A series of decisions determined the end of Anna Marie Garduno’s life.

There was the decision to place her on a ventilator. It was Nov. 16, a week since she was diagnosed with COVID-19, five days since she was admitted to Evans Army Community Hospital. It was 78 years to the day since she’d been born in Las Vegas, New Mexico, to a homemaker and a railroad worker.

This decision was thrown on her daughter, Sheryl Abeyta, as it has been and will continue to be thrown onto countless other children and families. Abeyta felt rushed: It was morning when the hospital called and told her Anna Marie — she went by Lorraine — could die, her oxygen levels had fallen so low. They needed direction. Abeyta told them she had to think.

Federal prison in Colorado allowing COVID to spread largely unchecked, employees allege

She’d just been with her mom the night before. Garduno was in a chair and talking. Her speech was labored, but she was still talking. That was maybe 12 hours ago.

“How could she turn so quickly?” Abeyta wondered.

Two hours after the first call, the hospital called again. Abeyta relented, grappled with this call coming on Garduno’s birthday. She was outgoing, an Army wife during Vietnam, a mother hen to her two children and a frequent hostess for the other wives. She still sang the Everly Brothers at karaoke every Thursday. And somehow, now, she was unable to breathe on her own.

Abeyta wonders — will always wonder — if she should’ve waited. She didn’t know at the time, but more time would pass before the anesthesiologist arrived to sedate Garduno. Could her mother have held on another day? Could Abeyta have held off for a few more hours, so she could’ve gone to see her mom, to try to talk to her? If Abeyta had seen her, maybe she could’ve said, “See, look. She’s sitting up, just like she was last night. She’s OK.”

Broad immunity from omicron surge may bring peaceful months, Colorado modeling projects

“It was her birthday, and if I didn’t put her on a ventilator and she died, that would be awful,” Abeyta said. “But if I did put her on the ventilator, was that depriving her of one more day on oxygen and letting her talk to me one more time?”

There was Garduno’s decision to not get vaccinated, despite Abeyta’s urging. Garduno had strong phobias, and she worried about the side effects — her companion had chills and a fever after getting his vaccine. Garduno had gotten her flu shot in mid-October. If she’d received her COVID vaccine then, too, she would’ve gotten her second dose that same week she was hospitalized.

Back in early September, the family gathered in Abeyta’s backyard for her daughter’s birthday. Over Papa Murphy’s pizza and cake, Abeyta told Garduno to get vaccinated. Her mom had taken the pandemic seriously: She’d masked up, she played bingo in her car, she briefly stopped going to the 11 o’clock Saturday Mass. Her mother’s friends would later tell Abeyta they urged her mom to get vaccinated, too.

Two weeks after Garduno was intubated, the hospital called again and laid another decision at Abeyta’s feet. There had been some positive signs in the two weeks since Garduno had been intubated, hope that had bolstered Abeyta. Her ex-mother-in-law had been on a ventilator, and when the doctors removed it, she drew breath again. 

But Garduno wasn’t getting better. Did her daughter want to keep her on the ventilator? Abeyta went back to the hospital on Nov. 28. She’d arranged for a Catholic priest to come and perform last rites. Her mom’s hands were strapped down, to prevent her from pulling out the tubes pumping air into her lungs. 

The next day, Abeyta and her daughter, bedecked in protective gear, stood on either side of Garduno’s bed. Abeyta could see her reflection in the window, could see the doctors and the nurses and the machines, her mom and her daughter.

“Was this us?” she wondered. “Is this happening? Or is it a dream?”

10,000 deaths: Colorado's grievous losses have devolved into an unwinnable argument

By 9:30 p.m., the providers had taken Garduno off the ventilator. Abeyta tried to absorb what was happening, looked at her reflection again. She hoped her mother would breathe on her own. If she couldn’t, then at least let her hear them saying goodbye. 

There are more decisions now, bringing the others into sharper relief. What should she do with her parents’ brick house in Security-Widefield, the one her dad, Larry, bought back in the ’70s, where her mom would sit and watch the neighborhood from the living room window and where her dad would work in the woodshop. What does she do with her parents’ classic cars, the 1970 Chevelle Super Sport and the ’71 Lincoln Continental?

How should she process this grief? December was hard. Her mom loved to celebrate holidays, but she spent Thanksgiving on a ventilator and Christmas came too late. For weeks, Abeyta was numb, in a daze, going through the motions, all of those inadequate euphemisms for living while shattered. She ground her teeth so hard she cracked a tooth.

Abeyta’s trying not to be angry, but she is. She’s angry at the doctors for not giving her more time to see her mom before they intubated her. She’s angry at the stress placed on the health care system. If her mom had gotten sick in the summer, would she still be here?

Her father died eight years ago, and now she was an orphan.

“I lost part of my heart when my dad died,” she said, “and the rest of my heart when my mom died.”

She’s frustrated, and reeling, and grieving. But she’s beginning to shift her eyes forward. She has a family around her, a granddaughter. Garduno had lived a full life: She was a dancer, a lover of Mexican music and food, an active Catholic, a protective mother who followed her husband’s military career across the world. She twirled and sang up until she got sick.

Those were decisions, too.