Gently

I’ve been really obnoxious lately around bedtime.

I just want to go to sleep and there’s Olivia, giggling over everything, but most especially over her attempts are twerking or something else to do with her butt.

That kid…I swear.

But one recent night was different.

We went to be a little after nine. I unbraided her hair, she ‘toileted’ (that’s what she’s taken to calling the act of peeing in the toilet. I know.) then all the turtles and Bobby the penguin kissed her goodnight.

At that point, I told her I’d be back and I went about my own bedtime routine.

Ten minute or so later, I made my way back toward her bed so that Barbie could sing to her.

Barbie commented that she saw Olivia yawn.

I told Liv that she looked tired.

She asked, “Can you smell someone’s tired?”

I told her that you probably couldn’t smell it but that you can hear it in a person’s voice and you can see it in their face. You can also hear the yawns as well as see them.

She smiled tiredly at me.

After Barbie performed her usual repertoire, she kissed Olivia good night. The turtles kissed her gently and then she asked me if I would touch her face.

Odd request, but okay. I gently rubbed her forehead, cheeks, and scalp. Her eyes got heavy as she relaxed under my touch.

I scratched her back a little and went back to rubbing her face. She fell asleep before five minutes of gentle touching passed.

I think she needed a night of gentleness from me.

I know I needed it too.

Auntie Nell

My mom and her sisters all had their children very young; as in late (or in one case, early) teens.

As such, they didn’t seem old enough for us (me, my brothers and cousins) to bestow the titles of “Aunt” or “Uncle” upon my mom and her siblings.

So they were just Dianne, Grice, Janet, Evelyn, Nell, Keith, Debra, Lorry, Ronnie, Eleanor and Rodney.

But then we, the next generation, started having kids. Most of us waited until at least our mid-twenties if not early thirties to have kids, which made the Aunts and Uncles that much older.

So when I’d talk to my girls about my mom’s sisters, they became Auntie “Name”.

When I got home that Friday afternoon and told Tom that my mom’s sister Nell had died, Alyssa said with despair, “Oh! But she was my favorite.”

That’s not to say she’d have chosen one of the others to take Nell’s place even if she could. She was just saying she was going to miss our Auntie Nell.

And we do miss her. We miss her laugh, her ability to tell it like it is.

She was so honest, so real.

She was also the auntie that my girls saw the most because she, like us, lived fairly close to my mom, so it was easy for all of us to drop in for a visit.

I can’t count the number of times the girls and I would show up at my mom’s house and Nell would be there. Or we’d be there when she arrived. And it was (still is) a given that my mom would have tea ready for Nell, Cherry and Olivia.

For what it’s worth imma pass on the tea, thank you very much. Blech.

But yes, she was the favorite. She didn’t try to make anyone like her. She just let people be who they were. I think that’s what my girls love most about her. She didn’t pretend she was there to visit with me or them. She was there to see her sister. We were just part of the package. My girls are reserved (at least around most people, including family) unless they see you every single day, or at least several times a week. It’s just part of their personality.

I don’t know where I’m going with this. I just…her death has hit me hard. We knew it was coming but kept hoping she’s bounce back. She had a hard life. The beginning was really hard.

I just hope…I pray she’s a peace. I pray that she and Amy are laughing and loving and watching over everyone.

Motivate Me

The last time I managed to go on a diet and lose substantial weight (60ish pounds in six months) was 2013.

I was motivated by not wanting to be the fat sister in my brother’s wedding pictures.

That didn’t actually motivate me back in 2003 before my own wedding, though. So yeah. Huh.

I don’t know what will motivate me this time. Obviously being fat-shamed by my doctors doesn’t do it.

My jeans being tight and making me uncomfortable doesn’t seem to make a difference.

Hating my body with the passion of a thousand suns isn’t motivating me.

Knowing that being overweight is bad for my health doesn’t seem to matter either.

I mean, come on, self! I don’t smoke because it’s bad for me. I don’t drink alcohol because it’s bad for me. I don’t do heroin because, yeah, SO BAD for me. I don’t vape, I don’t snort cocaine, I don’t go out in the sun without sunscreen because that’s all bad for me.

Yet, I’ll make frosting so that I can eat it from the spoon.

I’ll buy Most Stuf Oreos and eat the stuf.

I’ll eat a bag of mini York peppermint patties, the FAMILY size, for God’s sake, in two days.

What the hell is wrong with me? None of the above things are good for me. I can restrain myself from having wildly unsafe sex with strangers but I can’t stop cramming high calorie, nutrition deficient food into my fat face.

Why? What is going on in my brain that I can’t be satisfied with the salad I have for lunch each day? Why don’t cucumber slices fill the void in my stomach (brain!) the way a bag of Funyons does?

Obviously, I’m a mess. My relationship with food is so very messed up.

So what next? That’s what I need to figure out.

For what it’s worth, I can’t and don’t blame the cancer completely. I know I was a fatty before I got cancer. That’s part of why I can’t figure out what’s wrong with me. I mean, what if my fatness contributed to my cancer? One would think that would be motivation, right? Since my stupid cancer wasn’t fed by hormones, hello, something had to trigger it.

So if it was fatness, wouldn’t you think I’d be out there jogging every single freaking day and watching every morsel I put into my mouth, making sure it’s the highest of nutrition and lowest of calorie?

Yes, I’d think that too and look at us, we’re ALL WRONG.

Hello, self, get your shit together!

And this ends my little tantrum.

Fat

News Flash: I’m fat.

Shocker, right?

Yeah, I didn’t think so. Everyone who can see through their actual eyeballs knows I’m fat.

