Mom does not deal with waiting well. She is wandering around, and has been for the last half an hour or so that i've been on the computer. Meanwhile, bubs is talking (loudly) with his friend jeremy about the different sorts of alcohol, and my nerves feel strained to a near breaking point. my friend (aka best friend from home) turns thirty tonight, and as much as i don't want to drive 20 minutes away to see her (when with my windshield currently i have trouble seeing anything at night and was just reveling in my lack of need to drive far at night tonight) i ought to help her celebrate. i'd asked bubs to take me. he declined. he can't, you understand, loudly discuss beer while he's driving.
okay, mom is not going to stop until i give up and give her the computer for solitaire.
Wednesday, January 6, 2010
Saturday, January 2, 2010
i wish you well, i wish you well.......
This weekend (well pre-weekend really), xh., m. her husband, and r. came to visit. They came because, in the past, i have come to philadelphia to celebrate the new year with them, and this year i felt my home life precluded this. (mom is walking to the bank, please hold while i watch to ensure she makes it across safely.) So they came to see me. It was really a blessing, though, as always, nothing turned out so simply as planned.
mom refused to come with us. i was so embarassed, and felt so guilty. bubs has been caught, again, in a quagmire of depression. This is one of the deeper bouts- he lay in bed yesterday, too despondent to get up, and told me with sincere pain in his voice that nothing would help. i know what would help- God can, but he claims he's tried and God isn't answering. i don't know why God is putting him through this, but i know He has a plan, and i pray that the plan leads to good in bubs' life. People don't seem to realize how bad things are for him. our middle sister says he's not truly depressed, and expects him to jump out of it. she thinks i'm enabling him. i live with him though, i see the sadness. Last night he asked if i'd be upset if he shot himself. i don't think he was entirely serious, but it's still a scary question. At any rate, when mom didn't come with us, bubs agreed to stay home with her. i felt so badly that he was missing his party, and that these people had traveled so far because i needed to be with mom, only to discover that i could leave her at home after all. They had the good grace not to appear upset.
r. doesn't seem to get my life situation. he kept asking me why i didn't just spend the night with them, why i didn't go back to philadelphia with them, ribbing me about never coming and visiting. Perhaps i worry too much, perhaps my worries are unfounded, perhaps (i wonder this sometimes) my family would do better without me sometimes if i didn't put so much effort into holding things together. This morning, however, mick and mom had a screaming match over the toilet. They can be so cruel to each other. She can't help her behavior sometimes, and he really can't deal with it right now. Things escalate until he's hitting walls, and she's threatening to call the cops, and maybe hitting him. So am i really overworrying things, and i making things worse by being the mediator instead of forcing them to deal with each other, or am i holding together a situation which, without me, may be quite bad. i told xh. that maybe after mickey calmed down, i would go down there again. Then again, Lord willing, he'll be in an apartment by then. So we both agreed that i probably wouldn't. It's like having to care for a child, except not, because you can force a child to come visiting with you.
The visit itself was great. we fenced with balloon swords, saw a madrigal choir, saw the movie avatar, watched a juggler, walked snowy streets with mom, built a giant snowman. i only freaked out a few times, once afraid to drive home from the movies, which i again felt very guilty about. it was good though. and i considered, on the drive home (having made bubs come get me, a blessing due to the snowy roads actually, so thank God for freak outs), how this way there was no jump into cold water. In the past, when i left for carefree weekends at friends' houses, walking home was a bit of a shock. Don't get me wrong, i love my life, but to go from being a young relatively carefree thirty year old jaunting with friends, back to being a young, relatively carefree thirty year old with a mother, a household, two jobs, a brother, two cats, and a dog for whom she feels at least partially responsible, is a bit like diving into the deep section of a pool on a warm day after an hour's sunbathing. Sure, the warmth of the sun was worth it. The swimming will be worth it too, once the shock wears off. That shock, however, is mildly distressing. This way i never left my life, though i got to dance in the sun, i kept one toe in the water while floating on my raft. The shock, then wasn't so extreme, if it was even there.
Speaking of responsabilities, they are calling now. Though i've been up since nine, i have yet to give mom or buddy their morning medicine. Today i ought to clean, do laundry (start the stove so it dries), get mom's medicine and mine (probably get breakfast while we're in hallstead), and try to do stuff with bubs to help him shake his lethargy. Tonight i have my cousin's wedding. Lord willing i'll get there with no problems, and get mom there as well. Getting both of us ready can be a bit of a chore sometimes, and i always pray that me and driving will go well together.
i hope, Lord willing, to maybe stop by the Christian bookstore on the way to the wedding. i have $10 from my aunt, and i want to buy a Christian historical or military fiction with it. bubs once commented on my reading. i told him we each had our maladaptive coping mechanisms.- he his alcohol, and me my escapist fiction. i pride myself on mine being less destructive, though i still pray God will pardon something i perhaps spend too much time, money, and energy on.
