More on the Same Theme

I used to think life sucked as a thirteen year old. Granted, my family was dysfunctional and I was an awkward very young teen..but I had no idea how good I had it. I had a Guidance Counselor (Mr. Dave Holleren) who spent a lot of time with me, mainly because he knew if he could just get me past this dark cloud that I'd have a very good life. 
I spent most of 8th grade hanging out in his office, or around it working with the secretaries and not attending classes. I still did well enough with my grades just half-assing the work and taking the tests after the fact. Teachers gave me grace to not attend classes for the most part. Dave (the counselor) may have had a hand in that, too. 

You know the expression: "Youth is wasted on the young?" Seems like folk over 60+ years of age are the ones who express this thought more often then a 46 year old...but I'm genuinely frustrated.

Let's recap:
I've been told (years ago) I have Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. Not sure about that one, but I can believe it lately. It includes symptoms like joint pain (having that - esp. right hip and knee and it's verified by MRI on the knee. Plus easy breaking bones...yep, tell that to my tibia) and confusion and memory problems. I have some serious memory issues.

I have Sleep Apnea. That one was legit easy to diagnose. I was stopping breathing like 30+ times an hour, sometimes up to 22 seconds in duration. I'm lucky I didn't cause brain damage. (Okay, the jury is out on that one. The family might tell you I have!)

I have Chronic Kidney disease, Stage III. I'm not going to need dialysis for a while it seems, as long as we keep a close eye on it and I keep my high blood pressure under control. I'm on like 4 different blood pressure medications. It's crazy.
However, this condition comes with it's own set of side effects that include feeling tired, too. 

I have Bipolar II which comes with its own set of medications and two of them, yep count that TWO of them cause aversion to exercise and weight gain. Weight gain in turn exacerbates the rest of my health conditions (and makes me generally feel shitty because I miss being a size 4 - 6).

Now I fall asleep sitting up - in the car, in church, at my desk - against my best efforts not to. Is it narcolepsy or just exhaustion and meds that are causing this? Who the hell knows?! There isn't a clear test to rule anything out and I'm running out of levers to adjust.

We got the phenomenal sleep number bed, I wear the CPAP mask to sleep..if it weren't for the meds would I be waking up every morning feeling refreshed? God, I wish I knew.

I have intermittent cancerous spots on my body--and that's just handled by a diligent dermatologist.  

I have a young colleague, in her twenties, who recently resigned due to her health. I don't know exactly what's going on...could be a terminal brain tumor or could be a chronic condition, but she got to the point where she wasn't sure how much longer she could work so she switched to a job with kickass benefits.
(And here I thought my company had good bennies.. apparently not good enough!)

And I think to myself: How long will I be able to work? When will these symptoms increase to the point where they impact my career so much that I have to scale back or quit? 

Or, conversely, how can I fight to get back in better condition so that I can continue to work and support my family. How much of this is within my control? How much can be fixed with big efforts on my part? 

I'm not sure..but I need to try hard to find out where the limits are and how long I can keep going. 

When I Became a Mom (again)

I consider Erik my first "kid" because I became part of his life at about 14 months old. He was our guinea pig kid--sometimes we were too worried about him hitting milestones, we worried, we prodded, we experimented with sleeping techniques (a big ol' FAIL because he never needed more than 5 or 6 hours of sleep a night) -- and we had a co-parenting triangle with his biological mom which made things more complex.

But when Lucy was born, just about a month and 18 years ago.. here are additional things I learned:

• To have a baby is to have your heart walking around outside of your body.
• The smell of a newborn - especially their head - is intoxicating.
• Even if the labor is three days long, breaks your tail bone and completely rips every bit of supportive fascia in your lower abdomen, it will be worth it.
• You lose a certain amount of modesty after a room full of people have stared at your crotch for hours. (Or days, in my case.)
• You become paranoid and worried at somewhat irrational things like a car veering off the road to hit your stroller. This doesn't go away much once they start driving.
• You may start off pointing out which bits of the baby that resemble you or your husband or personality traits... but you better knock that shit off before s/he hits puberty and wants to be their own person with no comparison to either parent.
• There is a level of exhaustion as a new parent that is unparalleled in your later life. You will wonder, after the fact, how you ever survived it.
• You will marvel over the fact that your body DID THIS. For a short while you will have no body shame or hate, you will just respect your body for making this human being.
• Unreasonable bouts of pride, worry or frustration will become normal for you.
• Your baby will initially be helpless and only comforted by you. S/he will make your heart swell with love and then... a decade or so later break at times when they reject you as part of the process of growing independent. You may know this is normal -- but it will still hurt.

Happy Mother's Day to moms at every stage of the journey.