And yet, medical professionals seem to feel the need to TELL me that I’m fat. Then they suggest that I ‘talk to someone’ about my fatness. As in, perhaps I should speak with a nutritionist, a personal guide, if you will, who will help me figure out why I’m so fat.

Guess what? I know why I’m fat.

I eat too much. I don’t move enough. That’s it. That’s why I’m fat.

I know HOW to freaking lose weight and yet…I am not doing the things that would make me lose weight. I’m not stopping the shoving of food into my face.

I always feel so awful when I leave these appointments.

Dr. S and Dr. R both seem to think I can’t feel the tightness of my clothes, the pain in my joints, the weakness of my muscles. Guys, I KNOW. I really do.

I just…can’t seem to fix it.

It makes me feel so bad about myself. I leave these appointments near tears, feeling so low and so bad that I just want to go eat a package of Most Stuf Oreos. In an effort to save calories, though, I’ll just eat the stuf, chucking the actually cookies out the window of my car to poison the area wildlife.

Sigh.

Feeling bad about this makes me feel like I’m being a whiny ass baby. I mean, I’m here, right? I’m alive. I get to bitch at my husband and kids on a daily basis. I’m not dead, ashes in an urn on the mantel.

I’m also not suffering from debilitating pain as a result of my lymphedema. My scar doesn’t hurt all the time. My hair came back.

I have so much to be grateful for and here I am, bitching about a couple of doctors making me feel bad about my stupid weight.

Just stop eating junk, you idiot! Go for a walk, so something other than sit on your giant ass every single night watching American Housewife on Hulu.

Oh, if only it were that simple.

I know it actually IS that simple but actually doing that isn’t simple at all. Not for me.

And look at that, I managed to feel sorry for myself AGAIN.

Ugh!

80

My dad turned 80 years old in December.

Most days he’s a fairly spry 80 but other days, I often see just how old he’s gotten. He’s very thin, which means that when he gets sick, he goes from thin to frail in a matter of hours.

I’d been home from work for a couple of hours on a Monday evening when my sister called me. She asked me if I’d stopped to see Dad on my way home.

I was confused. “You mean in Metz?” I asked.

“No,” she said, very obviously exasperated. “Didn’t you get my message?”

“What message?”

“He’s in the hospital,” she explained. “I left a message on your phone.”

“A text or a voicemail?” I asked.

“I don’t leave voice mails,” she informed haughtily.

Okay then. Moving on.

“What hospital is he in and why is he there?”

She told me that he’d said his heart was racing and he’d fallen twice at her house (he lives there most of the time) so she’d called an ambulance and he was in the ICU at our local hospital.

Wow.

She went on to say that he’d be moved to a regular room the next morning.

So I didn’t go to the hospital that night. I went the next morning around 10:30. He was sound asleep so I left him a note saying I’d be back after work.

He was awake when I got there that afternoon at 4:30 or so.

But he was groggy and confused. He looked terrible. We’re a very white family but he was even paler than usual.

My brother and his boys showed up while I was there and we talked while my dad dozed.

I informed the nurse before I left that Tuesday that if my dad was released the next day, on Wednesday, that I would be the one to come pick him up. I gave her my cell and my work number, asking that they call me when they thought he’d be discharged.

But even though the nurse hadn’t called, my dad had, and so I went.

When I got to the hospital, he was still in his gown with IVs still attached. He was dozing.

He woke up when I walked into his room. He gave me an apologetic smile and said he’d been told they might want to do one more test before they let him go.

“Okay,” I said and put settled in. It was 2:50pm.

Around 3:30, the nurse came in and told me that Dad’s caseworker would be along soon to talk about at-home care.

At 4:15, my dad asked me to get his clothes out of the closet. I asked him why he wanted them, he said it was time for him to get dressed.

Huh. Well.

I got him his pants and told him that he couldn’t put his shirt on yet because he still had a couple of IVs in his arms.

At that point, the nurse came in and told him that she’d help him change into this clothes when it was closer to time to go home but that we’d probably still have at least a half hour wait.

The caseworker came in and we talked about his weakness and how he’d need a lot of help getting around. She suggested home health care. She gave me several pages of information for such things.

At around 4:40 the nurse came back and started helping my dad into his clothes. I looked away as one does when one’s elderly parent is wearing a hospital gown.

Finally, the nurse’s aide arrived with a wheelchair. I left to move the car around to the discharge door.

I was parked and waiting, car running so that my dad wouldn’t have to get into a cold car when the aide came out and told me that the echo tech had shown up and they really wanted to run that one more test. It would be at least another fifteen minutes. She was so sorry.

Eh, whatever. I moved my car back to the parking lot and watched the clock. I moved it back to the discharge door about fifteen minutes later and waited another five minutes and wait, here he comes!!!

The aide and a nurse helped my dad from the wheelchair to my car, where he slouched in the seat as if he couldn’t hold up his own head.

I think he might have been dreaming during these episodes of dosing because while we were sitting in the parking lot of the local CVS (we had to pick up a prescription, don’t you know? And of course it wasn’t ready when we got there, it’ll be another twenty minutes or so, ma’am.)

As we sat out there, my dad came in and out of his dose. At one point he asked me if I was going to get glasses.

Nope, I hadn’t said anything about glasses.

Then my brother called him. My dad struggled to put his phone on speaker so he could hear my brother talk.

When he was done talking, my dad asked, “So what did J say he and the boy were going to get at Wal*Mart?”

“Ummm, they didn’t say anything about Wal*Mart. They’re at karate.”

It was weird and worrying.

I’m hoping he just needed a good night’s sleep in his own bed (couch, as the case may be.)

