clickmom

waiting

Last weekend I met a woman from a university not too far away who told me she needed a photographer. She saw me sliding my camera into the camera bag at the dog park, and she asked me what I was photographing. I told her I was photographing patterns of light and that I often photographing the woods but manage to keep evolving a different way of looking at the same woods.

We chatted for a while. In the end, we exchanged cell phone numbers. I haven't heard from her, so I boldly went on the university website, found her staff profile and emailed her what I think was a very enthusiastic letter about how I am looking forward to working with her and have perused her website and am confident I can meet her needs and I even offered her a reference and sent her a link to an old newspaper story I covered when I was a freelance photojournalist back in stepford. That was yesterday and I have never checked my emails so frequently while waiting for her response. I really want something to do and I think this might not pay nothing either and I could use some guilt free spending money to buy photo paper with. I would feel alive again if I was working and this part time sporadic situation is perfect for my current full time sit beside the ill person circumstance I find myself stuck in.

Speaking of, yesterday I couldn't take sweet pea for our normal long walk in the morning because she sliced her foot open in what I assume was broken glass in the woods. She is on bed rest and antibiotics for ten days. I assume it was broken glass because from where I sit it looks like a certain population (disc golfers) are purposefully breaking their (illegal to bring and drink in the park) beer bottles so that the dogs get cut because they don't like the dogs. Also because the vet said It's a straight thin cut, looks like glass. Now, it could totally be teenagers at night (an obviously reasonable suspect because teenagers, no concept of consequences) or drunk people on the weekend, or any number of other people. I just happen to see the disc golfers with their beer in hand from time to time. I don't see anyone else, but that doesn't mean they aren't there. Disc golfers just happen to show early in the day like I do. Also the disc golfers have been known to be destructive to the woods by clearing areas for their games, so I automatically dislike them. Anyways, so I have been taking sweet pea for tiny little walks in grassy areas so she doesn't get dirt into the wound and then I find myself back in the house for the bulk of the day. Since the husband is sitting in the family room I feel compelled to sit in the family room too and I realized yesterday that sitting in the family room watching him doze in the chair and zone out to his iPad 2 inches from his face is very similar to sitting by his hospital bed. I am a natural born waiter. How did I get like this? I think the ability to accept this kind of inertia has got to be built in. I might be at my own personal tipping point though. Not sure how much more sitting around doing nothing I can take.

A couple of weeks ago I told a friend that my house was a mess. Which it is. I had been watching the driveway for the chinese food delivery car so I could hop onto the front porch to greet the delivery guy before he could see into my front entry way. That is how bad it was. It might look like the mid stages of a hoarding situation in here. She insisted her house was worse so I sent her some photos. Then she sent me some photos back. I won the embarrassing house contest as far as I am concerned. Then I felt ashamed that my place was such a disaster and I cleaned for a while. I'm telling myself to do a few minutes here and there and most days I do... ok, in all honestly, not most, occasional days I do, but there is part of me which knows that as the husband declines people (like his sister) are going to want to stop by and I really have to get on top of the mess and clear it out. Goal for the day- kitchen area. (That is between checking my email for a response from the university woman) 

mirroring

I had a bit of a revelation today about how the husband's current state mirrors my mother's experience with her illness/cancer. When my mom finally accepted her diagnosis of the rare and terminal peritoneal mesothelioma she went to 2 doctors. Once was at Sloan Kettering, because SLOAN, so naturally... and that doctor told her, it was not curable and with her other health issues her best bet was to not treat it and enjoy her time left which he estimated at 18 months. My mom, the fighter, did not like his answer. I remember the day she came back to my house after that appointment. She was pissed. The next doctor was trying very hard to treat and extend lives for patients with this insidious cancer and he gave her the false hope of the possibility of living 5 or even 10 more years with treatment.  This doctor was telling mom exactly what she wanted to hear.