okay, mom's getting pleasantly impatient (asking me questions ever minute or so, as opposed to swearing and crying and fidgeting). i'd best go. remind me to tell you my most recent thoughts on love later, however.
mom refused to come with us. i was so embarassed, and felt so guilty. bubs has been caught, again, in a quagmire of depression. This is one of the deeper bouts- he lay in bed yesterday, too despondent to get up, and told me with sincere pain in his voice that nothing would help. i know what would help- God can, but he claims he's tried and God isn't answering. i don't know why God is putting him through this, but i know He has a plan, and i pray that the plan leads to good in bubs' life. People don't seem to realize how bad things are for him. our middle sister says he's not truly depressed, and expects him to jump out of it. she thinks i'm enabling him. i live with him though, i see the sadness. Last night he asked if i'd be upset if he shot himself. i don't think he was entirely serious, but it's still a scary question. At any rate, when mom didn't come with us, bubs agreed to stay home with her. i felt so badly that he was missing his party, and that these people had traveled so far because i needed to be with mom, only to discover that i could leave her at home after all. They had the good grace not to appear upset.
r. doesn't seem to get my life situation. he kept asking me why i didn't just spend the night with them, why i didn't go back to philadelphia with them, ribbing me about never coming and visiting. Perhaps i worry too much, perhaps my worries are unfounded, perhaps (i wonder this sometimes) my family would do better without me sometimes if i didn't put so much effort into holding things together. This morning, however, mick and mom had a screaming match over the toilet. They can be so cruel to each other. She can't help her behavior sometimes, and he really can't deal with it right now. Things escalate until he's hitting walls, and she's threatening to call the cops, and maybe hitting him. So am i really overworrying things, and i making things worse by being the mediator instead of forcing them to deal with each other, or am i holding together a situation which, without me, may be quite bad. i told xh. that maybe after mickey calmed down, i would go down there again. Then again, Lord willing, he'll be in an apartment by then. So we both agreed that i probably wouldn't. It's like having to care for a child, except not, because you can force a child to come visiting with you.
The visit itself was great. we fenced with balloon swords, saw a madrigal choir, saw the movie avatar, watched a juggler, walked snowy streets with mom, built a giant snowman. i only freaked out a few times, once afraid to drive home from the movies, which i again felt very guilty about. it was good though. and i considered, on the drive home (having made bubs come get me, a blessing due to the snowy roads actually, so thank God for freak outs), how this way there was no jump into cold water. In the past, when i left for carefree weekends at friends' houses, walking home was a bit of a shock. Don't get me wrong, i love my life, but to go from being a young relatively carefree thirty year old jaunting with friends, back to being a young, relatively carefree thirty year old with a mother, a household, two jobs, a brother, two cats, and a dog for whom she feels at least partially responsible, is a bit like diving into the deep section of a pool on a warm day after an hour's sunbathing. Sure, the warmth of the sun was worth it. The swimming will be worth it too, once the shock wears off. That shock, however, is mildly distressing. This way i never left my life, though i got to dance in the sun, i kept one toe in the water while floating on my raft. The shock, then wasn't so extreme, if it was even there.
Speaking of responsabilities, they are calling now. Though i've been up since nine, i have yet to give mom or buddy their morning medicine. Today i ought to clean, do laundry (start the stove so it dries), get mom's medicine and mine (probably get breakfast while we're in hallstead), and try to do stuff with bubs to help him shake his lethargy. Tonight i have my cousin's wedding. Lord willing i'll get there with no problems, and get mom there as well. Getting both of us ready can be a bit of a chore sometimes, and i always pray that me and driving will go well together.
i hope, Lord willing, to maybe stop by the Christian bookstore on the way to the wedding. i have $10 from my aunt, and i want to buy a Christian historical or military fiction with it. bubs once commented on my reading. i told him we each had our maladaptive coping mechanisms.- he his alcohol, and me my escapist fiction. i pride myself on mine being less destructive, though i still pray God will pardon something i perhaps spend too much time, money, and energy on.
okay, mom's getting pleasantly impatient (asking me questions ever minute or so, as opposed to swearing and crying and fidgeting). i'd best go. remind me to tell you my most recent thoughts on love later, however.
