I just got off the phone with a friend of mine who marvelled at my calm. “Aren’t you scared out of your wits?” she asked. “I would be.”
“No, I’m scared into them” I told her. There was silence for a moment while she deciphered that, then “Yeah, you would be.”
Quite the compliment, that.
As my friend V., who is an ICU nurse, was explaining to me what to expect in language more comprehensible than that of an article written for physicians, it suddenly dawned on me. I’m going to need clothing that is not only non-constricting, but downright loose around my waist and abdomen. (Yeah. I think of things like that. I really am that practical.) Most of my current wardrobe runs to jeans, dress-pants and skirts, none of which qualify.
Ok, some nice long jumpers ought to serve me well. They hang from the shoulders instead of the waist, and can be adapted for different temperatures by making the accompanying shirt long or short sleeved. So I did a little on-line shopping, to discover that whatever else is “in” this year, jumpers evidently are not.
I have a solution. I have fabric – flannels, denims, corduroys, wools – and I have some nice jumper patterns. There aren’t many of those out this year either, but I have a habit of picking up patterns I like when I find them, because that way I have them when I want them regardless of the vagaries of fashion. I need to have busy hands to keep myself from losing my mind. These things come together well. So while I did manage to order two jumpers in case I don’t sew as much as I’d hoped, I’m off to cut out three more.
And I will be adding an extra few hours to my time-estimates to allow for kitten assistance.
This has been a good couple of days for getting annoyed by random sundry computer systems. Weren’t they supposed to streamline processes? Well, I am here to tell you that they don’t. I’m sure that isn’t a newsflash to any of you, but there it is.
First there’s the bank that gave us our car loan. First payment is due the 15th. That’s Monday, right? Well, I can’t find out where and to whom to make a payment. After about 4 hours on the phone, during which I got transferred from department to department until I came back around to the entry menu no less than five times, I know no more than I did when I started. They can’t find my identifying information, nor my husband’s. They can’t find our names, nor our address. Or maybe they can find the id info, but don’t have it associated with our zip code. In short, they can’t find us, give us our account number, or tell us where to send payment. So my first car payment is going to be late and it’s Not My Fault!
Then there was my son’s attempt to register for a game on Cartoon Network dot com. They do not list the requirements for name or password anywhere. So I tried seven – yes, you read that correctly – seven times to get him registered, then sent e-mail saying “what’s the problem here? It can’t be name-conflict; I’ve tried one random letter string and several transliterated foreign words.” Turned out that they wanted elements of the name separated by spaces instead of underscores, and a password of no more than seven letters. (His original choice had eight.) So he’s sitting over there now, happily playing his game. But dammit, it should not be so complicated that it leaves a kid in tears and his mother – his computer literate mother – ready to tear out her hair. If there are such requirements, post them on the entry webpage. I should think that was pretty basic web-design, but I guess not. The first test of the game is whether you can figure out how to register. After that, you can learn to play it.
I remember when my grandfather started going in and out of nursing homes. He’d get sick enough to be hospitalized, and then, once recovered from whatever had put him there, be too weak to go home safely. So he’d go to a nursing home for rehab, during which time he would spend the idle hours thinking up errands for my uncle and/ or me, and then eventually he’d go home. The cycle began when he was in his early 80′s, but I didn’t think it would be so long as that before my father began a similar saga.
And so it appears. He’s been in for rehab for 2 1/2 weeks now. His preliminary eligibility runs out on the 17th of this month, but evidently there’s a secondary insurance. That’s good, because there is no way he’s ready to go home. I’m told he can stand for at most 3 minutes without assistance, and that will no more serve for him to function at home than to fly.
On the one hand, I’m glad they’re keeping him if he isn’t strong enough to function, because there is no way on earth my mother could provide the sort of assistance he’d need. On the other hand, she doesn’t do well alone. Really, she’s never had to learn that skill. She literally never slept by herself until dad’s snoring got to the point that they needed separate rooms about ten years ago. She went from sharing a room with her grandmother to college with a roommate to marriage at 19. I know it was the common pattern for her generation, but it is nearly incomprehensible to me.
We didn’t have that with Gramps, because he was already living alone by the time the cycle began. But it is a concern now, for Mom, and I wish I knew something constructive to do about it.
So far it’s scarcely been winter here. The same is true pretty much across the eastern half of the United States, I know, but it’s been particularly striking to me. I have seen the signs warning that it’s dangerous to walk on the beach when it is ice-covered, because you can get out over Lake Michigan itself without realizing it, and the waves hollow out the ice and weaken it from underneath. To me, signs like that indicate that it is a common problem, one that occurs most winters. I remember seeing it when my folks lived up here, and I went to the beach on a winter day. I didn’t walk out, but the ice was beautiful, a translucent blue that looked as if it had captured and frozen light itself. This winter and last, though, the signs seem remarkably incongruous, as the lake hasn’t formed more than a skin of ice that you can easily see isn’t safe for walking on.
Today? The wind is howling around the house like it’s tired of being cold and wants to come in and get warm. The cats ask to go out, poke small noses out the door and pull them back in quickly, then go curl up on sofa or chair. I won’t have to fish Tornado off the roof today because she isn’t climbing trees. She went out and chased old leaves the wind was dancing with for about three minutes, engaging in kitty-ballet and cracking me up, but was in again before I quit watching and curled up in my lap (her favorite spot to get warm) mere seconds thereafter. Gee, force me to cuddle a warm furry purr-ball.
