Thank you Colo for the idea to write about a "typical" day.

My day started off going to bed at 3:30 a.m., waking up at 8:30 a.m. when my oldest said bye to me when she went off to classes. I finally woke up at 10:20 and realized that I told my mother I would be up there at 12:30 to take her for her diagnostic mammogram. If I hurry I can get in two hours of work. So I quickly dress and head downstairs to my office. Wonderful, just in time to clock in. My feet start getting really cold and my fingers are freezing. Dang hubby, always turning the heat back so much and I freeze even when layer a lot of clothes.

My mom calls and asks about helping her get dressed and ready. I explain that I'm working but I'll call the oldest to stop in from her class to help. Finally it's 12:35 and I'm done and my oldest comes home. She volunteers to go along with me. We take her car instead of my van, thinking that my mom might be able to transfer better from the wheelchair. We head up to my mom's and have to switch her from one wheelchair to another and she didn't have any problem transferring from the wheelchair to the car.  I just hope we can get her out as easy. So off we go.

We arrive at the imaging center and we get mom out of the car. Thank goodness my oldest was with me cause I could barely get the wheelchair in and out of her trunk - in my van it was so much easier. So I take mom in while the oldest parks the car. Of course we had to fill out paperwork. The building was relatively new so everything in it still had that newness about it. They had a wall of water. It was beautiful and soothing. Okay so we are called back and taken to another waiting room (this one had a TV and I wished I told the oldest to come back with us but she brought her books to read and study so I knew she would be occupied.) They took my mom back. I watched the soaps (Days and Passion). I waited 40 minutes until my mom came back but we had to wait again cause they were going to do an ultrasound. This time I went to retrieve my daughter. Thought she would enjoy some different scenery. So, another 20 minutes went by and a nurse came out to get me cause the doctor was talking to my mother. The mammogram and ultrasound were nondiagnostic. He "thinks" it's just fluid (she has an enlarged left breast) but he wanted to send her to a surgeon. It's already almost 3 o'clock but the doctor was kind enough to turn in one of his favors owed him by the surgeon to get us worked in. The surgeon's office was in the big mall-like building across the parking lot. We had to wait for them to give us the packet of her films and off we went.

We decided that I would just push her across the parking lot and the oldest would bring the car over. This was done to make it easier on my mother. We arrived there and thankfully, the surgeon's office is inside the main door. We sit and wait, fill out more paperwork and finally were called back. Again more forms to go over with the nurse and the doctor comes in. He examines her and determines that she needs a breast biopsy, explains this to us and said he wants to get this done next week. I'm thinking "oh wait, I'm leaving next week and I have so much to do - yikes". So off we go to schedule that. She has to be off her Coumadin for five days which means next Tuesday. I look at my calendar and see that I'm suppose to see the therapist that day - okay no problem, I'll just call her and change my appointment. So we leave.

My oldest gets the car and brings it up to the door. We load my mom and my oldest helps me put the wheelchair in the trunk. I go to get in the driver's door and my oldest is feeling around in her coat pocket. She informs me that she thinks she left the keys in the trunk. I just starting laughing and said "Call you dad and tell him to hurry." I didn't want to spend anymore time with my mother and I had six more hours to work. While she is talking to my youngest, who was giving her a hard time, I asked my oldest if she checked her jean pocket and lo and behold, she pulls the keys out. So off we go - taking mom home. We get back there and help her change for bed - It's now 4:30 - she is tired and both my oldest and I are starving as we haven't had an opportunity to eat all day.

As soon as we are done with that, we head home to raid the refrigerator. My daughter had another class at night and had to leave almost as soon as she was done eating. She couldn't find her pocketbook and she swore she brought it in the house and my youngest said she thought she saw it too. I asked did she check the car, maybe she left it there. So out she goes to check there and comes back and says "can someone call my cell cause it's not out there"  Hubby calls her cell but we don't hear it ringing. Meanwhile as the cell is suppose to be ringing, I call my mother and ask her if she hears a cell ringing and of course she does. So off the oldest goes to college first stopping at grandma's house. But she is back in ten minutes. Her key to get in my mom's house was in her pocketbook and she couldn't get in. Poor child!.