The surgery to remove as much of the cancer as they could and implant the chemo ports was horrific beyond imagination, but mom, the tough broad she was made it through and fought her way back. Then, as soon as she was healed enough came the chemo. Now most patients, stopped by in the morning for their chemo and went on their way, back to work and the rest of their lives, or to the airport to fly home, and never even had an issue with it. My mom was not so lucky, my mom would start puking before she even made it to the curb to get into my car. She'd sometimes puke for hours and be miserable and in pain for days. She was in and out of congestive heart failure and also her kidney function began to decline until they couldn't treat her anymore. She was in and out of the hospital. A month or two after they stopped treatment for the cancer she was in total kidney failure and on dialysis, which was also brutal as they could never seem to get her fluid levels just right. My poor mom, pushed valiantly through the last 6 months of her life, she suffered the symptoms of her cancer, she spent half her time in the chair getting dialysis half putting on a brave (and by brave, I mean, a full face of makeup, dressed to the nines, looking as sharp as she could because that was how she rolled) face. She was so weak that a trip to the supermarket was all she could do for the day. An outing for lunch and she was done in, but she looked fantastic!  

In the end her heart just couldn't support her sick body anymore. She lived for a long and painful and grueling year after those consultations. Mom needed to fight. I know she needed to feel like she wasn't just accepting her death. But I wonder. Would she have had 18 months if she hadn't fought? Would she have had a better year? Would she and Dad have had more time together? Made it almost to their lives ends side by side? I wonder.

I feel like I am right back in that time where one doctor says he can help and the other is saying, just accept the diagnosis and make the best of what you have left. Should I encourage the husband to charge forward with surgeries and implants and devices and experimental medications knowing there are big risks to all of this and no guarantees? Or should I encourage him to accept what time he has left and help him enjoy it? (Ice cream sundaes every day!) We don't even know why this is happening to him. Is it genetic? (I think it is) Worst case of diabetes related illnesses ever? Depression and sleep apnea combining for total body disaster? No one knows for sure, so how am I supposed to do the right thing here?

Also, the husband's situation is different than my mom's. Mom was still mom and her choice was what she needed to do. I'm wondering what the ethical thing to do is when there is dementia involved and the choice today might not match the choice my fully functioning husband would have pre-made for himself if he had known.

WHERE IS MY CRYSTAL BALL??? Dammit

 

real

The husband was supposed to get an implantable defibrillator surgically implanted tomorrow. I told the husband I had concerns, he said he wanted me to butt out and I spoke with his heart failure specialist anyway and he wanted to post pone the procedure so now the husband just might suspect that I am trying to get rid of him.

I'm not exactly kidding, I suspect he may be inching up on the paranoia scale. He is just keeping things to himself right now because a little slice of him knows how insane it all might sound. I can read this guy like a book. (And he hates that!!) We'll see what happens down the line as the dementia (which he is adamant that he does not have) progresses.

In the mean time, still no test results to give a name for this special kind of hell on earth. Might have something in a couple of weeks.

I did bring the husband to his primary care doctor for a flu shot and during the pre injection time where we sat in the doc's office the doc got all philosophical with us and spoke to us a great deal about ethics and decision making. I was quite hurt when the doctor relayed a conversation from 8 years ago he had had with the husband where in the doctor said "If you don't start taking care of yourself you're going to die and die soon." and the husband replied "I don't care." Thanks dude, it isn't like you had a wife and three kids relying on you. Jerk.

But mostly I was stunned by the doctor's suggestion that it might be best to sit back and not aggressively treat every heart issue with all of the surgeries and devices. He spoke a lot about quality of life (I think the husband has close to none and the husband looks as if he can barely absorb the question) and making it clear what the husband's wishes might be. Also, the doctor pointed out the chance of the husband not even surviving the surgeries. I hadn't even thought about that one. Then the doctor talked about the surgeries messing up other fragile areas of the husband's health, like his kidneys and the possibility of living on dialysis if they messed too much with him. I think I'll make a phone call for an ethics consultant tomorrow and see if there is someone who can guide us through this process.  The trouble is that this current version of the husband is completely complacent and willing to undergo anything the doctor's suggest and does not have any desire to be introspective about his condition or quality of life. The old version of the husband would have hated this new guy.

