

1:51

Yeah. And it's on this is not

1:53

happening. You did it.

1:54

Yeah. fucking great. Well,

1:56

welcome back. And before we get into

1:59

anything today, please

2:00

plug, promote everything Kelsey Cook. Yeah.

2:03

So you can listen to the self helpless

2:05

podcast on all podcast platforms.

2:07

I'm on tour right now. You can go to kelsie cook dot

2:10

com, get tour day tickets, at

2:12

Kelsey Cook comedy on all socials. And then

2:14

my special is coming out. It

2:16

will be available everywhere on YouTube

2:18

March ninth. But it's gonna be coming

2:20

out a little early as well for

2:23

purchase on February twenty eight on my

2:25

website. So kelsey cook dot com, you'll

2:27

get like a sign poster, free

2:29

audio album download as

2:31

well. I love doing a little bundle if you wanna do

2:33

it that way, but it will be free everywhere

2:35

on March ninth. But

2:36

prior to that, you can get it a week early straight

2:39

through what's your website?

2:40

KelseyDew cook dot com.

2:41

I fucking love that.

2:42

Google. Yeah.

2:43

Very smart.

2:44

Thank you. Yeah. YouTube seems to be a

2:46

good a a good way to do it. I mean, it

2:48

depends. It depends. So when you have a show

2:50

like I have, when you talk about women

2:53

have come on, talked about rape. Well,

2:55

when you put the word rape into

2:57

anything, they fucking

2:59

demonetize. They've taken what And

3:01

so our argument is how do we educate people

3:03

about this?

3:04

Right. And we

3:05

can't talk about this.

3:06

Right. We've had incest We've had rape,

3:09

we've had domestic violence, we've

3:11

had unique drama, we've

3:13

had all of it. And YouTube's like, no. We're

3:15

not we're gonna demonetize your episode.

3:17

We're still gonna run ads in

3:18

it, but you can't find it. Yeah.

3:21

So it's it's a little challenging, but

3:23

I'm sorry. didn't even think about that. But I wonder

3:25

about

3:25

our specials. Like, are they gonna demonetize

3:28

those because of content language? Some,

3:30

you know, that Yeah. Shit.

3:32

But go. Watch her special. Yeah. There's

3:34

definitely some dumb jokes on her so. Like

3:37

show. It's not cool kids, but

3:40

Please please let there be ads on

3:42

there, but I'll see. Alright. Let's get

3:45

into what you wanna talk about today because you came

3:47

with something that was is sort of

3:49

new? Is it not? Is it recent? Well,

3:52

it's ongoing, but

3:54

it started a couple years ago. I just

3:57

it's been a recent thing that I've decided

3:59

to talk more publicly about it because

4:01

I really kind of kept

4:03

it to my self except for close family

4:05

and friends the last couple years, but

4:08

my mom got diagnosed with dementia two

4:11

years ago. And

4:12

can I can I just ask you this?

4:14

Yeah. Of course. What happens when you're like, what

4:16

do they first see to where

4:18

they say, no, you do have it? Is it a scan of

4:20

the brain where they can

4:21

tell, like, gray area or something

4:23

like that. Yeah. Plaques, atrophy,

4:25

stuff like that. So they had done an MRI.

4:28

But Sickler, what how

4:30

it had started. So twenty

4:32

twenty was such a hard year for everybody. And I think

4:35

if there were things that were underlying with

4:37

people, they got exacerbated And so

4:39

was living in LA at the time and

4:41

I had noticed some kind

4:43

of behavioral changes with my mom, little

4:46

things, but nothing that cause

4:50

too much concern. Nothing that I was like, I think she should go

4:52

to the doctors. Just kinda like, that's kinda

4:54

that's a little different. And then

4:57

at the end of twenty twenty, I decided to

4:59

move back to Spokane, which is where I'm

5:01

from originally because things were so

5:03

shut down

5:03

here. That's

5:03

where your mom is. Yeah. Mhmm. And

5:07

I had gotten a gotten an apartment

5:09

there. I was living there for three weeks.

5:12

And then went over to my mom's and

5:14

found her face down on her living

5:17

room for it. Oh, no. Mhmm. Bird

5:20

was her her bedroom floor. And You

5:22

just went to visit, and that's how you found her.

5:24

Mhmm. Holy shit. Mhmm. Are you terrified

5:27

when you walk in that my mom's

5:28

dead? Yeah. Yeah.

5:30

Mhmm. Just, like, fully, like,

5:32

face And you don't know

5:34

how long? You don't know anything? Oh

5:36

my god. Your mind's gotta be going a mile

5:38

a minute. Right. I had talked to her the

5:40

night four on the phone, and I could tell

5:42

that she was, like, not not doing

5:44

great. And I was, like, oh,

5:47

okay. I'll I'll come over in the morning. And

5:50

she overnight had basically become septic.

5:52

She was like about to her white blood cell count

5:54

was through the roof. And so

5:56

I called 901. They an

5:59

ambulance came, we went to the

6:00

hospital, and she had a

6:02

perforated stomach ulcer.

6:04

Oh, my my god.

6:05

Her gallbladder was inflamed and full of

6:07

stones and she had COVID.

6:10

So What what was it to

6:12

ripped her stomach open. So she

6:16

she had been taking a lot of

6:18

Tylenol Advil and SEDS

6:20

to help with sciatica

6:23

pain, and that

6:26

can cause ulcers if it's going on

6:28

for too long. So that

6:30

happened and so they wanted to

6:32

do emergency surgery to repair

6:34

everything. But what we didn't know

6:37

is that she had this underlying dementia.

6:39

And when you have

6:41

anesthesia done, it can

6:43

accelerate dementia.

6:44

Oh, is that right?

6:45

So she came out of surgery a

6:48

completely different person.

6:49

What? Like noticeably? Like,

6:53

like, you could No. Completely she's,

6:55

like, thought she had time traveled. She was

6:58

Oh, man.

6:59

Like, not. She was not there. She

7:01

was not. On this planet.

7:04

And I

7:05

gotta say this.

7:06

Yeah. As

7:07

a person who just went under anesthesia three

7:10

times, Yeah. I think I got time travel a

7:12

little bit.

7:14

It's like that time travel a little bit.

7:16

Yeah. Well, and in the market, like,

7:18

I'll be scared to say some shit. Love

7:21

these shows because I'm like, you're awesome.

7:24

You have to say this, you know,

7:26

we have to like, that's the thing is, I

7:28

that's why I'm wanting to talk about

7:31

it a little more is because, like, I was

7:33

isolating myself and that had become,

7:35

I think, unhealthy from my mental

7:37

health. To be going through this

7:39

in a vacuum and not opening myself

7:41

up to like, there are a lot of

7:43

other people who experience this, but I'm not

7:45

ever letting myself connect

7:47

with people in that way because I've just kept it

7:50

pretty private.

7:50

Completely understand that as well.

7:52

Yeah. So

7:55

she she came out of surgery and also this

7:58

was early twenty twenty one. So

8:00

everybody, especially in like the COVID ward

8:02

of the hospital, is in like full astronaut

8:05

hazmat suits. So if you come

8:08

out of surgery and

8:10

dementia that you didn't know you have has now gone

8:13

way up. Oh. And you're seeing peep

8:15

like, no wonder she thought she was injured.

8:17

Yeah. No wonder she thought she

8:19

was, like, what the fuck is this? This

8:21

is crazy. So she

8:24

was

8:25

so out of it. It's so out of it.

8:27

And like there's I don't know. Can I ask you this? It's --

8:29

Yeah. -- it's Maine. It's COVID. How

8:31

would your mom at the time?

8:33

Two years. So she just turned seventy, so

8:35

she would have been, like, just

8:37

short of her sixty eighth

8:39

birthday. Okay. She was, like, 67I think you

8:41

allowed

8:41

to even visit with COVID and everything? Do you

8:43

have to wear the suit too? Or, like, how's that

8:45

work? So that's the thing is we

8:48

couldn't visit my mom for the first

8:50

six weeks. Damn. My

8:52

mom, it was in the hospital for five months.

8:55

I see I complain about a month and then there's

8:57

that. I hear things like this and I'm like shut the fuck

8:59

But a month is insane. That's so It

9:01

was five months is five times that.

9:03

don't know how that wouldn't make someone crazy

9:06

to be honest with you. I don't know how that wouldn't

9:08

accelerate I could see myself

9:10

four more months. Like, if I was still in there

9:13

right now, we're not even halfway through February. I

9:15

would fucking be like, give me the fuck out

9:17

of here. I'd be losing my

9:18

shit.