When Spouses Outlive Spouses

Jeff does this very morose thing every time he goes on a trip. He leaves me as equipped as I can be for his not returning.
He vacuums, cleans the house as much as possible, tells me about upcoming money things (that he probably should have already mentioned, but that wouldn't have been on my radar anyhow) and we both, if we travel by air, send pictures of the location of where our cars are parked in case the other should need to retrieve it from the airport parking lot.

Jeff is genuinely morose about it - I'm more practical in my mindset. I'm thinking: "Hey, I took this picture of where I parked the car so I could find it when I get back. I'll share it with Jeff in case he needs the car for any reason between now and when I get back."

Also, the other thing Jeff says constantly is that I'm going to outlive him. He points out that most of the retired people are women living alone who have outlived their spouses. What he fails to realize is that these women are from a generation that didn't work outside the home. Many of the ones I've met never handled their finances -- it was just something that their husband always did. Now they've either had to take a crash course in their retirement investments and monthly income or leave their financial affairs to one of their adult children, usually the oldest son.

My grandmother out-lived my grandfather by decades. But the greatest stressors in her life were feeding a bunch of hungry teenage boys whatever they wanted like a short order cook. That was a fleeting point of time in her life and the rest of it was spent at Bible studies where she nourished her spiritual well-being and being surrounded by loving family. She traveled, tried all sorts of diets (mostly healthy and vitamin based...some hokey things like magnets in her shoes, too) and followed her passions and was a caretaker.

Compared to my corporate life, which she genuinely can not have imagined, she had a life with limited stress. I don't have to outline how being a working mom, with a husband who travels, in a male dominated corporate world where I need to do every twice or three times as better as my male counterparts to keep my job and climb. (Because climb, adapt, move or find a new job. You're like a shark, you need to keep moving and proving your worth.)

Travel, overtime, toxic and even abusive bosses, challenging work (which is both good and bad) have been just as (more?) stressful then my husband's career. It's not a contest, but he's had white male privilege and stability within a non-toxic work environment for nearly all of his career.

Not to say his life has been without stress. His reaction to stress included losing chunks of his hair. So, again, not a contest.

But my health is for shit these days. I was trying to figure out how old I am last night (yeah, your mid-to-late forties just kinda all blend together) and my helpful daughter who first shamed me for not just doing the math said: "You're not like a 46 year old. Your body is like...beyond 60 years old."

She's right. I have more medical conditions and medications than I could have ever imagined, even 5 years ago. I've already posted about how I take more than 20 pills a day. I don't want to and I'm sorely tempted to skip many of them...but I have physicians who would be very angry with me if I did.

I have a freakin' CPAP machine now. I can't sleep without a device on my face. (Or, I'm not supposed to, and as I just found out in a very creepy way, there are strangers tracking that I am wearing it and how many hours I'm wearing it and how many times I still stopping breathing each hour when a nurse called me up and talked to me about my data--which they can SEE.)

So my theory is this: Jeff's assumption that I'm going to outlive him and all his preparations as such ("Here's how you do this.. if I wasn't around you'd need to X, Y, Z) are unnecessary. Of the two of us I'm the one with the shitty body and looking like I won't make it to 55.

I've had doctors chastising me that I'm going to have a stroke any moment and devastate my family since I was in my late 30s. (Gee, thanks Doc!)

I'm still sorely tempted to stop taking every pill I'm taking every day. To just walk every day and eat as healthy as possible and leave life to its whims.
I'm having a hard time just letting age ravage me and leave me with age spots, fat around my middle and gray hair.

Part of me wants to "Rage, rage against the dying light" and the other part of me just wants to say F*CK it, let nature run its course.

The stressful job isn't going anywhere. Life changes aren't possible on the horizon. All I can do is take care of me to the best of my ability, with the limited time in my schedule and limited budget available to me to take care of minor things like age spots.

Sun screen, like everyone says after the fact, is what I should have worn.
Screw it. Maybe I like the sun on my face. Just not right now while I'm vainly paying a few hundred dollars to wipe out some age spots.

Getting Serious About This

I was an English Double Major just for the fun of it, my first post-college job was TESL/TEFOL (Teaching English in Japan), and I worked as a Tech Writer for some years before moving into my current field. I correct my family's essays and emails (when asked) and recently...I've been writing.

They say the ideal word count for a book is no less than 90,000 words, but not over that number, either. I'm at nearly 45,000 and just reaching the key plot arch - pre-denouement.  I think I'm doing it right, but I have no idea.
Unlike other writers I have no desire to share what I've written (yet) with an alpha or beta reader. I definitely won't be posting it here, either. 
I just feel a bit proud, like taking cello, that I'm not putting it off. That I'm tackling it now while I still have kids at home--that I'm not waiting for "some day"--that I'm doing it today.

I'm also relieved I can quilt again. I think these 'productive' hobbies are good for me. It would be better for me if I went back to yoga and running, too.... But baby steps. 