After my BIL was diagnosed the husband told me that BIL's terminal illness might not be such a bad thing because he had suffered so much in his life and was in constant pain and did not have children. I'm glad his wife didn't overhear that one. That statement leads me to believe that the husband's one and only reason for going on with this little sliver of a life he exists in is because he has children. Not because he wants to spend time with or impart his wisdom upon the children, because he does not make any effort to even speak with the children. The husband thinks he "should" stay alive because the children exist. There are children therefore he should hang around this world longer. I dunno. So they should see him wither away? Suffer? Turn into a vegetable....

The doctor also brought up issues like being a burden. No reaction. As a matter of fact, anytime the doctor brought up that someone might consider how hard this entire ordeal is on me or the kids, no reaction. Especially to me. I am no one to him.

I don't know anything anymore

I don't know anything anymore. Really. I don't. The most basic thing ... When people say "Hi! How are you?" totally throws me. How am I? Well, technically, I'm mostly fine. I've been on a low-ish carb thing for a couple of weeks, so that feels good, (though my stomach is kind of messed up more than usual.) I have my normal aches and pains but I believe that if I could just motivate myself to go to work out I'd be back in whatever shape I was in before I stopped working out and that would be a good thing and I'd feel so much better too, I am at least making work, which means I haven't completely lost it, and then.... oh yeah... I'm kind of dead inside because I have to suppress that part of me which wants to absolutely go over the top postal every minute of the day because I am sure there is something no doctor has named wrong with the husband and I am also sure that time is running out for figuring out why this is all happening to him. 

I act angry all of the time when it comes to the husband. To anyone else (with the exception of other drivers on the road who cannot hear me anyways) I think I am as pleasant as can be. I am aware that we never really do know how we are received, it's just my guess.  I realized this morning that the anger might just be a cover up for a level of sadness that I am not equipped to deal with. I wonder of I have been mourning the loss of this relationship for the last many many years. This morning I sat down alone to watch Sunday Morning. Josh was surprisingly still asleep and the husband, who had been wandering the house all night  was finally asleep, and I flashed back to the early years of our relationship when we would lie in bed, my head nestled into his arm pit and watch and discuss Sunday Morning together. I just wanted to sob. I want life to feel simple. I want to feel loved. 

Part of me feels the sadness welling up, like an avalanche breaking free and gathering weight and strength as it makes it's way towards you and then you get one last thought right before it hits you in the back, rolling you around and leaving you upside down and disoriented under the snow not knowing which way is up and praying that the rescue dogs find you before you freeze to death. Oh wait, that happened to my friend Susi when she was a teenager and she just told me about it yesterday. Susi is a cool character so I had to add some drama to the story. Obviously, Susi was discovered by the rescue dog, interestingly enough the dog who found her was one that she had stopped to pet on her way to the ski lift.

Back to me. In this colorful analogy I think I am right now racing down the mountain, feeling the tears slide from my eyes straight over my temples into my hair (true story, I went really fast down a mountain without goggles on and was mesmerized by the feeling of those tears falling sideways)  and wondering how much more time I have before the snow hits my back. Or maybe the snow has already reached my back and I am in an eternal tumble as the entirety of it washes over me. No, the problem here is that I don't think it has hit me yet, I am racing and racing and I know it is going to hit me and I know I cannot outrun it, I am still wondering if I can be strategic about it though. Yeah, that's where I am. Racing downhill just in front of doom. 

It sucks, and when people say  Hi How are you? I can't tell them. I can't ask them if they've ever tried to outrun an avalanche knowing there wasn't an actual chance they could do it. If I know the person I say, I suck, don't ask. But if Idon't know the person I say Fine Thanks. and then I feel a twinge guilty for lying. It's funny how (and we all do this) people are so wrapped in their own lives that they cannot see the burden and the pain in anyone else. Sometimes I walk with a woman who has been telling me all about her crush on this guy who seems to be feeling it too, but playing it cool...It's been going on forever, and she tells a great story and loves to talk so mostly I just comment on what she says and don't talk to her about my stuff.  For some strange reason she was done talking the other day and casually asked me how I was and I just unloaded (reader's digest style) on her. Having been in this revolving door of specialists for a while I have to watch how I talk because I speak a little bit of med-speak now, but I didn't think she'd actually be listening so I just threw some details and emotions out there and she got quiet for a second and then she said I can't believe I go on and on about my lack of a love life when you're going through all of this and I told her I liked to escape into her world and forget mine, but really I wanted to half say, I know! You are totally oblivious to what I 'm going through!  It's kind of crazy.