Tuesday, December 29, 2009
utterly twitterpated
.....okay, i'm not. Actually, my love life is sort of at a standstill. i simply like the phrase, "utterly twitterpated." Living now in the world of real estate, i miss the world of english more and more.
i drove past the formal gown shop at the bottom of the hill near where i work, and realized that i want to skip valentine's day this year.
i'm attempting to update this, largely to make happy one of my closest friends, who not only appears to read it, but actually requests that it be updated. In the meantime, however, mom keeps interrupting me. Her patience is low, in some ways. She often "needs" to know the answers to questions right now, yet she can play solitaire for hours at a jaunt. It can become frustrating, answering the same questions over and over, or just answering questions all the time. Sometimes i catch myself going on auto pilot, and realizing belatedly how incorrectly i answered. Quite often i tell her it's the wrong day, in this manner. Saturday, no, it's Tuesday mom.
Life here has continued trucking along. (Yes, i realize that this is poor writing form, to use such cliches as "trucking along".) i've thought about a few posts i should put here, even began one. (See, in the midst of beginning a deep paragraph on the death of friends in the minds of dementia patients, i am interrupted by "we have no toilet paper", yelled from upstairs. This is one of her current obsessions, toilet paper. we must, at all times, have several rolls in stock. Only one roll, if in any way not full, is tantamount to being out of it.
mom locked her companion out of the house yesterday. She didn't want her coming in, bubs was off work, so she locked the door and told her so. When bubs related this to me later, when i called from work, i laughed. He scolded me, stating that it was not funny. It's not kind of me, but it is, in a certain way, very humurous. To picture my small mother locking the dooor, like a petulant child, and telling the nurse (for lack of a better short nickname) to go home. Lord forgive my pettyness.
The nurse and i have a somewhat strained relationship. It appears as if we are both looking for a way out of the current situation, but we both need it until we find one, so we both pretend nothing is wrong. Then both of us lets bubs know, in no uncertain terms, about our unhappiness. Poor bubs.
The last few days, mom has awoken (and thus i have awoken) in the middle of the night due to excrutiating (apparently) foot pain. Lord willing, we have another doctor's appointment scheduled for tomorrow. Please, should anyone actually read this, pray for it- okay?????
Well, this post has been somewhat disjointed. There are many ways in which it could be expanded, or ordered, or solidified. There is so much more i could say. However, i think mom and i are going to attempt to watch a movie, and there are wet clothes to be considered. God is god, life is good, may it, if He wills, continue to be so.
i drove past the formal gown shop at the bottom of the hill near where i work, and realized that i want to skip valentine's day this year.
i'm attempting to update this, largely to make happy one of my closest friends, who not only appears to read it, but actually requests that it be updated. In the meantime, however, mom keeps interrupting me. Her patience is low, in some ways. She often "needs" to know the answers to questions right now, yet she can play solitaire for hours at a jaunt. It can become frustrating, answering the same questions over and over, or just answering questions all the time. Sometimes i catch myself going on auto pilot, and realizing belatedly how incorrectly i answered. Quite often i tell her it's the wrong day, in this manner. Saturday, no, it's Tuesday mom.
Life here has continued trucking along. (Yes, i realize that this is poor writing form, to use such cliches as "trucking along".) i've thought about a few posts i should put here, even began one. (See, in the midst of beginning a deep paragraph on the death of friends in the minds of dementia patients, i am interrupted by "we have no toilet paper", yelled from upstairs. This is one of her current obsessions, toilet paper. we must, at all times, have several rolls in stock. Only one roll, if in any way not full, is tantamount to being out of it.
mom locked her companion out of the house yesterday. She didn't want her coming in, bubs was off work, so she locked the door and told her so. When bubs related this to me later, when i called from work, i laughed. He scolded me, stating that it was not funny. It's not kind of me, but it is, in a certain way, very humurous. To picture my small mother locking the dooor, like a petulant child, and telling the nurse (for lack of a better short nickname) to go home. Lord forgive my pettyness.
The nurse and i have a somewhat strained relationship. It appears as if we are both looking for a way out of the current situation, but we both need it until we find one, so we both pretend nothing is wrong. Then both of us lets bubs know, in no uncertain terms, about our unhappiness. Poor bubs.
The last few days, mom has awoken (and thus i have awoken) in the middle of the night due to excrutiating (apparently) foot pain. Lord willing, we have another doctor's appointment scheduled for tomorrow. Please, should anyone actually read this, pray for it- okay?????
Well, this post has been somewhat disjointed. There are many ways in which it could be expanded, or ordered, or solidified. There is so much more i could say. However, i think mom and i are going to attempt to watch a movie, and there are wet clothes to be considered. God is god, life is good, may it, if He wills, continue to be so.
Friday, November 27, 2009
i'm in a lousy mood. i don't even know why i write to this thing, for the one or maybe two people who might read it in the world. Originally, it was supposed to be cathartic, telling my story to the world, maybe letting others know they weren't alone. letting my closer friends stay abreast of developments in my life too personal for livejournal and its judgmental eyes. At this moment, however, those rays of hope and inspiration have been swallowed by a sort of dead weight despondency which sucks me into lethargy. i've done some work today, and have much to do, but decided i ought to go get glasses. Speaking of which, i'd best go get dressed, although my desire to get the glasses has waned. i'm really only doing it at this point so that i can see next week, Lord willing, while traveling to philadelphia. mom and mickey need me now.