9:19

Yeah. Of course, especially when you're you're just like

9:21

staring at the ceiling.

9:22

And you're drugged a lot of the time too

9:24

for the pain and everything as well.

9:26

Yeah. And

9:26

your mom's in there for six how

9:28

long?

9:29

Five months. Five months.

9:30

And then you can finally get the seer. Yeah.

9:33

So here's the

9:34

I'm a million questions. I'm sorry.

9:35

You know it's tough. About what you're going

9:37

through during the five months where you can't see it.

9:39

Can you can you can she

9:41

face time? Or is there any way to communicate

9:43

with her all?

9:44

So the first six

9:47

weeks, they only let me see her one time.

9:49

They made this. It was like a hospital

9:51

exception. That they were gonna let me see

9:53

her for a

9:53

day. To see

9:54

you at the window. This

9:55

is so bad. We got you on the

9:57

grass floor of purpose, so I can

9:59

do this.

10:04

I talk to their mom. I

10:07

forget how amazing

10:09

the shows from making you be able

10:11

to laugh at some of these because it's like,

10:13

I was just telling my friend before

10:16

I came on here and, like, anytime that I because this

10:18

is my third time on HoneyDew. Anytime

10:20

you get that thought in your brain of, like, oh, this would

10:22

be good for the honeydew. You know

10:24

that, like, life is fucking bad

10:26

right then. Like, this show is such a barometer

10:28

show. Yeah. This show is such a barometer

10:31

of, like, how your life is going because

10:33

if anytime I'm like, oh,

10:34

like, this would probably be something

10:36

to talk about and do? I'm like, fuck.

10:39

This is

10:39

a tough time. I'm glad you're tough enough to do it

10:41

though, and want to because, you know,

10:44

I -- Yeah. -- certainly have been through my

10:46

shit recently, and I'm gonna do an episode about it.

10:48

And if somebody there's so many people who are

10:50

taking shots at you while you're down and it makes

10:52

the

10:52

land. I love

10:53

love it. Yeah. I

10:54

love And I'm like, thanks for that kick in the wrist. Motherfucker.

10:57

When I Yeah. If I could

10:59

come in. Got this PT. Yeah. This leg's

11:01

gonna be bionic. You boys go through your fucking

11:04

chest. Yeah. So they

11:06

let me see her for one day

11:08

in those six weeks to see if she would

11:10

recognize me. It was like an experiment

11:13

because they thought, well, if

11:15

she recognizes her and it's

11:18

helpful, then maybe we'll make a hospital exception

11:20

that she can keep seeing her. And I went

11:22

and of course my mom is she was so

11:25

out of it at the time that, like, I

11:27

I mean, she kind of knew it was me,

11:29

but it was little in and out, and they

11:31

took that as an unsuccessful visit.

11:33

And I was furious because I was like, this is so

11:36

unfair. Like, that's not this

11:38

isn't a a good enough way to measure

11:40

this, I think. Like, she's on such another

11:43

planet right now, you giving me a couple hours

11:45

with her is not, I think, a good test

11:47

of this. But anyway, so they they

11:49

didn't let me come back for, I think, it was another

11:52

couple weeks, and then my mom went catatonic.

11:55

And they were, like, she

11:57

went catatonic, I think around the same time

11:59

that their hospital policy had changed

12:01

to, like, one visitor a day. Okay. I have to

12:03

ask you this too. The only way I even

12:05

know what catatonic is to know.

12:08

It's from the

12:08

movie, Weird Science. Oh. You remember

12:10

the Weird Science? I'm no longer than you.

12:13

So

12:13

And those make I I mean, I know of it, but I haven't

12:15

and

12:16

it's Robert Downey Junior, and they make

12:18

this girl who's Kelly Lebrock, like

12:20

-- Yes.

12:20

-- beautiful whatever -- Yeah. -- that's

12:22

their girl. And then the older

12:24

brother is Bill Paxton. And he's

12:27

they've somehow, I forget how it

12:29

happens, but the grandparents get frozen and they're

12:31

in the closet. And Bill packs and Jan at

12:33

them on the laundry list all the shit

12:35

goes. And our grandparents are catatonic

12:37

in the closet, and

12:38

the silly crease, and I even know the word.

12:40

So What actually is it? Because

12:42

the the grandparents are just frozen in a

12:44

state

12:45

of, like, they're alive, but they're just

12:47

frozen. Is that what it is?

12:49

Yeah. It To me, it

12:51

doesn't Like, it doesn't

12:53

appear that different from a coma. Okay.

12:55

Where, like, they open. No. No?

12:57

Okay.

13:00

I think they can be. I think there's probably

13:02

different states of being catatonic, but

13:05

my mom went into a state where

13:07

she just completely shut down. Her

13:09

body was just done in

13:11

that moment. And so when

13:15

that happened, the diagnosis

13:17

was like or I'm sorry, the prognosis was

13:19

maybe you're looking at like a few weeks.

13:22

Because if she's not really able to

13:24

eat or drink or anything like that, like, we can keep

13:26

her on IV fluids, but then it becomes a

13:28

quality of life thing. Like, how long do you want her

13:30

to be like this? So in

13:33

the last two years, we've thought that we were gonna lose

13:35

her five different times, which

13:37

I know with what you just went through, you had.

13:39

It's like it's crazy how frequent

13:42

those scares can be when things start

13:44

to go wrong. So she has gone

13:46

catatonic, I think three times

13:49

-- Wow. -- three or four times. And

13:52

so she ended up pulling out

13:54

of that kind of miraculously,

13:57

but would like dip in and out of it. And anyway,

13:59

I ended up being an a hospital with her every

14:01

day for almost four months. Like,

14:03

that was the one that's, like, the gift

14:05

of doing comedy for Olivia is

14:07

that I just was

14:08

like, well, I'm just not gonna Yeah. That's me.

14:10

Right? And I'm like, I can't anyway. Like, I

14:12

thought about it. don't think I could stand for five

14:15

minutes right now and even do a

14:16

set.

14:17

Oh my god. Yeah. So I get

14:19

it. You're like, look, I can take this time off, and

14:21

what's really important is this. But this is

14:23

now COVID's finally

14:25

past, so they let you come in and see your They

14:27

will let me come in. mean, COVID was still

14:29

going on, but they had loosened

14:31

it a little bit. We were so lucky that, I mean,

14:33

like, people were losing

14:35

family members having to say goodbye over

14:37

iPads on

14:38

FaceTime. Like, that was that was the

14:40

only way we could communicate with her during those

14:42

first

14:42

weeks. Right. So they didn't do that. Mhmm.

14:45

And And did she recognize you when she

14:47

talked to you then? I'm

14:49

trying to I think yes. But

14:52

it's been a couple years. She was she was just

14:54

so gone. It's hard to explain, but she was, like,

14:56

not really making any sense. And

15:00

yeah, then I ended up being there

15:02

with her in the hospital. Like,

15:05

it was, like, eight to ten hours a day every

15:07

day. I just let that kind of

15:09

become my life because we

15:12

thought she only had so much time left. They did

15:14

an MRI while she was catatonic and

15:17

the way her brain looks, they were, like, I

15:19

mean, maybe you've got yeah.

15:21

You're truly looking like, weeks maybe. Weeks,

15:24

like, told you. They were, like, taught maybe, like,

15:26

a few months. Because her brain

15:28

just had shrunk so much.

15:31

And then so that's when they diagnosed her with

15:33

it's called frontotemporal dementia. So it's

15:35

different from Alzheimer's. This

15:37

affects more the front and the side

15:40

parts of your brain, and it

15:42

impacts language,

15:44

emotion, lots

15:47

of personality changes, and it hits

15:49

people a lot younger. So Alzheimer's, you

15:51

see more with people older often,

15:54

so my mom had this

15:56

much younger, like in her Sickler, then it's much

15:58

more progressive. So it

16:01

it goes, it develops more Sickler. And

16:05

just, like, so many times that the

16:07

health care system has failed her in the

16:09

last two

16:09

years. I mean, the things you're

16:11

referring One one

16:12

sec. It's yeah. Yeah. Health care. So it's Yeah.

16:15

Yeah. I can't imagine years. Yes.