 

 

anything else

I got in a good shooting groove there for a couple of weeks and now I'm wondering if I lost it again. sigh. I was so close!! SOOOOO close.

I hate this summer. It has been the worst summer and as far as I am concerned it had no redeeming qualities at all.  We didn't get good lightning storms, it was too cold to swim for most of it (ok, I might be wimpy about that) and BUGs, oh my goodness the bugs were horrible this summer.

Speaking of bugs, I was in the tiny dog park near my house and saw something I thought was kind of strange. It was swarms of dragon flies swooping around in circles over an open field. Now I have been told that they were eating the mosquitos, so I feel all grateful and tender towards the dragon flies, where as before I knew they were 'quito eaters, I was just like, "Why do these things land on my head when Im in the lake?!?!" 

Things I hate: the sound of clapping, whistling in the house and chewing with your mouth open. 

My stomach is messed up. Every day it feels like I'm brewing chunky kombucha in it. Is that even a feeling? A little like there is a nugget of nastiness in it. Even if I haven't eaten for so long that I've got rumbles, it still feels pretty freaking rotten. I'm a wee bit concerned a burned a hole through the stomach lining when I was pounding OTC painkillers back when my hip was on fire a couple of weeks ago. It never ends with me. I am tired of hearing myself.

Today I was recalling a time before Josh and I told the story of "back when I only had two kids" and it seemed so strange to think of myself as a mother of only two kids. I mean , was I even a mother with only 2? Did I know how incomplete I actually was? I do recall this feeling after Evan was born  that I somehow had more of a legitimate family with 2 kids, rather than only 1. Hmmm. Who would I even be today if I had stopped with two kids? I can't even imagine my life without the sweetness of Josh in it. I guess I really define myself by being the mother of three kids, even though I must not talk about them as much as I feel like I do ( I just think about them 24/7) because people can not seem to wrap their heads around that 1. I am a mother and 2. I have 3 kids-- as if that number is so huge. Sometimes I say 3 and people look at me like I've said 23. I think I look rather mom-ish but maybe I don't... I have no idea. Maybe I just talk about photography so much that no one knows I can think about anything else.

Or they think I am so into dogs I can't relate to people! Because SWEET PEA!! The best dog in the world. I love her so much. She does not disappoint.

totally

So

Yesterday I'm driving the husband back from a visit with the heart failure specialist and for miles and miles and miles I can see right in front of me some beautiful heavenly rays shining through the clouds. The heavenly rays did that thing where they shine in almost a full circle, they all shined down in a long stripe like a distant rain storm, they did that thing where they outline the clouds in a brilliant pink. It was quite the impressive show and no matter times the highway twisted and turned I could always see them. 

Finally, 20 minutes into the ride I ask the husband if he's been enjoying the rays too and just as the words come of my mouth My Sweet Lord begins to play on the radio. 

Are you really going to tell me to not believe that is a sign? Come on!! 

Recall: When I approached the adoption event and Evan already had sweet pea in his arms he told me this bullshit story about how she had turned to see him and leaped over one dog and pushed another over and jumped into his arms I totally believed him.

 

second woods

So, there is a second woods where I sometimes go with sweet pea. This second woods has a Facebook page and I've been reading all summer about two different dogs which have been attacking other dogs. One is a shepherd and one is a rottie mix, so they're not light weight dogs.

I've been thinking of going to the second choice woods because the geography of the second choice woods might be better for the photo series I am currently working on. 

And then yesterday one of the attacking dogs tragically killed another dog. The dog which was killed is one of those small furry guys. He probably didn't stand a chance.

Last night I ordered the pepper spray I've been thinking of carrying for coyotes and bears and I can't believe I might have to use it for dogs too.  I am so deeply sad for this dog and his owners who I don't even know. I can't imagine being in their place. 

