Navigating a Power Outage When You’re on an Oxygen Concentrator
My mom, Diana, relied on a plug-in oxygen machine to breathe, and the power was going to be shut off for days. This was back in the late summer of 2019, when she was still on the lung…
The Emotional Support Daughter – a Column by Emma Schmitz
Emma lives in Truckee, California and earned a degree in Literature: Creative Writing from UC Santa Cruz in 2013. Her mother, Diana, was officially diagnosed with pulmonary fibrosis in 2019 and had a single-lung transplant in May 2020. Emma was one of her caregivers during recovery and continues to support her mother from 185 miles away every day. Her column, “The Emotional Support Daughter,” sums up their relationship in a cheeky but loving way, and Emma hopes to depict her mother’s journey through her own lens with equal doses of realism, humor, and compassion.
When Touch Is Forbidden, Food Becomes My Love Language
Last June, my parents and I stayed in a house in San Francisco while my mom, Diana, recovered from a single-lung transplant. Note that this was 2020 — the year of COVID-19. Because I was…
Weighing Risks and Rewards as a Lung Transplant Patient
My mom, Diana, long hoped to outlive both her mother and grandmother. She accomplished that goal some years ago, and thanks to her single-lung transplant last May, she sets a new record every day. Still, everything feels fleeting. Over…
Caring for My Mom When Her Lifesaving Organ Brought Hereditary Risk
Spending a month in San Francisco is a good way to get out of your head. Some people come to the mountains, where I live, to clear their minds. I like to go where the action is in the city to fill my head with things besides my…
I Miss Giving My Mom the Gift of a Good Hug
I don’t know if humans will recover from this pandemic: the lack of touch, the resocializing to keep our distance, the physical isolation. I have dreams where I’m in groups of happy people touching … and those dreams are actually nightmares. My mom is a hugger.
I Now Understand the Importance of Really Washing Your Hands
“Did you wash your hands?” That’s a question I was very familiar with long before the COVID-19 pandemic. My mom, Diana, is an obsessive hand-washer. She is also obsessive about making sure everyone else does it. She’ll merely sense my dad’s craving for…
Finding the Perfect Rental Home for Our Transplant Patient
Care-cation: an extended stay in a place away from home to care for a loved one in need. In the middle of the coronavirus pandemic, we had a week or so to find a six-week-long rental in San Francisco that could house my mom, Diana, who…
Transplant in the Time of Coronavirus
On a beautiful Thursday afternoon late last May, my partner and I took the dogs swimming at our secret spot at a nearby reservoir. A sailboat gliding across the water made me reminisce about sailing in the San Francisco Bay while growing up. The first…
Hello, I’m the Emotional Support Daughter
I was finally at that mature stage in life when you go to beer festivals with your mother. (Oh, that’s not a thing?) On a windy fall day in October 2016, my mom, Diana, and I dressed up as pirates and got…
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