16:17

It's been it's been so disheartening

16:20

to see like, she

16:23

right before she was supposed to

16:25

get discharged from the hospital. I think it was,

16:27

like, a day or two before she fell

16:29

in broke her hip. Damn. In

16:31

the hospital because they weren't monitoring

16:33

her. And like, she should not have been.

16:36

So

16:36

then you're right back in the fucking hospital. Yeah.

16:39

Mhmm. And then was

16:42

bedridden, then her hip didn't.

16:44

The surgery didn't set right, and nobody

16:46

had ever come to check. And so then it was just

16:48

like not. Like, it was

16:50

not fixable because they would have to do another

16:53

surgery and they're

16:53

like, we don't think she would make it through another surgery.

16:55

We don't think her brain would be able to go through

16:57

it. Because now her hip's just fucked. Yeah. I mean,

16:59

that sounds like a lawsuit, doesn't it? There's

17:01

so like, there have been so many lawsuit

17:04

moments. But I've also had a lot of people in my life that

17:06

are

17:06

like, you can't win against hospitals. Like,

17:08

don't even bother, and

17:10

that's very I mean, So

17:12

probably clean and dry. And that's

17:14

the it's like It'll be caught up in

17:16

courts for years and you just there

17:19

goes all your fucking money.

17:20

Yeah. Yeah. So

17:23

And it doesn't help your mom or bring your

17:25

mom back. That was the thing. It was, like,

17:28

I only have so much. Back to be. Yeah.

17:30

You know what I mean? Only so much one

17:31

time. About

17:32

lawsuit lawsuit, but but also

17:34

falling and breaking your hip and being like, we're just gonna leave

17:36

a fucked up.

17:37

Yeah. It's little

17:38

bit like, there have been so many

17:40

conversations I've had with people where I'm like, I have

17:42

to be high right now. There's no way that

17:44

this is, like, there's no way this

17:47

is really happening. And and So she's

17:49

just gotten the short end of the stick

17:51

so many times with the healthcare system in the last

17:53

couple of years. And they

17:55

after the five months in the hospital, she

17:57

got discharged into an adult family

17:59

home that was about fifteen minutes from where I lived

18:01

and spoke young. And so would just go

18:04

be with her a couple times a

18:06

week and but she needed,

18:08

like, full around the clock. Okay.

18:10

Because now she's basically bedridden

18:12

or she could be put into a wheelchair.

18:15

But Yeah.

18:17

It's been

18:19

it's been easily the most heartbreaking thing

18:22

I've ever gone through these past couple years. It's

18:24

been so

18:24

Thank you. It's just been so Yeah.

18:28

It's so tough. Nobody prepares you for

18:31

that happening with your parent. Okay.

18:33

I have a lot of questions for you. Yeah. Is

18:35

this hereditary? And if so, are

18:37

you fucking terrified?

18:39

Yeah. So I'm gonna

18:42

do some testing soon. Fronto

18:44

temporal dementia is a specific thing.

18:47

We're like, if my mom

18:49

has the certain gene then

18:52

it's a really, really high chance that

18:54

I would have it too. But

18:57

I'm still trying to learn a lot about it because

18:59

it sounds like people are finding more and

19:01

more out about how it can develop

19:03

that like taking certain

19:06

antihistamines every day. Inhalers,

19:09

like albuterol inhalers, which my mom

19:11

was just always using that all

19:13

the

19:13

time. That's some I think they're saying that

19:15

that can lead to that too.

19:17

That's that's what I wanted to say. I wanted

19:20

ask is this could this be from a car

19:22

accident years ago? No.

19:24

I didn't know. So, really, inhalers

19:26

can possibly be cause of this.

19:28

That's, like, recent information. Yeah.

19:30

Have you

19:30

ever used inhalers? Like,

19:32

a few times young, but not I didn't

19:35

really have intense asthma. I had some

19:37

exercise induced asthma when I was young, but

19:39

my mom has always had bad asthma her whole

19:41

life. So she was also inhalers

19:43

all the time and, like, twenty four hour

19:45

inhistamines and stuff

19:47

like that. So they also

19:49

don't know very much about

19:51

it. About this particular disease.

19:53

It's less common than Alzheimer's,

19:55

I believe. So I don't mean to put you on the spot here,

19:57

but do you know the difference between dementia

19:59

and Alzheimer's? Because I don't know the difference.

20:02

I know that it's they are

20:04

both under that umbrella term of dementia.

20:07

All I understand so far

20:09

is that Alzheimer's hits people much

20:11

later. It's like a different It's a different part

20:13

of the brain. It's affecting different part of the brain.

20:15

Yeah. People show

20:17

up. I think they showed

20:20

their signs of it differently as

20:22

well. And that's what's so heartbreaking about

20:24

frontotemporal is because its

20:26

personality changes, and so it can be

20:28

really it's very subtle over time.

20:31

So family members don't really

20:33

know that that's even a possibility. You

20:35

just think like, oh, this person's

20:37

kind of stressed out or they're just kind

20:39

of, like, moms behind all these things. They're just, like,

20:41

behaving weirdly or getting

20:44

really emotional. And this

20:46

also all happened in twenty twenty when everybody

20:48

was acting weird

20:50

and feeling off and all that

20:52

stuff. So and there was so much

20:54

isolation, and I think that can

20:56

really bring out the worst of people. And

20:59

mean, and she wasn't doing anything bad. It

21:01

was just like, I could just tell

21:03

that something was different with

21:05

her. But -- Yeah.

21:07

-- and so where is she now in that home?

21:09

She's yeah. She's in that home. Mhmm. Alright.

21:11

And home's always worrying me too. So are

21:13

they a good for facility? Like, are they taken care

21:15

of? Or do you know what they're giving her and

21:17

all that? Like, are you her, like, ride

21:20

or die for everything in there?

21:21

I've which is unfortunate because

21:25

people tell you a lot in this process

21:27

like just focus on being the daughter.

21:29

Like, just focus on the be be in the daughter,

21:31

let them do their job, but it's like, I have watched

21:33

people fuck up and her

21:36

be the person that is impacted

21:38

by their fuckups so often

21:40

that I don't trust anybody anymore.

21:44

In that world, like, I'm always

21:47

double checking what's going on with her

21:49

and making sure that everything's right because, yeah,

21:51

she's she's had some

21:53

absolute angels of healthcare

21:55

workers that were, like, the greatest people on the

21:57

planet, and then there have been people who

22:00

you're like, how the fuck how did anybody

22:02

let you in here? Listen

22:04

again not to make this about me.

22:06

No. And this is, like, it's weird that this

22:08

is

22:08

appreciate that. Yeah. Because I

22:10

would say, like, let's just say I dealt with a

22:12

hundred different people from nerd, whatever.

22:14

Yeah. Ninety six of them were fan

22:16

fucking fantastic. Amazing, beautiful

22:19

souls, kind, but there were

22:21

four fucking

22:22

assholes. Okay. That

22:24

number by the way, that's a phenomenal

22:26

number cedar sign

22:27

out. Ninety six out of

22:30

a

22:30

hundred. Hey. A plus plus. Okay?

22:32

Yeah. In our health care system

22:33

-- Yeah. -- but those four motherfuckers, if

22:36

you don't stick up for yourself. If

22:38

you are not an advocate for yourself in our

22:40

healthcare system, then they're just gonna fucking

22:42

roll right over you. Or if

22:44

you don't have someone, who can be

22:46

an advocate for you because when you're just fucking

22:50

catatonic for God's sake and

22:53

you have dementia, You can't even remember

22:55

what the fuck they're telling

22:56

you. You don't even know anything. You might

22:58

forget what the hell you're even in there for.

23:00

Exactly.

23:01

So if someone isn't there fighting for

23:03

you. Fuck that daughter shit. I mean, that's great.

23:05

I

23:05

would be both. I would make a for

23:07

advocate and d for daughter,

23:09

and I would just say fuck b and c. Okay.

23:13

Forget this. Yeah. That's

23:16

why I'm on the

23:16

phone. Because

23:18

because because

23:19

I'm on the line. Yeah. Because I ever a daughter

23:21

and yours are doing your job. Yeah.

23:23

It's it's so true

23:25

though. It's Have you had any arguments,

23:27

like, Oh, yeah. Because I you

23:30

you distract me as such a kind person,

23:32

but the half the fucking that's the other thing too.

23:34

It's like the half to go there with somebody. You

23:36

don't wanna go there. Like, I didn't go

23:38

there on the first swing. When the

23:40

lady missed my blood three

23:42

times, then I was like, hey, go get

23:44

some of my nose. I'll do their job, please.