And I think I shall stay mostly inside and sew today. The attic is the warmest place in the house, and that’s where my sewing room is in this house. So aside from a trip to get my teeth cleaned so I don’t have to worry about it for another six months or so, I’m staying home. Who knows – I might even clean up a bit around here? Heaven knows it needs it.
Ok. First off, my apologies to those who should have heard this news more personally. In the case of most of you, I at least tried to call.
My genetic heritage has caught up with me. I have uterine cancer. To be specific, I have endometrial endometrioid adenocarcinoma, grade 2. I have no idea as yet of extent of spread (i.e. stage), prognosis or anything else. I know only that there is a hysterectomy in my very near future – not that the equipment ever did me any good in the first place – and that what happens thereafter will be determined by what the docs learn when they have the monster in their hands.
I have my preliminary appointment to schedule surgery and discuss options on January 16, or sooner if there’s a cancellation. I’ve had all my x-rays, CT scans and bloodwork done. My doc was talking about doing all of that “early next week” and got a good look at the personality he was dealing with when I said no, I was doing it now, as in that very day. So he faxed the orders to my insurance that moment, which I don’t think he’d expected to need to do. Poor man, he’s a regular ob/gyn. He delivers babies. He was so far out of his depth it wasn’t funny, especially in the face of the sort of questions I was asking, and he knew it. At least I take “I don’t know” as an answer with some grace, because he ended up saying it quite a lot.
Emotionally? I’m feeling rather like a child’s pinwheel in a force 10 gale, they change and whirl so quickly. Anger, bewilderment, outrage, fierce determination, defiance, desperation, shock, tearfulness, terror, impatience, stunned disbelief, occasionally numbness, exhaustion, some guilt, because I didn’t realize what was happening physically was sign of anything so serious, and so took a couple of months getting around to the test my doc recommended – as my oldest friend said, the only thing she didn’t find in the list was denial. She’s right. Stunned is as close to it as I ever get in any crisis. <!– D([“mb”,”
The phone&#39;s been ringing off the hook as word as spread, with people calling to offer help or an ear or shoulder or just tell me I am loved. I swear they&#39;re coming out of the woodwork. There were some I expected, was relying on, but I&#39;m realizing that there are more out there than even I ever knew.
So I&#39;ve got that support, which means the world and all. I&#39;m being sent to the University of Chicago hospital&#39;s gyn/oncology, which by all accounts is excellent. I&#39;ve got a wonderful, loving husband. And I&#39;ve known for a very long time that I&#39;m one of the most stubborn people this planet has ever hatched. So I expect it to be a pretty damn bumpy roller-coaster ride for awhile, but I expect, at the end of it, to pick my regularly scheduled life back up and live it for at least another half a century.
Ed. note: This is an open post, as will be the &quot;big&quot; landmarks as things develop. But I will be putting up a specific filter so I don&#39;t give them as don&#39;t want it too much of information. I will be specific on it, but not graphic – some medical details no one needs, or if anyone feels they do they can ask me. If you want to be on it, let me know. But that&#39;s where the bitching and the emotional roller-coaster riding and such will go. You have been warned.
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The phone’s been ringing off the hook as word as spread, with people calling to offer help or an ear or shoulder or just tell me I am loved. I swear they’re coming out of the woodwork. There were some I expected, was relying on, but I’m realizing that there are more out there than even I ever knew.
So I’ve got that support, which means the world and all. I’m being sent to the University of Chicago hospital’s gyn/oncology, which is quite literally world-class. I’ve got a wonderful, loving husband. I’ve known for a very long time that I’m one of the most stubborn people this planet has ever hatched. I’ve never backed down from a fight (refused to take a few, but not backed down once engaged), and that’s not changing now. So I expect it to be a pretty damn bumpy roller-coaster ride for awhile, but I expect, at the end of it, to pick my regularly scheduled life back up and live it for at least another half a century.
Back when our son was tiny, I took advantage of my adoption leave to do a lot of work that had me sitting at my computer – desktop, in those days, rather than laptop, but still sitting tapping away at a keyboard for hours at a time. I did all of it while serving as a bed for a tiny boy who slept best in contact with Mommy, propping my feet up and settling him across my lap, then reaching over him to type. It worked very well, once I got used to typing with my elbows up on the chair arms.
Now, nine years later, I’m doing it again, with a small creature about the same size as a newborn human, but much more self-sufficient in the matters she is capable of. (A brain the size of a walnut does have its limitations.) There a little girl in a black fur coat curled in much the same place J. used to rest, snoozing happily with her body tucked under my right arm and her head pillowed on my left, purring continuously. She does this for a couple of hours almost every morning, requiring of me only that I sit still and pet her occasionally. So this is my writing time, since only my hands really need to move and that doesn’t seem to much disturb her. We both take pleasure in the cuddle time. And I must admit, it’s a lot easier to make myself sit still and get my work done when I have a cat purring her satisfaction at being in my lap.
Our boychick was trying to write his own crossword puzzle, telling me the clues as he went. “What is Thomas (the tank engine) afraid the viaduct will do?” was the first one. “Break?” I guessed.
“No, that’s not right.” he responded. “The word is ‘collapse’. It’s a cinnamon for “break”.