Day 306: on a weeble-wobble wednesday

The Queen Mother was a little weebly today. She got up this morning "not feeling too good," in her words, then napped after breakfast. She pulled herself together enough for dinner, though. I think it was her gallstones acting up. I sat at the dinner table with her, a rare treat these days, and we conversed a bit as we ate. She's okay right now, watching episodes of Blue Bloods on one of the cable networks.

Himself was a little wobbly today. The heat hasn't been roaring this week, but the humidity was a little higher than usual, and his sinuses were telling him all about it. Nevertheless, he helped out by mopping up the kitchen floor, then going with me to Petco to grab a harness for Inkblot. The harness was $17, and a bag of bribery (Temptations tuna treats) was $2.

It was much easier than I expected to get the harness on Inkblot and fitted properly. He enjoyed being out, but did not like the restriction on his freedom. We will be easing back into "outside adventures" over the next few days, with plenty of treats for being a good boy.

My mental state was steady today. This is good.

Shopping and workout tomorrow - at least that's the plan.

Day 252: on being back home!

This will be somewhat brief, as I am very tired right now...

We took full advantage of the free breakfast at the motel this morning; I brought some cereal and tea to the Queen Mother, and Himself and I feasted on waffles. (The thought of having waffles four mornings in a row would have appealed to me forty years ago; now, not so much!) Then we took two trips to schlep everything back to the condo, and opened up some of the windows. Moving back in the day after it was certified as "okay" made all the difference. Neither one of us had a reaction at all. :)

On the third and final trip, the Queen Mother accompanied us out to Petsmart, where we picked up a pair of grateful cats, then headed directly home. I broke out the "people tuna," which they didn't eat right away, as they were more concerned with checking out all the smells. Eventually, they settled down enough to eat, first the tuna, then a can of regular cat food.

We had to do a bit of grocery shopping to restock some essentials, but we settled down soon enough for our own dinner, followed by our regular Friday night meeting. Although I wasn't sure if I had enough oomph to go, I'm glad I did.

I will expound more tomorrow evening. For now, good night from SoCal. :)

Day 51: on celebrating with my husband

For those of you who don't know, this is Himself. Yes, he cleans up really well. He answers to Jonathan. Today he celebrates his birthday. He's a bit vain, so you will have to guess how old he is, but I can tell you he's ten years older than I am.

We met at a Cuddle Party in June of 2012, thirty three days after I had declared that I was ready to meet "my Beloved" to the Universe. I say he became a part of my life so that I could work through a few hangups that I had, one of which I mentioned in my Veterans Day post...you know, the one about not wanting to hook up with someone who had been in the military.

After we met, we exchanged phone numbers. I called him after a week, and he asked me why I hadn't responded to any of his texts. The only number I had at that point was a landline, not a cell phone. He was gobsmacked that people still had landlines.

Our first date was at a small restaurant called Ruby's, at the end of Oceanside Pier. While there, we exchanged eyeglasses, and noted that our prescriptions were remarkably similar - in other words, we were both blind as bats. We also share the last four digits of our Social Security numbers; no, I'm not going to tell you which four numbers those are. We share a love of the ocean, so of course that's where we had our first date.

He will tell you he knew I was "The One" immediately after the Cuddle Party. I needed a little more time to be convinced. I didn't take too much longer, though, as we had a very small & intimate Commitment Ceremony in August of 2012. Some of my friends raised concerns about how quickly we chose to be together, but I say there comes a time when you just Know when it's going to work, and the older you are, the less time you need to waste with the games of courtship. We have been together nearly 6 1/2 years.

Cancer was not even a consideration when we met, and was not going to be an excuse for me to leave him when it reared its ugly head. I take my commitments and vows seriously, and I meant it when I agreed to for better and for worse, in sickness and in health. We're stuck with one another until the very end, and I wouldn't have it any other way. He will be tumor-free 2 1/2 years at the end of January, and we are taking steps to keep him that way. 

Happy Birthday, Boo. Here's to many more. :)

Day 50: on saying "goodbye"

This was my Uncle Bob. He was 80 when he passed on September 30th. He had apparently been sick for a while, but no one one knew just how bad he was until he fell while picking oranges in his backyard, just before his birthday this past June...and a follow up exam led to a trip to the emergency room and a diagnosis of a pair of bone marrow disorders. His decline was fairly rapid, a smidge over three months. Judging by the turnout at his memorial service today, he will be sorely missed by many.

The day unfolded in classic Mercury Retrograde style: I believed the service was going to take place at the cemetary in Bonita this morning. We got there just before 11 am, when the services were scheduled to start. His name wasn't on the list of official services today, but we were advised that private services weren't always advertised. When my cousin texted me to see where I was, I told her we were at the cemetary but couldn't find them. When she mentioned the church where they were at, about 15-20 minutes away from where we were at - I burst out laughing at the miscommunication. We beat feet up to the church and arrived about 2/3 of the way through the service, but we made it. Fortunately there was a reception afterwards where we were able to properly mingle with family and friends. I wore a nametag to show exactly which branch I occupied on the family tree, as did the rest of my relatives.

My uncle's brief but wild medical journey gave me an opportunity to reconnect with the local portion of my family this year; my cousin actually reached out to me with the initial news about her dad, looking for any advice I could give them. The fact that I was able to share some of my expertise as a Caregiver, and offered to help my family with any research that they might need, actually helped to erase my depression, just a wee bit: my Caregiving was not in vain, and I could share my experience, so I didn't feel quite as isolated as I have in the past.