23:46

Okay. You know what I mean? I didn't fucking

23:48

snap the first time. Not even the second

23:50

time. It was the third time. And then

23:52

when she said I did miss and she took fucking

23:55

thing off blood squared on the wall. And I was like, well,

23:57

there's the blood we it. Right there. How about

23:59

you go get somebody knows how to do their job? Am

24:02

I a dick? I don't think

24:03

so. You know what? Is that blood on the

24:05

table? Yeah.

24:08

Yeah.

24:08

There are few of those for sure. Yeah.

24:10

And I always say on the show too, the person.

24:12

You know they call the person who finishes last

24:14

in med school, doctor,

24:17

not to be good? Yes.

24:19

You're like did you get in here? How did you

24:21

fucking get in? How did you do? You do.

24:23

Yeah. Yeah. That's such a good way to put

24:25

it to that being

24:28

being kind and not being confrontational person.

24:30

I mean, it is so hard for me to

24:33

speak up for myself to talk about that. Like,

24:35

I I am just not that person, especially

24:38

in a medical environment because I haven't I'm

24:40

a fucking clown for a living. don't know.

24:42

I don't know any of these things. And so I

24:44

would see things happening to my

24:46

mom in the hospital. I'd be like, I

24:48

don't love that. Like, that doesn't seem

24:51

like the way that should be done. But

24:53

you're so hesitant to say

24:55

anything and also it's that that

24:58

achy feeling of, like, you don't wanna

25:00

rub anybody here the wrong way because

25:03

when you're not here at

25:04

night, you don't know what they're driving.

25:06

Elbow is all moms. Yeah. don't

25:08

know. For real. Like, there are all those

25:10

horror stories, but it's true. And

25:13

So I was always trying and still

25:15

am trying to walk that line

25:17

between making sure she's being taken care

25:19

of. Being on good terms

25:21

with the people taking care of her. But, like, if

25:23

something goes wrong, making sure

25:25

they know, like, I I know what's

25:28

happening. And so we

25:30

watched

25:31

a nurse just not give my mom

25:33

her main medication for a week?

25:35

A week. When do you speak up

25:37

to that? We didn't know what was going on

25:39

until I

25:42

just I was like, god, she's acting so

25:44

different. Just out of nowhere. And we

25:46

know that there are these declines

25:48

in the dementia and it will keep going down, but

25:50

it just it felt like something

25:52

had triggered a decline. And we were like,

25:55

gosh, she's acting so much more

25:57

out of it and different than usual. And

26:00

so I called the, like,

26:02

overseeing nurse who

26:05

isn't always at the home and I

26:07

had said, you know, can you

26:10

just check because I don't know.

26:12

I just feel like something's off and

26:14

one of the nurses just had, like,

26:17

they there had been an issue with getting

26:19

their prescription refilled, and they just hadn't continued

26:21

to follow-up. So they just my mom just

26:23

didn't They just

26:25

didn't say anything. They just didn't give her

26:27

her main medication for a week, which

26:30

completely made her go off the

26:32

rails. And then it made her

26:34

decline. And it's like, you know,

26:36

there are only so many steps that you can go down

26:39

before you are

26:40

done. And so that I

26:42

was lipid.

26:44

So what happened? Who did you yell at that lady?

26:46

I yelled at the main the

26:49

woman who runs the home.

26:51

How that feel when you were done? I

26:54

mean, it it feels good to stand up

26:56

for what's right, but you also are

26:58

like, I just wish this hadn't happened.

27:01

Because, again, it's all my mom is

27:03

the one who suffers. What was your

27:06

reaction to them when they drop when your

27:08

mom broke her hip and shit? Like,

27:11

did you go nuts then? I would have just been

27:13

beyond

27:14

myself. Yeah. Like, who how

27:16

do you even do that? Yeah. Mhmm.

27:19

And it's hard because a lot of the excuses

27:21

that were being used during those

27:23

five months in the hospital were well, it's COVID time. Like,

27:25

we're short staffed. There's just so much this is just such

27:27

a hard time. And it's like, that is true.

27:30

That is a a thing that I understand

27:32

is going on that is hard. However, it's

27:35

like, there are

27:37

still things that shouldn't be happening.

27:40

And that's why I felt like

27:43

hey, I I love my mom so much

27:45

and there was just no

27:47

way she was gonna be in there without

27:50

me wanting to be

27:51

there?

27:51

Are you the only child? I'm

27:53

my I have a younger brother who's about six years younger

27:56

than me, but he lives out

27:58

of state. His wife was pregnant

28:00

at the time, like, just a really hard

28:02

time for him to be able to come

28:04

much, but Yeah.

28:07

It just I lost my

28:09

train of thought, but you love your moms. Oh,

28:11

yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And oh, because of COVID that

28:15

I could see that the nurses were

28:18

too loaded up. They had so many patients

28:20

each that if

28:23

they would try to feed my mom and my

28:25

mom wouldn't really, like, take to it,

28:27

they're not gonna sit there for an hour and try to

28:29

get her to eat. They're just gonna die. I don't know. She didn't

28:32

eat and then they're gonna go to the next room. But

28:34

if I'm there, I'm gonna make sure she eats. So

28:36

it's like it

28:39

it sucked to feel that pressure, but I

28:41

know I just knew that, like, because of the situation

28:43

it was in, people can slip

28:45

through the cracks in the hospital so easily.

28:47

Yeah. Especially if they can't advocate

28:50

for

28:50

themselves. Yes. Yeah. For

28:52

sure. Yeah. I mean, I know I had

28:54

nurses coming from. One will be from

28:56

Monrovia. And I'm like, damn, we drove all the way from

28:58

and then it'd be Pomona. Then it'd be somewhere

29:00

else. I'm like, damn. And they're never the same. They're

29:02

rotate and either floors

29:04

in the same building or different hospitals

29:07

in the same network. They're never I

29:09

mean, if I had the same nurse maybe two

29:12

days or two nights in a

29:13

row, that was, like, the closer

29:15

to you guys are

29:16

knowing some regular person. Right.

29:18

Who knew your shit? You know what I

29:19

mean? That's still great thing every time a

29:21

new person comes in, you gotta

29:23

tell them your shit again. Well, I'm originally

29:26

here for a back surgery. To

29:29

do, like, all the way, and you get so tired talent, but

29:31

it's a new person almost every fucking time.

29:33

Yes. Exactly. And that makes it

29:35

so hard too. Amazing. Sucks.

29:38

Oh my god. I'm having conversations with

29:40

them, like, this is what you gave. This is high

29:42

fructose corn syrup. Like, we're talking about

29:44

all these health

29:45

issues.

29:45

Yeah. And I think a lot of it starts with our

29:48

diet. Yeah. And look what you guys give

29:50

us and the nurse is like, you're not wrong. She goes the

29:52

same thing in schools. I go, you're right. Given

29:54

kids and us all this shit all the time, then

29:56

we come to places like

29:58

this, and then you give a shit.

30:00

And it's just a

30:00

cycle. Yeah. Where we are? Mhmm. I know

30:02

because that's the cheap stuff. So it's just

30:05

easier to eat. You want cheese? I gotta swear

30:07

to God. I gotta crap. Listen. I

30:09

do. I'm not above a craft

30:10

single. Alright. But I wanna get

30:12

it. I wanna get it.

30:14

Don't give me that in the hospital. You

30:17

know what I'm saying? Unpeeling, put

30:19

it on the fucking turkey burger, and don't

30:21

tell me. But don't give it. They gave it to

30:23

me, like like, somebody was like, wait.

30:25

Wait. Wait. I gotta he would wanna he woulda cheese, and for us

30:27

to be touched. Don't watch it. Like,

30:32

let me so hard to go out.

30:34

Let me buy it. Let me go down

30:36

this rabbit hole.

30:37

Biggie, you can. I'll bet you won't even craft.

30:39

It was probably a Kroger. It was probably

30:41

a Kirkland signature. Yeah. It was Kroger's

30:44

a veteran. Definitely.

30:45

Definitely. Because they probably had a sleeve

30:48

on, like, this, Kirkland.

30:50

I don't know if you could launch it from across

30:52

the room. Right. The way that those things stick

30:54

to

30:54

empire. If the

30:55

floor's get across, it gets wrapped. Don't worry.

30:57

Throw it bunch of rain. Yeah.

31:00

That's definitely what happened. You're

31:02

a second dusty system. You're

31:04

a second

31:05

dusty. You might as well be a star in the fucking

31:07

solar system. Absolutely. And it's disgusting.