We Failed

The “kid” that arrived was not the surly young man that lived with us for nearly a year after his arrival. In all, he lived with us just short of 2 years and I’d say less than half of that time was without conflict.

While we made progress, like pushing him to attend Anoka-Ramsey for a school year and getting his driver’s license – everything we did, every minor step forward took an immense amount of effort. With one notable exception: his finding a job. He stopped in at CVS, liked the manager and took the job immediately.

This was after he couldn’t cope with working at all and needed help tearfully resigning from a job when we first had him move in…he said he was “just too anxious” to work—and then suddenly he was working with the public at the Financial Aid desk at his school and working with the public at CVS. His self-proclaimed social anxiety became a complete non-issue. This boggled the mind as it was a significant sea-change from what we’d seen at first.

About a year or so into his living with us he began having what appeared like out-of-control outbursts. They were terrifying to me. One was when he was driving to school with me (while he had his learner’s permit) and he nearly hit a car. When I asked for him to pull over, he got into the passenger’s seat, let off a huge amount of verbal abuse and then essentially jumped from the (slowing down) car while it was moving.

I parked and met him on the sidewalk offering him his winter jacket (it was below zero) and he cursed me out again and then ignored my effort to give him the coat.

We sought out family counseling just before this time. He had made some hurtful comments to our daughter quite a few times and she considered the relationship broken beyond mending. We were still trying to figure out how to better integrate him in the family. He decided he hated Jeff and that Jeff was too demanding and he couldn’t stand him.

He tearfully hugged me and said I was the only real mom he’d ever had. This was all touching, but it all flipped on its head at the end when Jeff was the good guy and I was the evil spawn of satan, fat cow c**t, and every other expletive he could hurl my way.

At one point, months ago (probably over 10 months ago) he had a large enough conflict that he left the house and stayed overnight for a couple of nights with a friend (who later moved into our house) and during that time he self-harmed and decided to get tattoos on his FACE and neck. He then hid them from us with Band-Aids and make up for some time. I’m not sure how he thought we wouldn’t notice eventually, but it became a common thing for him to lie to us (he said he had an injury to his neck).

Looking back, he probably lied to us constantly. With some notable exceptions. A frequent excuse he had was that he was “too lazy” to do something. He meant this as a genuine excuse—that he shouldn’t be expected to do something because he was “too lazy” to do it.

This, of course, was unacceptable to us. “Too lazy” to bring up his dirty clothes for us to wash, fold and return to him was crazy-making. Too lazy to put away his clean work clothes he SAT on them on the chair they’d been placed on rather than put them anywhere else.

He began actively ignoring us months ago. I would greet him (I work in the downstairs), so when he would get up at 1pm or so I would say: “Hello!” or “Good morning!” and he would intentionally not respond and just walk past me.

All of this behavior was SO different than the “kid” we took in. At first, he was so thrilled to have a family. Our entire extended family loved on him, gave him gifts and he was treated identical to all our kids. Same or more gifts at holidays, same shopping where we bought him as much or more clothing than our kids. We tried for the same rules. Regular sleeping hours and consistent meals with the family. We bought him ANYTHING he asked for. Any food, clothes, protein drinks, lifting weights or poster.

We constructed, at great expense, before he moved in, his very own bedroom. It is literally the nicest bedroom in the house with a fireplace, built in TV and DVD player, huge space and the largest walk-in closet, by far, of any room in our house.

We had him select any color(s) he wanted for the room (which, frankly, were hideous) and did all the painting for him. He didn’t seem all that grateful which…at the expense we paid was a bit tough to swallow.

The same goes for the car we bought for him. We’d been driving him back and forth from Anoka-Ramsey which was hard for us (work schedules) and time consuming. About 2 hours per day of effort. No gratitude on his part.

So, we pushed for him to get his license. When he failed, we pushed for him to STUDY this time and take it again. Jeff quizzed him constantly in hopes it would help. We were thrilled he could drive himself, but nonplussed that he seemed ungrateful for the nearly $3,000 we spent on his car and fixing it up further to have Bluetooth connectivity for his music, etc.

--

In summary, after less than a year with us he came to EXPECT rather than be grateful for things that we did. He expected that I would take care of all his medical appointments and getting him there. He expected that if he overslept Jeff would get him up in time for school. He expected laundry service and to have all meals prepared for him. Jeff even packed him lunches. (Initially)

He never offered help the way our other kids would jump in. Examples: He’d see us come home from grocery shopping with lots of bags and just look at us as we carried them in. Our kids would, right in front of him, offer to help and start carrying in bags.

When confronted he claimed his “autism” (never diagnosed) made it so he didn’t notice. So, I tried a direct approach ASKING him for help. He gave it minimally and begrudgingly and always expected profuse thanks.