I worked for an hour before going to Wal-Mart. Hey, I needed undies for the trip and needed to pick up some things for my mother. Work can wait. Right after we get there, my mother calls my cell and asked if I was far away (she always does this when she calls my cell) and of course I"m 25 minutes away. Here she can't get back in bed (she is afraid of the transfer and falling). I told her to call my brother whose night it was anyway to tuck her in. She said he left and she was in bed when he was there. His line was busy she said. I told her to try again and that I was sorry I couldn't come right away. He lived 3 minutes away. In the meantime, I call his cell phone and get this angry outburst about her and this and that and I calmly tell him that I just spent 4.5 hours with her and he can do this. He calmed down and I'm assuming went as I didnt hear anything from my mother. So we go back home. Decide I need destressed  I go see my lover for a brief 1.5 hours. I got destressed.

The closest I got to valentine's day was when my hubby called me from work, wished me happy valentine's day and asked if I got the candy bar he left me. I told him I did (wished I had eaten it) and thanked him and wished him happy valentine's day. He said he was sorry that he didn't get me a card or anything and I said "Oh that's fine, you have given me the gift of a Hawaii trip"

As for lover #2, well, when I got there, he hugged me, wished me happy valentine's day and later made me weak all over and wore me out. Oh yeah, he gave me an e-card.

What did I get the two loves in my life? Well.........There's always the Hawaii trip. I did pay for Wal-Mart (165 bucks - yikes) and I gave lover #2 a full body massage. Usually, I'm more giving and thoughtful but it didn't seem to be in me this year. Does that mean I'm getting older? Does that mean it doesn't mean that much to me anymore? Is it the medicine? Who knows and who cares, I'm off to bed and steal the heat from lover #1 cause my feet are freezing.

Although life gets busy, crazy and even dramatic at times, it is good. I survive. I keep going.

I'll be leaving for Hawaii in three weeks. I surprised I'm not more excited. Oh don't get me wrong, I'm excited but when my friend (she is going with her husband too) and I talk about it, she is really excited and I seem kind of humdrum about it. Maybe it's the medicine. Went shopping with lover #1 for clothes to wear on this trip. Heck even that didn't get me excited.

I know I am definitely nervous. I always get nervous before taking a long flight. But this time it will be both the mommy and daddy leaving the children behind. Of course I think the worse - what happens if something happens to both of us? Will they know what to do? Will they know about this account or this document, so on and so on. My daughters are 20 and 18. They are quite capable young ladies and will know what to do I'm sure. But.....just in case, we are gathering up account numbers, documentations, etc that they would need in case something happened to both parents. One cannot be too prepared. We'll leave them with money, blank check just in case they need emergency money. I'll have a friend check with them occasionally while we are gone to make sure all is well on the homestead. And I will try to enjoy myself.

I'm thinking that this trip with the significant other will be a revelation for me. Help me make a decision about my life. What could be a better setting then paradise itself right? It's funny how two people can grow apart. I look back to when we met and then dated, became engaged and finally married. Sometimes I think I wanted out of my parent's home so bad that I used him to do it. Although I genuinely loved him back then, I was young and inexperience in love or life for that matter. We had a good life, a happy life. When the children came, things were great. We had two little angels and we kinda lost ourselves in them. They were our focus, not us. It was only after they were in the teenage years did things begin to seem different. That was probably only because I was made to look at my life. It was also the time I experienced something else that lead me to meet lover #2.  Looking back I do regret the things I did except for meeting Doc (lover #2). If I had the chance to do it over again, I wouldn't have done it. But I can't go back and I have to live with the experiences. Call it learning about life at an older age.

Maybe Doc is the reason I can't get too excited about the trip. He wants me to go and have a good time to the point of encouraging me to enjoy my company (meaning lover #1). I wonder too what will it be like when I come back. Will things be the same between Doc and I? Will I want things to be the same? Will I fall back in love with hubby? Who knows. Time will tell.

An update on the therapist sessions. I have been to two of them so far and have been honest about my mother to the point that the therapist could tell a lot about me and her. I need to make more time for me (my family) that doesn't include her. In other words I need to let her know that this time is going to be family time and if she needs something she isn't to call us (she can call my brother). This way I (we) can enjoy some time without her calling and wanting something. Well.......I tried that Saturday when hubby and I went shopping. I told her Friday that we won't be around and if she needed something she will need to call my brother. I must not have made myself clear. She still called. My oldest daughter went to her house twice and I went there twice. UGH!!!!! Next thing the therapist wants me to do is tell her about the therapy, how I feel about how she is monopolizing my life to point of stressing me out. Even when I don't need to go there, I am still on call thus there is always this underlying stress. I haven't made the time to do this. I take her to her doctor's on Thursday so maybe that will be a good enough time. We'll see how this goes. Could be a pretty stressful day. I know she won't get what I'm trying to tell her. She knows I'm under stress but for some reason she doesn't think it is her. She might not be the total reason but she is the major reason. I'm finding the therapist to be helpful. Not so much telling me what I already know but pointing out things in a way I might not have looked at them, telling me how I might be able to handle certain situations and encourages me to not to forget about myself in all this.