31:09

It's so they're it's

31:11

just a filthy place.

31:14

Yeah. It's really really rough.

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honeydew. Nah. Let's

35:03

get back to the doo. So those her

35:05

five months in the hospital completely

35:08

changed me as a person. I mean, I

35:10

just saw so many things that I had never

35:12

never seen before, never known that

35:14

that's how the healthcare system worked. I was

35:17

so disappointed by so

35:19

many things. But again, like you said, there are

35:22

healthcare workers out there that are

35:23

incredible. It's just it just takes

35:25

a few

35:26

Thank you. Health care workers for real. Yeah.

35:28

Seriously. Seriously? It's our

35:29

end charge nurse is all all of you.

35:31

Yeah. Yeah.

35:32

Because the there are some that go so

35:35

far above and beyond. And those ones, you're

35:37

like, I I mean, it

35:39

blows your mind because you can't believe that

35:41

they could also be working alongside the people who

35:43

just don't give us shit.

35:44

Yeah. I had great surgeons that didn't big

35:46

time me and didn't make me feel stupid. And I would

35:48

even tell him, listen, I don't I I'd

35:50

make people laugh for a living. I'm a clown. Like,

35:52

you said, like -- Yeah. -- it's okay to talk to

35:54

me, like, I'm stupid. But tell me what the

35:57

fuck's going on really, you know. And then some

35:59

of them would sit there for thirty minutes and

36:01

answer every question I had. You

36:03

know, and I'm like, thank you. Thank you very much.

36:06

And I've I've tried not to go

36:08

to the Internet with all the shit because I'll just

36:10

freak myself out. And I've tried to act like it's

36:12

the eighties and I'm just listening to the doctors.

36:14

I haven't googled one thing about what's happened

36:16

to me right now because I'm terrified. Okay.

36:19

To read it. I'm terrified. I'm gonna have

36:21

to, but I'm fucking terrified to

36:23

do

36:23

it. I'm just listening to these doctors and

36:25

going to my appointments and doing what they say

36:27

to do. Yeah. No. I think that's

36:29

I think that's the way to do it because the Internet

36:32

is definitely can be that black

36:34

hole feeling where you just keep going and keep going and keep

36:36

Yeah.

36:36

My regular doctors, like, stop Google and --

36:38

Yeah. -- and you're gonna you're gonna have AIDS. You're gonna

36:40

think you have AIDS. It's it's it's

36:43

always like I got to have AIDS. It's like Sickler

36:46

degrees of Every Yeah. Everything

36:48

leads back to kids. But yeah.

36:50

So she

36:53

she has kind of gone up and

36:55

down and

36:56

Is she still there? And that She's still there right

36:58

now. We there

37:01

was a so in June, I

37:03

flew to London to shoot a TV

37:06

show. We're so excited. I landed

37:08

in London. And had been

37:10

there for less than twenty four hours when

37:12

I got a call saying your mom had a sudden

37:14

decline. Like, we don't know

37:16

if this is it, but, like, you might wanna

37:19

come back. Whoa. So I

37:21

got back on a plane, didn't

37:23

shoot the TV show, just like told my

37:25

agent, so I was like, III could not

37:28

live with myself if I just stayed here

37:30

for a week, if this is

37:32

the time that this is happening. And so

37:34

flew back. Oh,

37:35

you were gonna be there for a full week?

37:37

Yeah. Mhmm. Flue back to Spokane.

37:40

She was basically

37:43

catatonic again and

37:45

then pulled out it.

37:47

It's so crazy to watch somebody be

37:50

Truly on, like, the brink of death

37:53

and then something in their brain kind of

37:55

wakes them back up again. So tell

37:57

me about that. Did you were you there for that,

37:59

like, one night she's got a tonic. You come in the

38:01

next day and she's talking

38:02

it. Mhmm. Or how, like, how much is

38:04

she actually speaking? And does she remember

38:06

you? And So those

38:09

times where she's come out of being catatonic, it's

38:11

a little gradual where she's not maybe

38:13

somewhere she's not able to say, full sentences

38:16

maybe it's just she'll, like, do

38:18

a little laugh here and there, but her

38:20

eyes will be open, which is

38:23

such a massive difference from somebody who's just completely

38:25

unresponsive. And and not taking in food

38:27

or water. So she's she's

38:31

been she's gone on hospice

38:34

like three different times and pulled

38:36

out of hospice three different

38:38

times. So

38:40

I mean, we're

38:41

talking about the brink of everything. Yeah.

38:43

It feels like for

38:47

for me, it feels like you're about to

38:49

get hit by a train. And

38:51

then somebody pulls that they don't

38:53

get rid of the train. They just pull it back further

38:55

on the tracks. Because I know that that train is

38:57

gonna hit me at some point. But

39:00

it's your

39:02

mom going on hospice and being,

39:04

like, with doctors telling you, yeah, this is probably

39:07

gonna be it. And then she pulls through

39:09

over and over again. I mean, it it

39:13

ages you five thousand years.

39:15

I believe Like, it's it's the most

39:18

horrible

39:18

draining. Yeah. I

39:20

mean, you go from the lowest to the low, to

39:22

a high, but knowing like

39:25

you just said that that no matter

39:26

what, it's common. Yeah. Tell me what

39:28

a mind fuck. Yeah. It

39:31

keeps you in that place. I

39:33

can't believe it's been two years because when she

39:35

went in, like I said -- Yeah. -- they were

39:37

saying she's kind of a medical

39:39

miracle based on her MRI because

39:41

they were like, the way her brain works, it's like, this

39:43

is she's not gonna really

39:45

have much left. And she

39:49

she's had moments. So I I

39:51

pulled her food small table out of

39:53

storage. And got it moved into

39:56

the adult family home so that

39:58

I can wheel her up in the wheelchair and we

40:00

can play a little

40:01

Does she play? So there were

40:03

time maybe, like, a year ago that shoe could

40:05

still have some motor

40:07

skills there and could

40:08

still, like, do some tic tacs and shoe. And

40:10

now it was so insane to watch

40:12

and I was so

40:14

Do those people there know that your mom is a

40:16

hall of fame, a football player?

40:18

Yeah. So here's and

40:19

I If you don't know, Kelsie's mom is

40:21

a hall of fame football player.

40:23

Yeah. So

40:25

What's your mom's name? I'm sorry. What's your mom's name? Kathy.

40:27

Kathy. Alright. So I've started to

40:29

open up about the dementia stuff on stage

40:32

during this tour and that's

40:34

one of the things I say is that My mom's

40:36

in the Fuspa Hall of Fame. And every time she gets

40:38

a new nurse, they always ask her about her

40:39

life. And my mom's always like, well, I'm in the Fuspa

40:42

Hall of Fame. So

40:42

your mom remember everything.

40:44

Yeah. And then the nurse goes. Sure

40:46

we are.

40:49

God is crazy. Yeah.

40:51

It is a weird thing to say to the Vonage

40:53

holiday. And I'm like, Oh, yeah. No.

40:55

I know that sounds crazy, but I swear it's around the

40:57

nurses like, hey, you don't have. It

41:04

is a weird thing to say. You would think

41:07

Samayah would make that

41:08

It sounds like you're on this Street

41:10

in Santa Monica saying shit to

41:12

people.

41:13

It doesn't sound like it's I'm

41:15

like, it's it would be more believable that

41:18

she was in the WNBA. Because

41:20

at least that's what you think people know

41:22

about. And then I'll, like, keep going

41:24

with the nurse. I'll be like, no. Like, I I really

41:27

I could show you, like, trophies. I can show you

41:29

videos of her. I gotta get to the next

41:31

floor. You gotta work

41:33

too much

41:33

there if I got awful. They start looking

41:35

at the other nurses like does the daughter have

41:37

dementia too? Because it's like a family

41:40

plan T Mobile dementia that

41:42

they're on in the home. Oh, yeah.

41:45

Oh god. Alright. But yeah, it's

41:48

like nobody's ever gonna

41:50

believe that in that home, but

41:53

it's so or not. It's

41:55

so unbelievable. But it's

41:57

true. It's just

41:58

so unbelievable. That sex is tornado

42:00

tornado in the middle of

42:01

that. I know.

42:04

I know. She's so cute planned,

42:06

but I I was there

42:08

with her five days ago and wheeled

42:11

her up to it. And it's been a little while

42:13

since she's wanted to play and her

42:16

I think her some of the muscles in her arms

42:18

are starting to atrophy little bit because she was having

42:20

trouble even doing it, and then she said it was hurting.