Thursday, October 22, 2009
savoring this hope and healing..........
Thank and praise God!!!!!!!!!
The articles are going well.
Lord willing, they'll continue to do so.
:OD.
The articles are going well.
Lord willing, they'll continue to do so.
:OD.
oooh, ooh, oh, the sweetest thing
mom appears to have lost half my laptop cord. Which means i don't have it to do my newspaper article on. So i'm trying to do two articles and a police report (which i had to handwrite at the station due to the aforementioned laptop cord issue), but mom is wandering around swearing (because i'm not upstairs with her like i normally am, winding her down for the night), bubs is drunk (at least that puts him in a decent mood, but still.......) and there isn't really sufficient light to make me happy doing this on the desktop.
in related news, i actually had this conversation with bubs (something like this)after realizing that we hadn't gotten mom her tylenol pm yet (she needs it to sleep through the night, and usually that hasn't been enough, and i've been giving her fish oil pills as placcebos to compensate, else she will med seek for another sleeping pill on top of the tylenol):
"are you sober enough to take mom for tylenol pm"
"define sober"
"not going to get in an accident, or get arrested"
"i'd get arrested if i was caught, but i should be able to make it to the pump without crashing" (pump is like two blocks away)
"well, can you take her?????"
pause, pause, pause.........
"bubs, did you hear what i said?????"
"no, what"
"i said, if you stop drinking now, you could still take mom for her tylenol pm"
his answer was a laugh. at which point i decided it was too late.
him: "she doesn't need it"
me: "well, i can't give her three fish oil pills"
think, think.........
"i guess i could give her some regular tylenol instead"
At one point this conversation would have probably shocked me, or i would have been ashamed of it. To think that i would ask my slightly drunk brother to drive our mom to a store, because he's sober enough to drive and it's not likely the cop will catch him, or to think that we would discuss what placebo we'll give her tonight, would probably have seemed very foreign. Now stuff like this is just part of my life, associated with only mild bemusement and guilt.
She is wandering around me puttering. i may have to stop the newspaper article writing to settle her down, despite the fact that i have noon deadline and three assignments, one of which was an almost four hour long meeting, and i have to work tomorrow. Thank God!!!!!!!!! that at least i was able to get part of the long one written during school today, and the other one should be short, and the third just typing in the police report from my notes.
Still, i sometimes think that i might have to quit this newspaper gig soon. It just doesn't fit in so well to my life of late. The paper's been pretty patient about late assignments, thank God!!!!!!, but still..........
Lord willing this one will work out too. back to work.
in related news, i actually had this conversation with bubs (something like this)after realizing that we hadn't gotten mom her tylenol pm yet (she needs it to sleep through the night, and usually that hasn't been enough, and i've been giving her fish oil pills as placcebos to compensate, else she will med seek for another sleeping pill on top of the tylenol):
"are you sober enough to take mom for tylenol pm"
"define sober"
"not going to get in an accident, or get arrested"
"i'd get arrested if i was caught, but i should be able to make it to the pump without crashing" (pump is like two blocks away)
"well, can you take her?????"
pause, pause, pause.........
"bubs, did you hear what i said?????"
"no, what"
"i said, if you stop drinking now, you could still take mom for her tylenol pm"
his answer was a laugh. at which point i decided it was too late.
him: "she doesn't need it"
me: "well, i can't give her three fish oil pills"
think, think.........
"i guess i could give her some regular tylenol instead"
At one point this conversation would have probably shocked me, or i would have been ashamed of it. To think that i would ask my slightly drunk brother to drive our mom to a store, because he's sober enough to drive and it's not likely the cop will catch him, or to think that we would discuss what placebo we'll give her tonight, would probably have seemed very foreign. Now stuff like this is just part of my life, associated with only mild bemusement and guilt.
She is wandering around me puttering. i may have to stop the newspaper article writing to settle her down, despite the fact that i have noon deadline and three assignments, one of which was an almost four hour long meeting, and i have to work tomorrow. Thank God!!!!!!!!! that at least i was able to get part of the long one written during school today, and the other one should be short, and the third just typing in the police report from my notes.
Still, i sometimes think that i might have to quit this newspaper gig soon. It just doesn't fit in so well to my life of late. The paper's been pretty patient about late assignments, thank God!!!!!!, but still..........
Lord willing this one will work out too. back to work.
the ways i've failed.....
i've been failing a lot lately, in mom's care. Or at least i feel like i have (for instance, sitting here typing this instead of hanging with her). On that note, i think i'll finish this later maybe.
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