The nurse said he’d had a lot of Tylenol with codeine over the past few days and that will make a person groggy.

I don’t know.

It’s hard to see your parent so fragile, as I’m sure everyone knows. Once upon a time, my dad was larger than life in my eyes.

I hate watching him fade and yet…I know how lucky I am to still have him here, pushing my boundaries, irritating me. He’s so hard to define and that’s okay too. He’s human, flawed, just like everyone else.

I’m trying to move forward with the attitude that every single moment I have with him his precious rather than watching the clock when he stops by at 9:15 and being annoyed by it.

Then I remind myself that I’m human too and VERY flawed.

Together, we’ll figure it all out.

Flooded

Hey, remember back when I didn’t post for weeks at a time?

Yeah, I didn’t have much to say or, rather, I was saying stuff but not posting it. And one day of not posting would stretch into a week and suddenly, I’d feel paralyzed by my lack of posting and blah blah blah.

I’d wonder if I should acknowledge my lack of posting or if I should just jump right back in there with posts, pretending I never paused in my posts.

What to do? What to do?

This last time, I just sat down at the computer, opened my email and started scheduling posts using things I’d written over the past few weeks.

Since you’re here reading, you can see that I didn’t bother to say anything about the pause in posts. I just jumped right in and it felt good.

It still feels good. Even if no one reads here much anymore, I still want to write.

I want to bitch about being tired, record my angst about cancer coming back, talk about how amazing (and sometimes, amazingly frustrating) my kids are.

Even if no one cares but me, I’m putting it out there, polluting cyber space, if you will.

Support

There’s something about talking to a fellow ‘survivor.’

Wait, let me back up.

I got a card in the mail a couple of weeks ago reminding me that my annual physical with my gynecologist is due.

I called the office to schedule the appointment.

The person who answered was a woman I’d met two years previously when I was going in for an appointment. Her hair was so cute, super short and curly. I was bald.

I complimented her hair that day and she said that it was post-chemo growth.

I was impressed with how adorable it was and shared that I hoped mine looked that good when it grew back it. *Spoiler* It never looked that cute.

She shared some of her story that day and I think I cried a little because she was so kind of me and she’d been through so much more than I had. She had a double mastectomy, 49 lymph nodes removed, stage 3 cancer…all that. I had it so much easier and yet there she was, comforting me. I felt like such an ingrate even though I knew she wouldn’t want that.

Anyway!

When I called for my appointment, this woman answered. And, because she’s awesome, she asked me how I was doing. I told her that according to my mammogram back in November, I’m doing well.

We talked for several minutes. She shared that her lymphedema is pretty bad, considering how many nodes she had removed.

Yikes. Poor kid.

But can I just tell you how good it felt to actually TALK to someone who’d been through something even similar to what I’ve been through?

I shared that I worry that every twinge, every single pain is a sign that the cancer is back. I told her that I worry about which doctor I’m supposed to ‘bother’ with my latest worries.

And she got it. She understood my worries, my fears, my stress because she’s right there too. She feels the same worries, fears and stress.

We shared opinions on the surgeon who did both of our surgeries (we like him and his staff very much) and how great it is to have a doctor who doesn’t make you feel like you’re bothering him even if you probably are (again, that’s me thinking that, no him and not her.)

This is probably just one more indication that I should find a support group beyond the one I recently joined on FB. FB is good for what it does but talking to someone directly, truly connecting on a personal level is important.

When I was going through treatments, I didn’t feel the need to connect. I suppose seeing doctors and nurses every single week, knowing we were actively fighting the cancer went a long way in settling my fears but these days…I’m not doing anything to actively fight cancer.

Not that we even know if there is cancer to fight. I mean, according to my surgeon, I was cancer-free after surgery back in September of 2017. The chemo and radiation were just precautions because my cancer was triple-negative. I can’t take medicines to keep it at bay.

I just have to pray and have faith that we did all we could to get rid of it and keep it from coming back.

But all the praying and faith in the world doesn’t actually keep the worries at bay.

So yeah, having others who understand, who get these fears, who have been there or who are there, maybe that’s what I need.

Sounds like a good step toward self-care in 2020, huh?

Cold Calls

I feel for people who have to make cold calls all day long.

I really do. I mean, they're just doing their job.

And yet, these calls irritate the shit out of me.

Back when I was a young 30-something I’d been at my last job for maybe six months when I got a call from a printing company. The person on the line asked me what kind of printer I used.

Being naïve and unaware of the scams that take place, I told him.

What do you know!?! He’d just had a huge order of cartridges for that VERY printer canceled. He could make me a great deal on those cartridges.

I was clueless, so I took the bait.

And once the original cartridges came in at the ‘bargain’ price, we were suddenly getting cartridges every single month for probably more than full-price. When I tried to cancel it, I was told I’d entered into a verbal contract to take those cartridges for a year.

Lesson learned.

When I was pregnant with Olivia I got another such call. I was five years old and a thousand years wiser.

The woman on the phone asked me the number on the printer that sat at the end of my desk.

I told her I didn’t have a printer on the end of my desk.

She assured me I did and wanted to know what kind it was.

I informed her that I was sitting at my desk at that very moment and there was NO PRINTER on my desk. Then I thanked her for her time and hung up on her.

She called me right back to tell me I was a rude bitch.

Well. I was so astounded that this woman had taken the time to call me back just to call me a rude bitch that I told me boss at the time what had happened. He asked me if I’d asked to speak to her supervisor.

Well, no. I mean, after she said her ugly words, she hung up.

Ehh, you know what? I’m okay with that designation. So be it.

Since I started my new job almost a year and a half ago, I’ve gotten more junk emails than I can count from companies trying to sell me stuff, get in the door to sell other’s stuff, etc.

