Help Ira after losing Joanne

My beloved mother passed away on August 9th. My father has not only lost his life partner but has also lost nearly half of his income with the loss of my mother's Social Security payments. They had already been struggling financially for many years after my father became disabled over 20 years ago due to Fibromyalgia/Lyme, which was compounded after my mother got sick nearly 7 years ago with Legionnaires' and was shortly thereafter diagnosed with Alzheimer's and consequently became disabled herself. They had to file for bankruptcy for a second time after my mother became ill and was no longer able to work.

Despite his own chronic health issues, my father became my mother's primary caregiver, a role which became increasingly difficult (physically/mentally/emotionally/existentially) as her disease progressed and also not made easier by the concurrent pandemic. He tore the rotator cuff in his dominant arm while maneuvering her last June, which severely impacted his quality of life as well as his ability to care for her. There was a wonderful aide who came to their home for a year, which helped immensely, but the limited weekly hours covered by health insurance was not enough as my mother became completely reliant on others. In January, my father made the difficult decision to put my mother in a nursing home.

My parents moved to Fort Lauderdale in mid-March to be close to my brother. My dad moved into a tiny one bedroom apartment and my mother went into a nursing home. She rapidly declined over the next few months. After just having had pneumonia in January, she got it again in July and spent her 70th birthday barely responsive in the hospice wing of a hospital. She returned to the hospice wing after only a week and a half in a different nursing home, and after 4 agonizing days she passed away - 4 days before my parents' 44th wedding anniversary.

Now my father has not only had to contend with immeasurable grief, he has the added burden of the fresh financial stress of the loss of my mother's Social Security payments. Their combined Social Security income was not even enough to cover all of their monthly expenses, and his situation is more dire now that that income has been slashed nearly in half. We have very luckily secured him a spot in a subsidized affordable senior housing apartment building, which he should be able to move into next month. The decrease in rent will help significantly, but he still will not have enough money to cover his monthly expenses. We are looking into options for him to supplement his income, but he could still really use help getting by right now, especially after everything he has been through over the past few years. My hope is that the love and generosity of family, friends, acquaintances, and perhaps even strangers can help carry him through these most difficult of times and allow him to breathe a little easier as he adjusts to life without my mother.