42:23

And it was so fucking

42:26

devastating because I was there with her for a

42:28

few hours and I know

42:30

she recognized me when I walked in. She, like,

42:32

I bent down and hugged her in the wheelchair, and she's like,

42:34

I'm so proud of you. I love you so much. And

42:36

we had you know, a nice time. Our

42:39

conversations now are not really, like,

42:41

coherent, but, you know, she's

42:44

she'll talk to me and stuff. And then at the

42:46

end of my visit with her,

42:48

she just looked at me and

42:50

said, and who

42:52

were you again? And it was

42:55

Oh, is that the first time? Yeah.

42:57

That's the first time. There was that moment

42:59

in the hospital, like I mentioned, really early on, but

43:01

she was so -- Right. -- was in like panning

43:04

attack all the time that I was like, this just doesn't

43:06

I don't know. It was a different thing. This

43:08

this absolutely

43:10

knocked all the wind out of me. was so

43:12

not expecting it, especially because I'd

43:14

been with her for a few hours

43:17

and everything seemed to be

43:19

like that she registered it was me. And

43:21

I think she had started to get kind of tired toward the end

43:23

of our visit. And

43:26

I think things were kind of firing less in her

43:28

brain, but it's so

43:31

chilling to have your parent look you in the highs

43:34

and not know who you are. Like, that's

43:36

something that nobody can prepare you for.

43:38

It disturbs you on a

43:41

level. Like, I've been having nightmare sense

43:43

because it just it it

43:45

completely fucks with, I think, some of the

43:47

really foundation parts of being human

43:50

that like that is your parent, that's the

43:52

person who knows you, all of those just

43:54

like, from the amount of

43:56

people who love. Yeah. Stuff

43:58

of that that person will always know

44:01

me. They'll always be my parent,

44:03

my protect her all of that.

44:05

And so for her to, in that

44:07

moment, not know it was

44:09

me, was yeah. That

44:11

was a really bad day. That was a a lot

44:13

of tears that day.

44:14

Out bet. Yeah. How did you answer

44:16

it?

44:16

I said, I'm your daughter, Kelsey,

44:18

and Chewy. She said it, oh, I would be her

44:21

mom. And I'm like, oh, you're Yeah.

44:23

Yeah. I started to get choked up, but I was

44:25

trying to not cry hard

44:27

because I didn't wanna make her feel

44:29

bad. Or

44:29

you're like, I'm the person who probably gave this

44:31

genius too. Oh, that's

44:34

it. You want me all day together. Yeah.

44:40

She I told her it was me

44:42

and she said, okay. And then

44:45

a couple minutes went by. And she was like,

44:47

I'm just worried, I'm abandoning her.

44:49

And I said, who? And she said, KelseyDew.

44:52

And I said, but I'm I'm

44:54

Kelsey and you're you're not abandoning me.

44:56

It's okay. Like, you know, I was so emotional.

44:59

But what my cousin and I have noticed, my

45:01

cousin visits a lot too, is sometimes

45:03

my mom thinks she's thirty years younger than she is.

45:05

Like, if you ask her how old she is, she'll be like, I'm forty

45:07

two. She just turns seventy. And

45:10

so that makes in her mind

45:13

me and my brother

45:14

kids. Mhmm. And

45:17

so I think

45:18

Oh, that's fucking. Actually, that's

45:20

a wild

45:20

Isn't that interesting? Yeah. So I

45:22

figured my

45:23

math is I'm forty two of my

45:25

children would be children, not this grown

45:27

woman that standing here with me right now.

45:30

Right. So I think in that moment, it

45:32

wasn't necessarily that I didn't exist

45:34

to her. Mhmm. It's that she

45:36

is thinking I'm a child and it's, god,

45:38

it is so gut

45:41

wrenching because she has always been the greatest mom

45:43

on the planet. And so, like, one of those parents

45:45

that's just always been all about her

45:47

kids, making sure her kids are okay. And

45:50

that to me I think is a circle of hell

45:52

that this disease has put thoughts

45:55

in her mind that, like, her young

45:57

kids are in a house somewhere and

45:59

that she's abandoned them, that they

46:01

they can't take like, that they're like, where's

46:03

my mom? Like, that's what she in those

46:06

moments. I think things is happening.

46:08

So that's why me standing there. It's like,

46:10

well, that can't be my daughter because my daughter's

46:13

kit. I mean,

46:15

this is all I I don't know

46:17

for sure, but we've just tried to kind of piece

46:19

together some things like that and it's

46:22

not linear. It's not like like I

46:24

talked to her on the phone on the way here. And

46:28

I was like, hi, mom. She's like, hi sweetheart. Like

46:30

she knew it was me,

46:33

but the fact that it it even

46:35

happened, now I know that it's,

46:38

like, probably, we'll keep happening and

46:42

Yeah. It's it is the

46:44

longest goodbye. It's so hard.

46:47

It's so fucking hard.

46:49

Do you ever talk to her about

46:52

do you remember yesterday when you didn't remember

46:54

me? Do you ever talk about the moment she doesn't

46:56

remember when she's actually with you and

46:58

really, like, there. Say,

47:00

like, yesterday, you didn't even recognize me or

47:02

do you ever do that? No. I I

47:05

mean, I'll ask her, like, Like,

47:07

I was like, what did you think of the Super Bowl to see

47:09

if she would could kind of remember watching

47:11

that

47:11

yesterday? But

47:13

Did she watch it? Did she She did The

47:16

way she responded sounded like

47:18

maybe she didn't fully remember. She's also

47:20

here's the thing my mom is in Mensa. She's

47:23

She has her masters in French literature. She

47:25

speaks like three languages. She's one of

47:27

the most brilliant people on the planet.

47:30

And so I think Even with

47:32

dementia, there are times where she'll still try to hide

47:35

that she doesn't know how

47:37

to communicate

47:37

properly.

47:38

Does she remember the other languages she spoke?

47:40

I'll speak so French with her sometimes. Like, that's still

47:43

in there. Yeah. Not great,

47:45

but -- But enough. --

47:46

yeah. She was my high school French teacher. No.

47:48

Mhmm.

47:48

Get the

47:48

fuck out. Yeah. What grade did you get?

47:51

Hey. Is I was out of the art.

47:54

I was in the art, but Yeah. She was,

47:56

like, everybody's favorite teacher. So

47:58

that's been so cool too is, like, whenever

48:00

I do shows and spoken in the merch line, there are always

48:03

so many people that were former students of hers that

48:05

just have so much love for her.

48:08

Yeah. But I

48:10

try not to say anything to her that would

48:12

make her feel bad for having dementia.

48:15

Because she can't control it.

48:17

It's not her fault. I know that she already

48:21

is just struggling so much all the time

48:23

that I think any sort of thing

48:25

where I'm like, hey, do you remember that you didn't

48:28

recognize me would break

48:30

her

48:30

heart? Yeah. And it's like, And then

48:32

there's no point. Yeah.

48:34

Is she up and around or she just in a wheelchair?

48:36

Right? She's in a wheelchair. So some days,

48:39

she doesn't want to leave the

48:41

bed. Some days, they

48:43

I mean, they always, like, try to encourage her. Like, let's get

48:45

into let's get you in the wheelchair and so she

48:47

can, like, kinda get out of the room. But Yeah.

48:50

It's it

48:53

it fucking sucks to know that

48:55

she's, like, mostly just watching TV

48:57

a lot of the days, but, like, there's

49:00

not there aren't that

49:02

many things that she is interested

49:04

in fashion or so I

49:06

played it for her on my lap top

49:08

a few months ago when Sid had been done

49:10

getting edited because my my agent

49:12

actually was really smart to suggest

49:14

that he was like, you never know. And she's

49:17

had so many ups and downs. Like, if you have

49:19

the finished product, I would watch

49:21

it with her right now while you can just in case.

49:23

So I watched it with her and she I,

49:26

like, dedicated to her at the end and there's

49:28

some food spa stuff at the end and she

49:30

was like tearing up for that and was really proud.

49:32

So That's nice. Good. Yeah. Yeah. For

49:35

you. I feel really lucky I gotta do that with her.