I just delete them and move on.

Alas, I recently got a CALL from someone who’d emailed me and hadn’t received a response.

This woman was much nicer than the above printer cartridge hag. She was pushy though.

She mangled my last name. I mean, how hard is Ordinary to pronounce really? Anyway, I asked her what the call was about and then told her that I was asking because I had absolutely no authority whatsoever at my company. She assured me she wasn’t trying to sell me anything. Uh huh.

She told me her company name. I don’t remember it because it didn’t mean anything to me.

Then she said that her files said I was the director of IT.

Hahahaha.

No.

I gave her a bit of a laugh and said, “Oh, no. I am most certainly NOT the director of IT.”

She asked me if I knew the name of the director of IT at our company.

Nope. Not gonna pawn this one off on someone else.

I said, “Well, actually, we just have an IT department here, no real director.”

By the way, we totally have a director of IT. *eye roll*

Then she asked me if she could send me an email and maybe I could forward it to the right person.

I asked her if her company would show up if someone in our IT department did a search for whatever services her company provides.

She said yes.

So, I said, if at any point, our company needs whatever she’s trying to sell me in that moment, we could find her company at that time. Then I told her that I’d probably just delete any email she sent me.

Then she asked if someone could call me.

Uhhh, hello? YOU called me, lady!

I then said, still quite polite I have to say, “Please don’t have anyone call me. Please just remove me from your list. I can’t make any decisions about what you do or what services you provide.”

She politely said that they’d remove me from their list.

Look at that, seems like maybe I’ve learned how to not be a rude bitch and still get people to leave me alone. Huh.

Milestones

There are big things happening around here but because it’s of a personal nature concerning one my children, I feel like I shouldn’t talk about it.

But it’s just so awesome that I want to shout it from the rooftops.

Except, I don’t think she’d want that.

On the other hand, that’s the only thing I can think about it because it’s such a big deal.

It’s one of those things that usually happens naturally around three or four but in our house, it took much longer.

I’m sorry to be vague and we all know that I’m a chronic over-sharer but this time, I don’t want to embarrass her.

I do think that the medicine Olivia is taking has helped move this situation along. She no longer needs the crutch she’d needed for so long. The anxiety she had over the idea of giving it up seems to be gone.

Sure, the first day was a little worrying for her but she let go of the worry so much faster than she would have a month ago when she wasn’t taking Lexapro.

In other news, my aunt died and my mom’s grief is currently manifesting itself as anger. So that’s super fun and it probably deserves a post of its own.

On the lighter side, Olivia has discovered the word anus. She thinks it’s the best word ever and uses it every chance she gets…better than butthole? You be the judge.

Court TV

My husband loves watching the trials that are televised and commenting on them as they happen.

These days, it’s the Harvey Weinstein trial.

Recently, Tom, an old white dude, said something about not understanding why a woman who’d been raped would maintain a relationship with the man who raped her; which led to his hesitant belief that maybe some of the accusers were lying.

*Sigh*

I tried to explain it to him. I told him that some of the victims (most? All?) were aspiring actresses. They wanted to make it in a highly competitive industry. HW was a very influential man in that industry. These women, these VICTIMS, knew that to cut off all interactions with HW could detrimentally affect their careers.

Tom didn’t understand how a career could be more important than distancing yourself from your rapist.

Again, I tried to explain that sometimes, the least confrontation path is the best.

I told him that at some point in their lives, most women have had to make the decision to acquiesce rather than fight because fighting might make a bad situation worse. I told him that there are women who are afraid to say no to something because saying no is more dangerous than just going through with what’s happening to them. Sometimes, we women just hope to survive whatever is happening so that we can pick up the pieces after it’s over.

I know he didn’t get it.

I don’t think, even with my explanations, he CAN get. He’s never been afraid to walk alone at night.

He’s never been afraid to go walk to his car in a parking garage.

He’s never hesitated about getting into an elevator because it’s already occupied by a man or even scarier, by men.

He’s never felt like he had to glance over his shoulder as he’s leaving the mall, fearing for his safety on the walk to his car.

He’s white. He’s a man. He’s in the majority and he feels the safety of that. He can’t possibly understand how those who are not white men feel.

I think he tries…a little.

But I could feel the doubt in his mind where those women were concerned even after I’d explained how it was very possible for a woman who’d been raped to maintain a relationship with the man who’d raped her.

I kind of wanted to tell him to read the room. Remember who was speaking to him. Perhaps, for one moment, think about the fact that I, a woman, will absolutely understand another woman’s mind, her fears, her motivations, better than he ever possibly could. Hell, I might be wrong but I’m more likely to be right than he is.

And hey, maybe…just maybe, he should consider the fact that I know what I’m talking about when I talk about ‘rhetorical’ fears. Perhaps I even know from experience. I don’t think he’s EVER considered that possibility.

American Housewife aka Art Imitating Life

The girls and I have been re-watching (not hate-watching) the sit-com American Housewife.

For anyone who has never heard of it, it’s about a stay-at-home mom and her family, a professor husband and three kids, daughter Taylor, son Oliver and daughter Anna-Kat.

It’s funny. It’s also almost too close to my actual life for comfort.

Katy Mixon plays the mom. She’s ‘fat’. Actually, Katy is maybe a size twelve, maybe. She’s probably actually a size 8 but the show is set on the east coast where the family rents a house in a very affluent community so that their youngest daughter can receive special education for her ‘issues.’

So, right there with you Katie on the fatness. She hates the other moms in her neighborhood and at her kids’ school. (You’ve all heard me make fun of the Edon-mom haircut, right?)