I'm not risking going to that woods right now. Maybe not until that dog is banned. 

9/11

 I'm really glad that today is over. It causes me a great deal of pain to relive this day over year after year. I can't compare what I went through to what the families of the victims went through.  Reliving  that hour of uncertainty when I didn't know if the husband had made it into work or if he'd ever make it home again I asked myself "How do I explain something like this to my children?" is still heart wrenching difficult

paragraph 2

So, the pain isn't quite the same burning campfire it was a few days ago, it's down to hot embers. But you know, I have melted beer bottles in some hot embers, so I'm not out of the woods with this ordeal yet. The one thing that the latest chiro said which made me so very sad is that I should not go for my daily (sanity saving) hike with sweet pea. (Wow, just typed bear bait and then had to delete it. She must be on my mind) 

I've been taking sweet pea to this postage size park closer to our house and giving her short walks. It isn't the same for either of us. My girl needs her long walks too. I wish Evan was here to help out.

Since it's Saturday I have told Josh (this is me bargaining with the world's laziest teenager) that I am going to force him to walk with me for a brief walk at the normal woods and then he can get back into his pajamas and do what ever he wants for the rest of the day. Since we aren't in utopia, where I would rather be, with my camera and tripod (which I have concerns about carrying due to the frigging hip thing) I am having extra trouble finding my motivation. Also, I find that if I roll over in the morning and even touch my phone to see the time I get sucked into the phone vortex of time wasting and lose hours off of my morning.  In the ideal world, I'd be awake, pain free and peppy and on my way to the park as the sun rises to get some quality work done!! 

I am tempted to make a sunrise photoshoot in the woods my goal for tomorrow except for the small detail of coyotes. And skunks. I could always song my tripod around as a weapon in the case of an attack. Maybe today I'll stop by the camping store and see if they have any bear mace. 

I am chicken.

But in my defense, this dude at the small park just told me yesterday that his dog chased TWO coyotes during an early morning walk at the woods I want to go to.

In other terrifying news, one of sweet pea's dog friends got spooked by another dog who was on the attack when she ran out of the woods, through the parking lot and across to the woods across the street. The owner couldn't find her and I hopped in my car to drive around and search for her for a couple of hours the other night. I was crying my eyes out, calling her name out the car window as I slowly rolled down the streets surrounding the park, praying nothing bad happened to this sweet dog. There were other good people doing the same thing and it made me so happy to know that so many people just cared. With no luck, I drove home and dreamed about searching for something all night long. In the morning the owner returned to the park and found his very dirty and very tired dog who was just fine. Gratitude. I was so relieved to hear the good news, I stood in my bedroom crying happiness tears as I re-texted it to other people who care.

My thoughts during the 10 hours that I was sick over the possibilities this dog might be a goner (in my defense a young German Shepherd had the same thing happen last year and he was found dead and partially eaten on someone's nearby lawn in the morning) were 90% praying for a good outcome and 10% me trying to convince myself that another tragedy would not be the end of me. (I really love this dog and the kid who owns her)  I feel like I am 100% full on sucky things happening to me and everyone I am even remotely fond of. Back off universe! I need a breather. (inhale, exhale, inhale, exhale) 

If the same thing happened to sweet pea I am not sure I could leave the park until I found her. I'd have to sit there all night with a baseball bat (for protection against the coyotes) just incase she came back. 

I'm not kidding. 

Speaking of Evan (paragraph 2)... he says he is fine at school. He's happy, likes his classes, already has some people to hang out with that he knew before going there. The next big test for him will be getting good grades. Fingers crossed. Like I said before, my plate is full.

shorty

Before I tell you this I want you to understand my personal level for pain tolerance.

I gave birth to Evan in the room next to (our bedrooms shared a common wall in house built of heavy duty cardboard)  4 year old Matthew's bedroom at 1:20 in the morning, with the bedroom doors open, without waking Matt.

I was in so much pain from this insane hip pain that every time I had to move from a seated position to standing I cried out in insane primal animal noises and said motherfucker a lot. Then I'd drag my leg along as if I just been shot in the thigh and it didn't respond to my command anymore.