49:37

Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

49:39

It's so weird to come. I just

49:41

talked about this on my podcast

49:43

self help list for the first time, but that show we,

49:45

like, get into serious

49:47

stuff from time to time. I'm just so used to

49:50

even on the doo with you talking about,

49:52

like, funnier things sometimes. It's weird to

49:54

come here and just kind of have, like, a

49:56

very somber therapy

49:58

session.

49:58

Well, what you're going through is not fucking

50:01

--

50:01

Yeah. --

50:01

fun and you're currently going through it. This isn't

50:04

story that happened to you fifteen

50:06

years ago

50:07

-- Right. --

50:07

that you've gone to therapy already about

50:10

and you've dealt with and you've thought these different things.

50:12

And over time, maybe you're opinions

50:14

and attitudes have changed in one

50:16

way or another

50:17

for this is happening to you right now.

50:19

So It's yeah. You know, it's interesting

50:21

to see where you'll be

50:24

ten years from now with this. Because

50:26

you also have your own concerns about your

50:28

own health.

50:29

Yeah. And I've

50:30

got a genetic thing that could kill me

50:32

easily. So I I'm I'm aware

50:35

of, like

50:36

Yeah. And nobody else in my family got it.

50:38

They all My family does it. I'm like, god

50:40

damn it. For

50:42

real. I'm a twin. I'm

50:44

a twin, and I got it. Not my brother,

50:47

but

50:47

that's what happens when your fraternal, your separate

50:49

eggs. And if we write that up, we'd either

50:51

both have it or not --

50:52

Okay. -- internal on my own Xigot.

50:55

Boom. I get this stupid fucking thing. Yeah.

50:58

I'm so sorry. Yeah.

51:00

And, you know, my mom has been

51:02

divorced for since

51:05

I was five. Okay. So that

51:08

has been a a tough part of it too

51:10

is that it did kind of all fall

51:13

on me in terms of her immediate

51:15

family. She didn't have a partner. Or

51:17

anything like that. And Is

51:19

your dad alive? He is. Mhmm. Do you talk

51:21

to him about it?

51:22

Yeah. My end is nice. My

51:24

dad has been a huge support system

51:26

for me, so I

51:27

Has you visited your mom? No.

51:30

But they didn't have that kind of a relationship where

51:32

where they would have done that. I I don't think my mom would

51:34

have wanted that to be honest, but but my

51:37

dad has really really been there for me. He was so

51:39

so nice to have around and

51:41

spoken especially during the hospital months because

51:44

he would like swing by the hospital drop

51:46

off food for me because I really I would

51:48

be there the whole day. And,

51:52

yeah, that that was huge to have

51:54

him around for sure and still have him around.

51:57

But yeah. So it's

51:59

been it's been crazy.

52:01

I was talking about the the London thing

52:04

and then it would was

52:06

it two weeks after that?

52:09

Yeah. Two weeks after that, I shot my special

52:11

in Denver. And I

52:14

got there a couple days early

52:17

before before shooting the special

52:19

and I got a call from the guardian when

52:22

I got there that they were officially putting

52:24

my mom back on hospice because

52:26

the the London thing was a couple weeks before

52:28

that. So she had, like, kind of pulled out of being catatonic.

52:31

I was still not doing great. And

52:34

I was just like in the comedy condo

52:37

playing old voice mails from my mom just

52:39

like

52:39

balling. Right. Before your Right. The voice mails.

52:42

Balling. It

52:45

was two days before. wasn't like I was about

52:47

to walk on

52:47

stage. It wasn't like my name on this voice

52:49

messages, my walk on music for the I've

52:51

heard everything. Kirsten and I heard a story.

52:54

I'm not gonna name the comic, but one

52:57

of the waitresses walked in and he was Yeah. That's

52:59

it. And she's like, excuse me. He's like, I'm not fucking

53:01

talking to you, and then realizes

53:03

that right before he goes up, he's on

53:05

a fucking sex thing

53:07

with the, like, a live sex thing having this

53:10

girl do

53:10

shit. And and she's like, that's your fucking

53:13

Why? That's what you're doing before you walk up

53:15

on stage and

53:16

to make you I'm curious who that is.

53:19

I'll tell you. I'll tell you after we're out here

53:21

for sure. If you're over there, it's a

53:23

solventeer.

53:26

I mean, again I never realized

53:28

got their thing. You know what I mean?

53:30

That way, it wasn't the day of

53:32

the special. I don't know

53:34

Yes. Oh, it wasn't right before they said,

53:36

Kelsey, Coke. It wasn't right there. We're like,

53:38

what a hard time. Hey,

53:42

guys. No.

53:46

But it is. It's like the sad

53:49

clown thing of you

53:51

go on stage. Oh. Tap.

53:53

No. It's okay. Tap dance around. Make

53:56

people laugh. Compartmentalize.

53:59

Feel

53:59

good for yourself. Okay. Feel good. Yes.

54:01

Of course. But people have no

54:03

idea unless you tell them. In

54:06

your act, what's going on? And

54:08

for the last two years, I haven't. So I

54:10

would be having moments like that where I was just like,

54:13

the lowest and low, just broken

54:16

hearted, solving, and then just

54:19

k. Go on stage. So

54:22

it's it's been

54:24

a lot.

54:26

What do you what's your biggest concern

54:28

with this for yourself? Moving forward.

54:30

Because if you don't mind me

54:31

asking, you don't have to say how old are you now.

54:33

Oh, I'm I'm thirty three. Alright. So thirty

54:35

three. And let's hit your mom six

54:37

late sixties. Mhmm. So

54:40

look, here's the other thing. You got thirty

54:42

years of advancement, hopefully, in medicine,

54:45

technology, knowledge, edge vacation,

54:47

all of that for for all of us that

54:49

have whatever we have. Yeah.

54:53

Like, does it scare the fuck out of you?

54:55

Yeah. Because this our job is

54:57

our brain.

54:58

I know. It's memory. It's

55:00

all of that. It's being able to talk.

55:03

So, yeah, it's

55:05

it's terrifying. And I also I feel like

55:07

there are there

55:09

just have been so many other things to be

55:11

thinking about that ironically, that has

55:13

been the last. Because in my mind,

55:16

I'm like, well, if that does happen, it's

55:18

a ways away. I still wanna get tested

55:20

to make sure I can, like, if that is the case

55:22

that I can take whatever precautions

55:24

I can. But just when

55:27

you do feel like the train is about to

55:29

hit with your mom, you're always

55:32

focusing on that and trying to

55:35

have, like, my tour schedules craze.

55:37

It's like so much going on all the time.

55:40

Yeah. And so

55:42

one thing that I

55:44

did recently, which was

55:46

so hard for me to do,

55:49

but I moved from Spokane to

55:51

Minnesota. And because

55:53

also touring out of Spokane for a year

55:55

and a half,

55:56

Yeah. You're as far away as you can fucking

55:58

be for those flights. You are.

56:00

Every flight felt like an international flight -- Yeah.

56:02

-- every week because Spokane is a tiny

56:04

airport It's way in the corner of the country.

56:07

No nonstop flights. Maybe

56:10

a couple flight time

56:12

options each day. Crazy time

56:14

zone changes. It was like, I came

56:16

home every week, just a shell of

56:19

a purse. Like, it was getting to be so hard

56:21

on my body for a year and a half, so

56:23

my boyfriend lived in Minnesota. We

56:26

wanted to live together. I didn't it

56:28

didn't make sense for him to come to

56:30

Spokane, then he's, you know, touring

56:33

too. We would both be dealing with Spokane

56:35

airport every week. But it was so hard

56:37

for me to make that decision

56:39

to move away from my mom when I had been

56:42

within fifteen minutes of her for the last

56:44

couple years. But I also

56:46

knew that I feel like

56:49

being that close to her was

56:52

kind of killing me because I

56:54

was I've I've just cried

56:56

so much the last couple years and

56:58

I learned I was looking

57:00

online. I know that we're not supposed to Google, but I

57:02

did Google because I was like, this feels I was

57:04

gonna

57:04

Google. I just thought yet. Yeah. I'm

57:06

not ready. I found something

57:08

called the prolonged grief syndrome

57:11

or something like that, and I

57:13

related to it a lot. It's in situations

57:15

like this where it's a very long

57:17

goodbye. It's not the like, you don't

57:19

get a complete the grief cycle in a

57:22

normal

57:23

healthy period of time. It's not like

57:25

you lose somebody and you go, it's like this.