In the second (or third?) episode of the first season, Katy is lamenting all the work that goes into being a stay-at-home mom. She considers going back to work (don’t do it! The work just compounds.) The end of the episode shows her in the bathtub, trying to get a moment of peace from her loving family.

Hey, remember that time I stepped out of the shower and my entire family (both daughters AND MY HUSBAND) were standing around the bathroom waiting to talk to me? Ha, hahaha. I laugh so that I don’t cry. (I told my mom the shower story because I thought it would amuse her. She was aghast at my family’s lack of common courtesy. “The intrusion!” she gasped. Whenever I tell the story when Olivia is within hearing she likes to point out that she was in the bathroom first! As if that makes it better/okay that she was there.)

Katy also has amazing friends who love her, flaws and all. I’m lucky that I have such friends. I don’t see them nearly often enough, but knowing they’re there, supporting me in spirit even if not by having breakfast together each day, is enough most days.

The Thanksgiving episode of the first season mentioned medicating Anna-Kat, Katy’s youngest child. Anna-Kat has a lot of anxiety. She also has OCD tendencies.

Remind you of anyone?

I was very resistant to medication when Liv was seven (which is how old Anna-Kat is in the first season.) Let’s see where Katy is on meds in a few more seasons, shall we?

Of course, this is all fiction so maybe in a few years Anna-Kat will be ‘cured’ of all her issues. It could happen.

But that aside, this show is like watching my life being played out by a woman who is younger, thinner and prettier than I am. But that’s okay, I like to imagine myself younger, prettier and thinner than I actually am on a daily basis.

Pushing Boundaries

Someday I am going to regret being such a raging bitch to my dad. I just wish I could channel that sad soul that will be me someday when I’m missing my dad because these days when the doorbell rings at 9:20 on a Sunday evening, I just want to punch something. It pisses me off SO MUCH when he shows up on a school/work night knowing we all have to get up early the next morning.

I am aware that I’d written about this so many times.

I’m sorry.

I just get so frustrated with him. It often feels like he’s daring me to say anything, daring me to try and maintain my boundaries.

He’s been retired for almost twenty years. It’s as if he’s forgotten what it feels like to have to get up at 5:30 in the morning..

Or, you know, he just doesn’t care.

He wants what he wants when he wants it and he usually wants to talk at me (yes, ‘at’ not to, it’s not a conversation, it’s a monologue and I’m the only audience) for a few minutes, ask me for some Excedrin (which is a precious commodity these days since it’s been pulled from the shelves, yikes!) and then he wants to weigh himself on the scale we keep in our half-bath.

I should buy him some damned aspirin, give him a digital bathroom scale and see how often she shows up.

Sigh.

I’m going to miss him. I know I am. But I just wish he’d make these visits easier by showing up at a decent time on either Friday or Saturday evenings.

Why after 9pm on a Sunday?

Why do the visits always coincide with bad weather? It’s as if he refuses to abide by social niceties or listen to weather advisories. He’s going to drive where he wants when he wants and the elements can go suck it. So what if he ends up with a flat tire or in a ditch? Someone will help him out and it won’t even bother him that he’s inconveniencing that person through his own selfishness.

Wanna guess where I inherited my own selfishness?

One guess…

I apologize to anyone out there who has lost a parent and who would give anything at all for a late night visit from that parent. I really do. I know how lucky I am to have both my mom and my dad. I just wish…I wish he’d make it easier to enjoy his visits.

That’s all.

And proof that I'm a jerk...the day I wrote this, my dad went into the hospital. My sister sent him by ambulance because his heart rate went up to 200 and he kept falling...I am sorry for complaining about his late night visits. Truly.

Independent Snacking

Once upon a time, every time Alyssa wanted to eat a pickle, she’d ask either me or Tom for permission.

Several years ago, I told her that she didn’t have to ask any more. If she wanted a pickle, she could get a pickle.

The ‘ask before you eat’ rule was/is Tom’s. I honestly don’t care if the girls get a snack. I mean, okay. I’d rather they not eat a bag of chips in one sitting or grab an oatmeal crème pie as I’m putting dinner on the table, but within reason, please, help yourself to whatever is in the refrigerator or pantry.

Tom seems to think that since they’re children, they can’t be trusted to know when they’re hungry vs bored.

Hell, I’m almost fifty years old and I can’t be trusted to know the difference between hunger vs boredom.

Anyway, the first time Lyss got a pickle without asking her dad asked her if she’d asked me first.

She looked at me, I nodded and she said she had. Later that same day I told her that from that point forward, she had blanket pickle permission. She could go with assurance that I would ALWAYS say yes if she asked for a pickle and so, she could tell her dad, without lying, that she’d asked me about the damned pickle. Because she had, that very night, and I was giving her permission for all the future pickles ever to be eaten.

Is that teaching her to lie to her dad? Ehh, it’s a pickle.

These days, though, I’m ready for Olivia to be able to get her own snacks.

Over the weekend right after her oral surgery, she asked for a snack every fifteen minutes. It was insane. She ate and ate and ate and she asked me every single time she wanted a snack.

And guess what? Because she’s been trained to ask for the stupid snack, she also expects the person she’s asking for the snack to GET her the snack. So I spent the weekend serving her majesty snacks.

I’m ready for her to gain a little independence by getting off her butt and getting her own snacks. I don’t want her to go crazy and eat an entire package of Oreos so maybe we’ll start small.

Going forward, when she asks for a snack, I’ll check the time, see if it’s close to a meal, if not, tell her she can get herself a snack. And when she does, for a while, I’ll check the snack to ensure appropriate serving size.