Long story short: Trochanteric Bursitis 

Pretty much it's a fat middle aged woman's condition in which the bursa of your (over) weight bearing hip becomes inflamed and "tender" in a world where "tender" means "CAUSES YOU SO MUCH PAIN THAT YOU TO LOSE THE WILL TO LIVE"

Seriously, I was walking around like my leg was dead weight and this caused everything else to hurt, especially my (also weight bearing thanks to my all natural god given Dolly Parton boobs) neck.

So, to wrap things up, the lake chiro recommended some sports guy chiro down here near new town and now I have a new chiro whom I shall call shorty. Someone warned me that shorty had a god complex. I asked her what man didn't? And I tried him out anyway but mostly because he gave his cell phone number to the lake chiro for me and told me to come in the same day and I was desperate. His office looks really familiar and I think that I might have gone there once when I first made it to new town, but this time he helped me out (or possibly the prescription strength doses of aleve I have been taking too...) so he can have his god complex as long as he takes me to a place where I am pain free enough to drive back to stepford to see the old chiro because I am 100% sure this all started because my foot is doing something weird and nobody else wants to look at my feet.  

Anyway, obviously we were at the lake last weekend (where I saw the lake chiro) and I had hobbled  down to lie on the lounge chairs on the dock with my friend who came by for a visit. She brought her dog, a small fuzzy mixed, which is what sweet pea thinks she is, so all was great until I took 5 minutes to lower myself onto the lounge chair and as soon as I got into a position where I could relax I heard an unusual "plunk" which turned out to be sweet pea falling off the dock into the water. Sweet pea does not swim- ever, she sometimes walks elbow deep into the water but that's it, so she didn't know how to get out. The look on her face was sheer terror and I managed to roll off the lounge chair with only one profane outburst onto my feet and drop my pants and dive into the September cooled lake (have I ever mentioned what a wussy I am when it comes to cold water swimming?) and then sweet pea followed me to the stairs and was able to frantically scramble out of the lake.

I really do like having a dog who isn't wet and stinky every day, even though one of my most special times with bear bait was swimming with her every day the last summer when she had the orthopedic problems and couldn't really walk but could swim as far she wanted to. She reeked by the time labor came around though. All the dogs who swim smell the same kind of awful by the end of summer.  Don't think it is very good for their skin or something. 

I kind of feel bad for being such a wuss when it comes to a cold lake, but I've been like this since I was a kid. The lake at the camp we were forced to go to was cold enough that my recollection of it was that it burned it was so cold. 

Did I ever tell you about the time I fell into a frozen lake? I was on the crew team in college and there were 25 girls for 24 seats, which pretty much always worked out perfectly because pretty much one person didn't show up for practice every day until one of the first spring time practices.  We would run to the boat house as a warm up, and then we would row. This particular morning there was still ice on the inlet where our boat house was located so when we got there the coach was already out in his boat chopping up the ice so we could make it to the open water of the lake. The coach put me into the boat to row and one girl into his motor boat. Since I was nice and warm from my run and would be working hard as I rowed I left my outer layers in the boat house. Half way through practice he told the girl in his boat and me to switch places. We successfully switched places on the middle of the lake but then I had to sit in his motor boat.... with not enough layers on, in my sweaty clothes for 1/2 hour or so. I recall hugging my knees. When we got back to the dock, he jumped out and I stood on my frozen and numb legs and got one leg onto the dock when the boat began to drift away from the dock. I was too frozen stiff to do anything about it and ended up in the lake. I fell in, came up and he screamed SWIM! I swam to the edge of the dock and he reached over, grabbed my shirt and just hauled me onto the dock. Then he yelled RUN! and I ran into the boat house while screaming in pain and ripping my clothes off. It felt as if needles had been shoved into every single pore of my body.

Pal will still occasionally tell the story about hearing me screaming in pain when I got home and went to take a warm shower. 

These days I prefer a hot tub environment.

But I'm thinking that with this new hip development that swimming is probably going to be my new best sport and that I really need to move it or lose it and should start swimming at the Y. Also, if I needed an excuse to get my act together and drop some poundage the thought of the pain coming back should be enough motivation for me.