This Thanksgiving, I reconnected with many members of my uncle's family: his three kids (my first cousins), and most of their kids (my second cousins). I had not spoken with some of them in years, especially since my strange Odyssey began. There were times when I felt like the main character in one of those time travel stories - I don't feel like I've aged that much, but all of the "young 'uns" seem to have grown up when I wasn't looking...once small children have now started college! I find myself in the position the Queen Mother and her brothers must have occupied when we first cousins were playing around and starting our own journeys into the world.

Now I can switch gears, from remembering a life concluded to celebrating a life very much in progress, as tomorrow is Himself's birthday. Tomorrow I will brag on him a little. :) 

Day 49: on filling up my cup

Today Himself and I made a quick trip to the beach to celebrate "Blue Friday." It was a bit busier than I expected it to be. We could pretty well tell who was from the East Coast at the beach; they were the people wearing bikinis and shorts. After the recent cold snap, I'm sure the temperatures of San Diego feel downright balmy to them. ;)

I prepared the Queen Mother's dinner a bit early, so we could drive down to my cousin's house and dine with family. Thanksgiving is the one holiday my uncle Bob's family has traditionally come together for, arriving from hither and yon for a few days of feasting and catching up and playing games and sharing laughter. The festivities are somewhat tempered this year, as this is the first Thanksgiving without my uncle Bob. He passed away at the end of September, and his memorial service is tomorrow. This is how the family wanted it, so as to not have to gather twice in two months. I will go a bit more in depth tomorrow.

For the second time in two days, my belly is full, and as this is a later post, I will stop here. I shall be taking plenty of tissues with me in the morning.

Day 18: on being still and listening

Today was not a day to move mountains after all. When I checked in with myself, I really wanted to rest, so that's what I did. There's always another day to fight battles in the outside world.

Instead, I did some writing , which provided me a snapshot of my thoughts...and they happened to be filled with Stinking Thinking. They were also an extension of the writing that had emerged on Sunday; I knew I had to pay attention when my first sentence was, I hate caregiving! To sum up what I wrote today: I'm feeling like I had a shot to realize my Dreams, but I didn't have the courage to manifest them fully. Now, I'm living out my "punishment" of taking care of my mother, alone.

I know from past Shadow Work that I have challenges arising from parental Shadows, and that a lot of my challenges around relating to/with my mom involve my identity as an Individual Person, versus "just" being my mother's daughter - a dance informed and complicated by being an Only child. How much do I owe her for birthing and caring for me as I grew up? How much do I owe myself to live my best life and pursue my dreams, now that I am an adult? Finding the balance between these two poles is tricky at best, and this dilemma is complicated by the notion that I have NO idea how long the Queen Mother will be around. Aside from osteoarthritis (and a body shaped by rickets), she's actually in good health...so she could live for another three, five, ten years, or even longer. Her mother lived to 95, and she's only 76!

With this knowledge, I look at the words that spilled upon the page today and I see a story that needs to be rewritten. For better and for worse, I am my mother's caregiver right now. I do not want to be one of the 40% (at least) of caregivers whose lives are shortened, or even prematurely ended, by the stress caregiving can bring. So as the moon comes to fullness, I can consider the rewriting of my Caregiving story, and the rewiring of my Lone Wolf attitude!

Day 3: on decluttering and downsizing

After I finished up yesterday's post, I returned to a project that has been ongoing for a while: decluttering the master bedroom in our home (where Himself and I sleep). One thing about depression is that there are times when I really don't want to Do Anything, so the bedroom got rather bad with clutter and mess. I've been cleaning it up by degrees, and got a lot of work done yesterday. The floor in front of our bed is visible again! and one can get to the side door now!

The Queen Mother and I moved into our current home just before New Year's, 2000. We went from a decent sized, 3 bedroom 2 bath home into a 2 bedroom, 2 bath condo just under 1000 square feet. We did a lot of downsizing then, and still left a lot behind. As time as gone on, more of the upkeep has shifted to my shoulders - and then our shoulders, when Himself joined us in the condo in 2013. Between his cancer adventure, Queen Mother's diminishing capacities, and my depression...well, things got chaotic. It didn't get Hoarder-level bad (though Queen Mother might disagree with that), but we are definitely planning to get some help with keeping up the condo once our financial situation improves. In the meantime, when the prospect of decluttering and reorganizing stuff doesn't seem too overwhelming - and sometimes it does, as I wonder if I'm ever going to get back on top of things when I'm in Stinking Thinking mode - I manage to carve out pockets of Order in the Chaos, one part of one room at a time.

I'm not alone in this.

At the start of the year, the Queen Mother had two brothers. The younger of the two brothers passed away last Sunday, on September 30th. (If you follow along on Facebook, you'll know this.) We went to visit my aunt/his widow today...and she has a monumental task in front of her. Their house was a bit larger than our original one, and they had three kids they raised and watched fly out of the nest. Decades of memories and items are still present there, and she needs to downsize radically in order to move into an Independent Living facility. Her room is slightly more than half the size of the condo we live in! We managed to take home a few things today, and we've called dibs on a few things we need to figure out how to transport home. She's a bit overwhelmed and slightly panicked at the enormity of the task, but she seems to be keeping her composure quite well. We've offered to help schlep stuff as needed.

As I type these words onto the screen, the sense of I'm Not Alone In This arises in my mind, and I can breathe just a little easier. If my aunt can summon up the gumption to whittle a lifetime down to Essentials, perhaps I can be inspired to sort through the things that have informed my life up to this point and get a little sleeker, and clutter-free. Wish me luck.