57:28

It's gonna

57:28

be a year's thing. Yeah. Slowly slipping

57:31

away of the person. And it

57:34

kind of holds you in

57:36

this mental state that you shouldn't be

57:38

in. So I've just like, everything

57:40

feels so high, like, every conversation with my

57:42

mom. I feel so it

57:45

feels so dear to me, but that's like a

57:47

lot of pressure to be living like

57:49

that for two years where you want every

57:51

interaction to be. Amazing,

57:54

imperfect, and meaningful. And

57:57

I think I needed I needed

57:59

some distance from it

58:01

in just a healthy way so that I could

58:04

also be able to function. And

58:06

that that was so hard for me because I felt like,

58:09

god is that is that fucked

58:11

up to move

58:11

away? But

58:12

Well, there's also something to be said for living

58:14

your life and not someone else's death.

58:17

Oh. You know what I

58:18

mean? Yeah. Because that's a powerful

58:20

quote. They're really Oh. I just made that up. Look

58:22

at you. Yeah. I believe that. Like, because

58:24

I understand what you're saying. You're you're in

58:26

a you're in a ton you're in a vacuum --

58:28

Yeah. -- a dark fucking vacuum.

58:31

Yeah.

58:32

Anxiety and fear and

58:34

unknown of everything. You're

58:36

hospice, you're out. You know, catatonic,

58:39

you're out. What's gonna happen with

58:41

me, you know, that sort of thing. You there's a lot.

58:43

And you're right. I mean, our brain is our job.

58:45

Here's the thing. Like, my business manager was like,

58:47

we should talk about what's

58:51

it called disability insurance?

58:53

And I was like, you know how fucking insurance companies

58:55

are? They're gonna say he's a comedian. He could roll on

58:57

age and tell jokes, which I could, I

58:59

have to roll up to this table. He goes,

59:02

yeah, you could. But then the

59:04

guys in the hospital are like, well, they're also you

59:06

could stroke and I was like, hadn't

59:09

hadn't even considered stroke. Like, they

59:11

keep saying shit to me and I'm

59:12

like, Yeah.

59:14

Yeah. So then I'm like, well,

59:16

then that is my job. I can't fucking

59:18

perform even though I have a stroke, you

59:20

know. Right. And do you recover fully from

59:23

that, you know, all these things you start thinking about,

59:25

especially as we get older with our

59:27

fucking DNA --

59:28

Yes. -- that we don't get the pick Yeah.

59:30

You know what I mean? We don't get the picketting. You

59:32

just get signed to

59:33

this fucking rock and outer space. It's like, miss

59:36

the shit you

59:36

got. It's your card. Yeah. Oh,

59:39

I'm not gonna hear about this till my thirties.

59:41

Okay. Cool. Cool. Alright. Okay. Yeah.

59:44

And I gotta worry about that for the rest of the

59:46

rest of my fucking life. Yeah. Nope.

59:48

Yeah. It's

59:51

a lot. And one of my friends who lost

59:53

her mom to cancer a few years back,

59:55

so she lost her, you know, also at a

59:57

young age. She was like,

1:00:00

your mom loves you so much and

1:00:02

you and your brother are her pride

1:00:04

and joy. If you run

1:00:06

yourself completely into the ground

1:00:10

to try to help her

1:00:13

constantly you're doing

1:00:15

her a disservice.

1:00:16

Like, she made you so that

1:00:18

you could go -- Live your best. -- live your

1:00:20

best lap. believe as a father I'm telling you

1:00:23

right now will bum me out to have my daughter there

1:00:25

every day. It would. Wow. Every

1:00:27

day, I'm like, go. You're weight you're

1:00:29

wasting your life. God, that's

1:00:31

wasting

1:00:32

it. You have no idea how much

1:00:34

that means to me to hear that from parents' parents'

1:00:36

parents. Yeah. My daughter's only eight, and I'm getting

1:00:38

chills now, but I would be like go. Go

1:00:40

fucking hang out with your friends

1:00:42

tonight. Don't

1:00:42

get here.

1:00:43

This is a dark fucking the

1:00:45

place. Once in a while, great, because I wanna

1:00:47

see you or

1:00:47

your face

1:00:48

time. Right. Okay. So let me ask you moving

1:00:50

to Minnesota. How has it helped you?

1:00:53

Or has it? It it's pretty

1:00:55

remarkable how even in the What's

1:00:57

it been now five, six weeks since I've moved?

1:01:00

I I cry so much less

1:01:02

because I'm just not I'm

1:01:05

just not accessing that part of

1:01:07

my brain as much. I

1:01:09

still talk to her on the phone all the

1:01:11

time, but it I

1:01:15

think it's been so healthy for me just

1:01:17

in every way. Every part of my life feels

1:01:19

healthier. Of course, the travel has been so much

1:01:21

easier, and I think that just helps

1:01:23

everything, but emotionally it

1:01:26

feels like that's what needed to happen

1:01:28

as I needed a little bit of separation because

1:01:31

it was as if there was still like an

1:01:33

umbilical cord with me and my mom. I felt

1:01:35

like everything she was feeling I was

1:01:37

feeling. And that's

1:01:40

it's a heavy thing. Well,

1:01:43

she's lucky to have you for real.

1:01:45

Thanks. I'm I'm so lucky to have her.

1:01:47

She's Wow.

1:01:47

We're lucky to have you. This has been I

1:01:49

know we gotta get you out of here. This has been

1:01:51

Has it been an hour?

1:01:52

Yeah. Look behind you. We're

1:01:54

right there. Oh my god. That felt like it was

1:01:56

ten minutes. Yeah. I can't wait. We were able to talk

1:01:58

about that that whole time. Well, thank you for doing

1:02:00

it. I know it wasn't easy. Yeah. And

1:02:03

also listen to everybody. Here's the thing I wanna

1:02:05

say this to everybody. I know some of us don't

1:02:07

talk to our family, we're estranged, whatever.

1:02:10

Figure out what the fuck their goddamn

1:02:12

medical history is if you don't talk to them because

1:02:14

their DNA is your fucking

1:02:16

DNA. You can't run from that goddamn DNA.

1:02:19

Yeah. So you also go get

1:02:21

your test done. And maybe you don't maybe you don't

1:02:23

fucking have it.

1:02:24

Maybe I don't yeah. There's a chance I don't.

1:02:27

Maybe you

1:02:27

got your dad's jeans. Yeah. You

1:02:29

know? Yeah. And I would just say if you're

1:02:31

seeing things in

1:02:33

your parent that seem unusual to you,

1:02:35

don't hesitate to take them in. Like,

1:02:38

I don't think anything would have changed if

1:02:40

I had. I mean, this was she

1:02:42

had the disease that was going to happen anyway,

1:02:44

but I just

1:02:46

I think sometimes we think, oh, our parents

1:02:49

know best. Right.

1:02:50

They're the adult. They're the adult. No matter how old

1:02:52

we get, we always think of ourselves as, like, we're the child.

1:02:54

They're the parent. If they say they're okay, they're okay.

1:02:57

But if you're seeing stuff that really does make you go,

1:02:59

hi, it wouldn't hurt for them to, like, get

1:03:01

checked out, go help them get

1:03:03

checked out if you can because

1:03:05

You just never know. You never know. Yeah.

1:03:08

And I know a lot of you are probably going through

1:03:10

this out there, so good luck to you and everybody.

1:03:12

Thank you. That's part of opening up. It's

1:03:14

just till, like, I would like more

1:03:17

community about it because I've kept it to

1:03:19

myself and you do feel so isolated.

1:03:21

So I'm about to start going to, like, support groups

1:03:23

or support groups in Minnesota of family

1:03:25

members of people with front of temporal

1:03:27

dementia. So, yeah, I think

1:03:30

it'll help.

1:03:32

Thank you again. I know this was not easy.

1:03:34

Please plug, promote, everything. Yeah.

1:03:36

So self helpless podcast,

1:03:39

everywhere you listen to podcasts, my special

1:03:41

comes out on March ninth

1:03:43

on YouTube. It will be available

1:03:45

to purchase on my website on February

1:03:47

twenty eighth, so that's kelsey cook dot com. And

1:03:49

my website is also where you can get all of my

1:03:52

tour tickets. I'll be in Cincinnati, Kearny,

1:03:55

Minneapolis coming up, San

1:03:57

Francisco, so many tour dates. So yeah.

1:03:59

Go check it out.

1:04:00

Awesome. Thank you again. And as

1:04:02

always, ryan sickler dot com. Ryan

1:04:04

sickler on all social

1:04:05

media, we'll talk to y'all next week.