It’ll be a learning experience for her. And it’ll be freeing for me. Win/win, right?

Hate-Watching

I get video notifications on my FB as everyone who is ever on FB does. Some of these notifications I understand. (Brad Mondo? Thanks Lyss!)

But others are just odd. There is this woman, she’s blond, has bad teeth and bad skin, who does these product testing videos. (I’m not going to put her name here because what if she googles herself and finds this and then feels bad because of the bad skin and teeth comment? I’m not a monster.) She tries out hair products and makeup. Once the makeup is on, by the way, her skin always looks ever so much better.

I can’t stand her. Her voice drives me crazy but sometimes, I can’t help but watch her videos.

One afternoon I sat there with a scowl on my face as I glared at my phone.

Alyssa peaked over my shoulder to see what I was watching that made me look so mean.

She laughed and asked, “Are you hate-watching that?”

I’d never heard it put that way but yes, I was absolutely hate-watching that woman’s video. Not that she cares, any view is better than no views.

There’s this other woman who does product reviews too but she’s adorable. Her videos are recorded in her car. I think she’s from one of the Carolina’s and she’s so funny. I do not hate-watch her. I just watch her. (insert her name because she deserves to know she’s awesome)

I’ve figured out that I also hate-watch House Hunters. Man, those people buying houses are idiots. They’re so annoying, with their, “But I wanted a white kitchen!” and “I wish these countertops were quartz.”

Ugh.

But I can’t look away.

And then there’s the hate-listening. I’m looking at you Andy and Nichole. (Yes, she spells her name with an H in there. Yikes.) I do a lot of hate-listening to them. That’s super fun.

Let’s not forget the hate-reading. There is on blog I still hate-read. The writer, a mother of six, thinks she’s hysterical. She’s not. Again, I won’t link her blog because I don’t want to be mean.

There was another blog I used to hate-read. I finally had to stop because the writer irritated me so much I just didn’t get any enjoyment out of the hate-reading.

That’s the thing, I must get some kind of joy out of all this hate-reading/watching/listening or I’d stop. I did stop with that other blog because the writer (this time a mother of two, one of which has autism) just rambled about stupid stuff and like to point out ad nauseam that she likes to read. She liked to think of herself as a writer, often pointing out that her love of reading lead to her being able to write. Big freaking deal, a lot of us like to read, it doesn’t make us all writer.

Ahem, let’s move on.

Placebo

I wonder if I should have told Olivia’s teacher that we were putting her on medication and then, you know, NOT given Liv the meds right away. Just to see what happened.

See, I think maybe the medicine is working but not necessarily in the way we think it should work.

I think that knowing she’s on medication, it’s making me and her teacher both more patient with her.

That’s not really fair to her, is it?

Let me give you tell you a homework story (there are already so many of those but this one is different):

We sat down to do social studies homework. Olivia told me that they’d been in groups that day in class and each student had read aloud a paragraph of the article we were using to do her homework. She pointed out that the members of her group didn’t make her read aloud. Ha. That’s my girl.

So I read the questions on the back of the article than turned it over and read through the article to find the answers. I’d ask Liv if she agreed with the answers I’d found, she’d nod and then she’d write the answers.

She erased maybe three times over the course of the five questions that required full-sentence answers and three definitions.

Let me repeat, she erased maybe three times.

This is the child who has been known to erase the same number five times before I lose my stupid mind and scream at her to, for the love of Pete, STOP ERASING!

So, was this non-erasing event due to the Lexapro taking affect in her brain, letting her relax and not NEED to erase every other letter or was it due to my patience and kindness and loving attention that kept me from being a raging bitch and hovering over every single word she wrote?

Maybe we’ll never know.

But whatever the case, it seems to be working for school too.

Her teacher writes me a little note each day just reporting on whether Liv had a good day or a rough day.

Since starting the medicine, she’s had good days.

In fact, her teacher reports that she’s completing her work each day and has, in the span of a week on the medicine, moved up a level in reading.

Is it her? Is it us? Is it a combination of the two?

I don’t know and I don’t really care. I’m just glad FOR HER that her days are calmer, better, that the people around her are kinder and more patient with her.

Oral Surgery

Last Thursday (not yesterday, but a week ago yesterday) I took the day off work and kept Olivia out of school. We got up at 6:30 (a whole hour later than usual, wheee!!!) and were out the door at 7:45 on our way to the oral surgeon (he's a TALL boy!!!) where they sedated my child, made an incision in her gums and then went up inside those gums where they attached a bracket to the tooth (remember Ruthie?) that is STILL up inside those gums, and attached a chain to that bracket.

In two weeks we'll go to the orthodontist and he'll tug on that chain in the hopes that Ruthie will behave and come down and join her toothy brethren.

Olivia cried as she came out of the anesthesia. She didn't understand why she was crying but I think it was a combination of being relieved that it was over and just how she reacts to anesthesia. I puke, she cries. I think maybe she got the better end of that reaction.

Once her emotions were calmer and she was less at risk for puking, they let me take her home. But first we had to go to Walmart and get some pain meds for her.

While we waited the twenty minutes for the pharmacy to fill the prescription, we got some ice cream and some tissues.

We were home by 11:00.

Olivia ate some ice cream, some more ice cream, a serving of jello, some yogurt and then some more ice cream.

She played on her tablet and I took a nap.

Then I made some mashed potatoes but she didn't eat much of them because apparently I made them too creamy and the gravy was 'weird.'

I gave her half a pain pill at 11 that morning and then again at 5 that evening.

She had one more half a pill the next morning but didn't take any more after that.

She's a tough nut, that Olivia. I couldn't be prouder of her.