Jeff and I once left for a brief two-day weekend trip with friends. Lucy was out of town at a debate tournament, we were out of town, Michael went to stay with Grandma and Grandpa so that he wouldn’t be troubled to feed him. It turns out he couldn’t be troubled or able to remember to feed the pets, so the dog was without food and water for the entire 2.5 days we were away.

Every time after this, if we left, we had to take our dog to Jeff’s parent’s house, too, because a 24-year-old self-professed dog lover could or would not feed a dog.

--

These are minor examples of minor things he did—but larger, very scary outbursts including him punching a whole in the drywall of his room, scared me.

I wanted him to have immediate care and wanted him to be hospitalized for his mental health, but this just caused him to run away in his car. (Which was worse because I worried about him driving in that mental state.)

We are certain he has mental health issues, but this doesn’t excuse his pattern of lying (he dropped out of college and continued to go there daily to “pretend” he was still attending classes) and disrespect.

We asked for very minimal things:

Please bring up dirty laundry

Please don’t sleep until 1 or 2pm

Please help plan one meal a week (this happened only twice)

These are ridiculously minor requests and yet he didn’t do any of them.

His room, with its giant walk in closet, was covered in a mix of dirty and clean clothes strewn across the floor in piles – with open half-empty pop cans.

He wouldn’t eat and began seeing a food therapist because he kept losing weight to the point where he appeared to have anorexia. Again, we had to push for everything to get him care.

We babied him when he had his wisdom teeth out, bought him new glasses and new clothes. I took him to no less than 5 dentist appointments to fix multiple cavities from lack of dental care for nearly 6 years. We did everything to help – and in the end, received nothing but vitriol for our care.

--

I genuinely think he will continue to think of himself as the “victim” of our actions. He has this mentality that he’s always the victim and everyone else hurts him – and he’s never at fault.

He has followed this pattern, bouncing from relative to relative, girlfriend to girlfriend’s house, even a stint in the military staying with no permeance. He told me that his father, on hearing that him was staying with us, said: “Well, that’s good. Maybe a family setting will finally help you.”

This should have been a giant red flag.

An additional red flag was when, without telling us, he booked flights to spend Christmas with his friend L in California rather than spend it with us, his supposed family. It would have been his second Christmas with us and everyone, including our extended family, bought him gifts.

I knew the relationship was deteriorating and it was clearly not working in family counseling because he always played the victim.

I also knew he was talking behind our backs about how terrible we are/were. M also living in our house, would try to come up and defend whatever outburst he’d had, suggest ways he might be a victim (probably suggested by him) and generally try to be a peacemaker. This put her in an awful position.

Before he left, he spat in our faces that everyone he’d talked to at all his jobs and on the internet and to everyone else thought we were evil and horrible.

He videotaped me trying to calm him down while he screamed and said he’d post it to the internet to show what a monster I am.

Every lie hurt. Every out-burst terrified me that he might hurt our kids.

I know Jeff thinks my fear is excessive, but I knew his sister threw him out because she feared for the life of her baby.

This made me scared. Scared that he could, in the night, take a knife from the kitchen and attack us in our sleep.

This is what really pushed me over the edge – and broke the relationship irrevocably. Being scared in my own home. That was too much.

--

Like I said, I know he thinks he’s the victim. I know he thinks we’re in the wrong. I don’t expect he’ll ever come to think of the things we did for him, from construction, to buying his car to all the support in enrolling him in college…I don’t think he’ll ever appreciate these things. He polarizes things too much – so we are “100% evil” or bad, and I don’t expect that will change in his mind.

Frankly, I don’t care. We know our efforts. We know we went above and beyond. We feel hurt and lied to, and now that he’s gone there is a new peace that is settling over our house and a relief I couldn’t imagine until now.

He threw away perfectly good clothes. Expensive posters we bought for him. Shoes and more. We salvaged some from our garbage, but we know the bulk of it he threw in a dumpster at CVS.

This was also heart breaking. Jeff is taking what we were able to find in our garbage can to Goodwill.

--

When the YMCA case worked helped him move out, she asked us to host again. I was horrified. She said: “I know you found him on your own…but would you consider hosting again?”

Please know that we are scarred. Perhaps for life. This level of dishonesty, this amount of hidden mental illness and how positively it started to the crash and burn of his departure has led to deep, deep distrust.

If we could find such a positive, upbeat and talented young person who had a hard luck story that looked like it could be fixed by just having a loving home—and it could turn into this nightmare of my feeling scared in my own home…I’m not sure you could find a more ideal initial homeless young person yet it ended with us terrified. We need time to heal.

We need time to heal as a family. Our kids are hurt emotionally. Can you imagine the guilt I feel that I brought someone into our home that called them names and caused immense family conflict, shouting and scary pounding on the walls?

No, we won’t host. Not for the foreseeable future. Maybe we failed, but at least we tried.