Well, it felt good to write this even though it was jumbled up but hey, it is random thoughts. It's just like my mind works, thoughts jumping around and constantly moving. It's a wonder I sleep.

I haven't written in a while due to a couple of reasons. One of them being that there was no way I could organize my thoughts enough to even write anything comprehendable. That's not to say that this will be. I started seeing a therapist last week for the stress I have to deal with regarding my mother.

When my father died almost five years ago, my mother was devastated. We all were. But it seems that for me I never could fully mourn for him as my mother immediately began with what was to become my burden to bear.

My mother and I never had the type of relationship that most daughters have with their mother. We certainly didn't have anything like the relationship I have with my daughters. She had issues with her mother who I found out later had issues with her mother. So, apparently this ran in the family and no one decided to stop it until me. I wasn't so much physically abused although I had my fair share of slaps to the face or my hair pulled or my butt beaten. She was more into the emotional abuse. The abuse that goes unnoticed by a child until they realize what is right and what is wrong. Without getting into all the details, she was mean to me. She said hurtful things to me and she made sure that I was constantly looking over my back at all times. At one time when my brother and I were almost teenagers, she took a handful of pills in front of us and fell to the floor. We were hysterical. We had no idea what to do. I called the family doctor and told him what she took and he assured me that she would be alright and to try to get her to bed. There are a lot of blanks in my childhood. Times of my life I have no recollection of. I don't think bad things happened to me during those times but I often wonder why I can't remember some memories my brother may have or other people have shared with me and I was part of .

I have become the crutch that my mother needs to get through life. My brother helps somewhat but he knows how cryptic she is and keeps his distance. She had walked with a cane before dad died and is now in a wheelchair, has gained an ungodly amount of weight, has numerous health problems such as arrhythmias, diabetes, neuropathy, angina, among others. I am the one that takes her to her doctor's appointments, sees to it that she has her medicines and other supplies. When my father was alive it was nothing for him to run to the grocery store every day to get something for her. When he died she still expected the same type of "service." Early on I made it clear to her that I will not be running like dad did for her. She can make a list. Well, I'm still waiting for that to happen and I still remind her. Thick head? Stubborn? Who knows.

Now that I have been overloaded with all this crap and I'm starting to have stress effect my life in ways that I never thought, I have begun medications and therapy. Would I have needed these things before he died? I seriously doubt it. I simply can't handle my mother. It was nothing for her to call me up (before dad died) and rant and rave for an hour about him. The whole time he is down the hallway and I know he could hear her. I never said anything, didn't agree or disagree cause I didn't want to prolong the call. A lot of times, I told her I had to go or do something. She still tries to do that and I still don't say much and cut the conversation short. Am I being a mean person? If this person wasn't my mother, I wouldn't be friends with her, I wouldn't associate with her but because she is my mother I feel obligated.

It is an emotional rollercoaster for me. One that I don't know how to control but hopefully with the help of a therapist, I can get it under control. If I had to look at my life and determine which gave me more stress - my two lovers or my mother - I feel my mother outweighs all and some.

1. I analyze everything.

2. I'm very sensitive to other's feelings.

3. My sense of humor can be dry and sometimes sarcastic.

4. I once won a trip to Cancun, took the money instead and gave most of it to my parents so they could enjoy the holidays.

5. As a teenager, I earned a green belt in Karate.

Thanks PolarBear!!

First, thanks Polar Bear for bringing some fun to the stream. It is nice to get to know people better. I had to really, really think of fun facts about myself. I was debating to share some but hey, what the heck right?

1. I am a collector of Longaberger baskets and have close to 300 (or maybe more - lost count).

2. I own a horse who has become a very big pet, spoiled but so lovable. His name is Trigger but he looks like Mr. Ed. I also had a peacock. One day he just showed up in our yard and wouldn't go away. We even tried to find where he came from but he just wouldn't leave. He acted like he own the place, kept the cats in line, played with the horse (although I don't think he thought it was playing when the horse was trotting after him) and even made his "nests" on our deck and shelter in the pasture. They are pretty but boy are they messy. We eventually (after a couple years and neighbors complaints) found him a good home with other peacocks.

 

3. I love road trips. Hopping in the car and taking off to a destination that is decided as we go. Always fun. Great memories.

4. I'm very much into sex. Enough said.

5. I love to cook, especially outdoor on open fires or gas grills.