Positive

You know you’ve got to accentuate the positive, eliminate the negative and don’t mess with Mr. In-Between.

Except, when you’re tired, the negatives glow like neon signs and the positives fade into the shadows.

But, let’s try this.

Here’s a moment of gratitude:

I have a full-time job and I am able to do every single day. There are women on the support group I recently joined who are years out from treatment and who still don’t have the energy to work full time.

So hey, look at me going to work every day.

I mean, hell, someone’s got to insure this family.

Wait, that wasn’t very nice, was it. Yikes, where did my fucking gratitude go?

Let’s try this again.

I can walk up a flight of stairs without gasping for air and having aching joints. That’s a positive.

I almost said I can run after Olivia but that made me stop and think about the last time I ran after her.

That would be like never. I read these women who say that they stay in shape by running after their little kids.

Whatever! How often do moms REALLY run after their kids? I mean, you corral those little suckers in a room, toss snacks at them and lounge on the couch with a book and some chocolate covered cherries. Who the hell is out there chasing their damn kids?

I can feel my fingers and toes. Which means I can walk without pain and braid Liv’s hair on a daily basis. This is truly something for which I am grateful, all sarcasm aside. There were times during my treatment that my toes were numb and it was hard to hold something as small as a bobby pin between my finger and thumb. I had a hard time putting earrings in O’s ears because I couldn’t hold on to the earring or the back.

So yeah, having the feeling back in my fingers and toes is freaking awesome.

The metallic taste in my mouth is mostly gone. I do sometimes still feel like my tongue is on fire or rubbed raw, which is gross and annoying but it’s not something that interrupts my day to day life. On the bright side, I can drink Coke now, so…yay?

Speaking of Coke, it seems like caffeine affects me much more these days than it did before. I can’t drink anything with caffeine in it after 4pm or my sleep is definitely going to be affected. That’s not fun at all.

Elective

On a Thursday in January, I took Olivia to an oral surgeon. The plan was for him to go in and expose a tooth (number 11 for those in the know) and attached a tiny chain to is so that her orthodontist can tug on that chain every few weeks to encourage that tooth to come down and join the rest of her teeth in her mouth.

Right now, there is a giant space between teeth 10 and 12, just waiting for 11 to make it’s appearance.

For the past several months I’ve called that tooth Ruthie. You know, as in Ruthie the Toothie. Cute, huh?

Yeah.

So Ruthie was all snug up there in Olivia’s head. She had no desire to join her toothie pals down in the tropics of Liv’s mouth. (eww)

But we’re resourceful around here. There are lots of people willing to take my money for elective procedures.

I mean, if we’re going to spend almost seven grand to straighten Liv’s teeth, why wouldn’t we spend another couple of thousand to make sure all her teeth are present and accounted for?

Right?

Right!

So we went in for the $100 (a drop in the proverbial bucket) consult and then went back for the actual procedure.

Wonder how that went?

Another Post About How Tired I Am

(Are you as sick of this as I am?)

One recent Monday the girls didn’t have school.

Alyssa had to work at 4:30 that day. Olivia and Tom had to go to my mom’s to print some labels using her computer and printer.

I got home that afternoon and found an empty house.

Do you know how rare that is?

We’ve lived in our house for nine years and I can probably count on one hand how many times I’ve been alone in that house.

The joy of having a spouse who works from home, right?

I mean, okay, it’s nice that he’s always there but…he’s ALWAYS there.

So what did I do with my ten minutes of solitude?

First, I snapped Julie a video of my empty house.

Second, I started washing dishes because, hello, I needed to pack my lunch and my lunch dishes were dirty. And of course, the girls’ breakfast and lunch dishes were in there. Tom usually washes the dishes before I get home but I beat him home.

He and Olivia got home before I finished washing the dishes.

It was fine.

But then, I realized it was only 5:20. I asked Tom when O had eaten lunch because he almost always feeds her a very late lunch.

He confirmed it by saying, “She started eating at 2 and finished at 3.”

Okay then.

I took her upstairs and made her take a bath. I won’t say she was stinky but I will say that her hair hadn’t been washed since Thursday and it was Monday. I know, mother of the year over here.

She was bathed and shampooed by 6:15, in time for dinner.

Then, during dinner, my brother called me to tell me that our dad’s truck had been hit in a parking lot. The dude who’d hit his truck waited in that parking lot to give my dad his insurance information. Go, good citizen.

But of course my dad had to drive all the way from Angola to my house (about twenty miles) to tell me the same damn thing. He showed me pictures, he talked about the ‘foreigner’ who’d hit his truck.

Olivia and I finished eating while my dad was there and then we started her homework because hello, it was 7:15 by this point.

While we worked on homework, my dad talked…about himself, his truck, his phone. Each time I’d try and refocus on helping O with her homework, he’d interrupt with another question or comment in an attempt to bring the attention back to himself.

Once homework was done, I packed my lunch for the next day, washed the dishes AGAIN and finally, at 8:10, I sat down.

I’m tired.

You guys, I’m so freaking tired.

I get up between 5:30 and 5:45 every day of the week. I get myself together as quickly as I can so that I can wake Olivia up and get her around (she does dress herself but she can’t braid her own hair.) I go to work, I come home, I make food for my family, I clean the kitchen, I fill Olivia’s cup of water several times an evening. I go and go and go and still feel like there is so much left to do.

I wonder, sometimes, if this is just residual exhaustion from cancer and the treatments I endured in hopes of killing off the cancer.

I recently joined a FB support group for breast cancer survivors.

Reading what some of those women are going through, still, even years after treatment, reminds me of how lucky I am.

But acknowledging my luckiness doesn’t make me less tired. You know?

But maybe acknowledging my tiredness, my right to being tired, the fact of what I’ve been through, maybe just giving myself permission to be tired and angry and sad about it all, maybe that will give me some peace.

I don’t know.

Maybe I just need a nap.

An Evolution of Sleep

Star date 1/16/20: Three doses in of Lexapro…tonight, our bedtime routine was cut in half.

Backstory: Back in the day, when Alyssa and Olivia slept in the big bed in my room and I slept in a twin next to them, I’d tuck the girls in, do an elaborate singing, scratching, talking routine and finally, FINALLY, they’d both fall asleep.

I transitioned out of that by singing to them, rubbing their backs for a couple of minutes and then telling them I had to go to the bathroom. I’d spend about ten minutes in there and by the time I got back, they’d both be asleep.

Then we moved down the hall (yes, all three of us) to Alyssa’s room. There was a full-sized bed and bunk beds down there. Alyssa, at 10, was thrilled to take the top bunk, Olivia went into the bottom and I slept in the full-sized bed. It was lovely.

Right after she turned fourteen, Alyssa declared that she thought she’d like to sleep alone in her room.

Okay, then.

Olivia and I moved back down to the master bedroom. I got the big (read: queen) bed this time and Olivia sleeps in the twin.

Our bedtime routine has evolved over the years, as it does.

Back before cancer and chemo and all that brought with it, we’d settle on the couch and I’d scratch Olivia’s back/legs/arms (whatever was itchy) until she fell asleep. Some nights it was so frustrating because she’d wiggle, turn, twist, etc. But once she was asleep, I could either carry her to bed or wake her just enough to get her to walk up the stairs and climb into bed herself, going right back to sleep.

Cancer and the exhaustion of treatment put an end to that. After my surgery, I couldn’t sit on the couch with her for an hour and scratch her. At that point, we started just going to upstairs, wide awake, and going to bed that way.

That brought its own struggles, though.

In the past few months, our bedtime routine has been:

Brush teeth, go upstairs, the turtles and bug (stuffed, obviously) kiss her goodnight. I scratch her back for all of ten seconds. I kiss her goodnight. I tell her I have to go take care of things in the bathroom.

I come back ten (or so) minutes later. She’s playing with her book light.

The turtles (Travis, mostly) ask her questions, she gives actual answers. Barbie (a Lego Barbie, just the head and torso) sings Frere Jacques and Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. She does this while ‘standing’ on a cube that lights up. She really belts it out on that cube, just saying.

Then Barbie kissed Olivia, Travis, Rosie, Gub and Rupert (all the stuffed turtles/lady bug.)

Then I kiss her goodnight again and scratch her back for another ten seconds and go to my bed.

There she asks me questions for at least a half hour. Sigh.

Finally, I tell her it’s time to try and sleep. She might or might not ask a few more questions. Then we go to sleep.

Sure, it’s exhausting but we sleep through the night, so I’m calling it a win.

Last night, though. The night she took her third pill, I tucked her in. The turtles and Gub kissed her good night. I told her I had to go brush my teeth and gather the next day’s clothes and suggested, gently, that maybe she should just try and sleep while I was doing that.

When I came back, maybe 15 minutes later, she was sound asleep.

Obviously, I don’t know if this sleep change is a one-time event, if it was caused by her still being sort of sick or if it’s a sign of the Lexapro working to settle her brain down. I guess we’ll see.

January 14

Alyssa turned 17 on this day. (She deserves her own post about this awesome event...it will happen.)

On this day also, Olivia started a very low dose of Lexapro. We’ll see what happens.

I communicated with her teacher that this was happening. She’s going to keep a daily log of O’s attention, her anxiety, her willingness to work.

She takes the pill in the evening.

The first day after the first pill, her teacher reported that Olivia seemed attentive and finished all her work.

Well, sure, but it was also her first day back to school after being out for two days due to illness. So take that for what it’s worth.

I did not see any difference in her ability/willingness to write spelling words. She still erased every other word at least three times. So yeah, that was super fun for me.

I finally just stopped watching her do the work. I still sat next to her but rather than sigh and grumble and make awful faces at her, I checked FB, Instagram, etc. while she wrote and erased and wrote and erased, and on and on. Every so often I’d tell her how great she was doing and then stop watching her again. It worked and it only took her twenty minutes to write eighteen words. I’m calling it a win.

But obviously, it couldn’t have been the medicine. I mean, one pill isn’t going to work miracles. We have to give it time.

I have this grand fantasy that this medicine will suddenly break down her walls, rewire her brain and let her shine. I imagine all the thoughts in her head finally being able to come out, spewing forth all that is so amazing about her but that is currently stuck inside her because of whatever blocks 5p- has built up in her.

I realize this probably isn’t going to happen but I can’t help but dream, hope, pray.

And then I realize that if it does all happen, if she makes a huge breakthrough, I’m going to feel awful for not seeking medicinal treatment years ago.

A couple of years ago, one of the school psychologists suggested we medicate Liv. I resisted. I didn’t (and honestly, still don’t, not really) want drugs flooding her system. But these days we’re having more bad days than good and so we have to try something to help her.

Our doctor also said he could refer O to a psychiatrist.

I didn’t take him up on that. Not because I don’t like psychiatrists, but because I don’t think, at this moment in time, Olivia would speak to a psychiatrist. She wouldn’t get anything out of seeing someone because her inability to speak to anyone other than a select few people would keep the doctor from helping her. So…if the Lexapro helps, if it breaks down those barriers and allows her to start speaking to more than her immediate family, we’ll see about that psychiatrist.

One step at a time.