Where's My Self-Importance Gone??

Just shoot me.  Really, put me out of my misery and shoot me.  Someone.  (okay I’m not really serious but on a serious note, I’m really freaking tired and I hate hearing my dad being upset and saying the things that I just heard so I would – in the least – appreciate it if someone would slam my head in a door to distract me from the stuff that IS my life right now.)

I’m exhausted.  And I have too much on my mind to do my job today, but guess what?  I have to.  I have to be here, I have to train a bs class that I HATE training, I have to try to focus on this when all I want to do is sleep and try to figure out my life. My dad said to me this morning, in reference to possibly replacing his pacemaker with a more powerful defibulator, “if I was younger I worry about it but I’m 81 today, I don’t know if I care or if I want to go through it”. As if I need more stuff to add to my already rather large pile of anxiety over potentially losing both of my parents within a year of each other and/or before my daughter can develop memories with them that she will always have.  Today, I just want and need to cry.  I need to be alone so I can cry my eyes out until I can’t cry anymore.  I need to go to the cemetery and cry.  But I can’t.  I need to be here, doing a job that is far from satisfying these days, supporting my family and facing the possibility of becoming the sole supporter of both my family and myself because my boyfriend has plans of quitting his job and opening a business.  When do I get to feel like I’m being supported?  WHERE is my support???  Do I have to scream from the rooftops I CAN’T TAKE IT ANYMORE SOMEONE PLEASE HELP ME!!!!  I don’t want to do this job anymore, I don’t want to be a single parent, I don’t want to put my life on hold so he can move forward with his, I don’t want to sit by and watch my other parent die just as I did the last one.  But I feel like my entire life – every single little piece – is out of my control right now and, as a huge control freak, I’m having a serious problem with it all.

And if I did happen to come across a roof top where I could gain access, stand up and scream – what would I actually scream, what help do I need?  I have no idea how anyone can help.  I have to have a job, this job for the time being.  I have to care for my toddler and, unfortunately, it’s predominately on my own in the next few weeks and possibly for a very long time in the future (the one and only reason I am supporting this whole idea is her; if I didn’t think this could be successful and make us a whole lot of money that would allow us to send her to private school, I would have put my foot down).  I can’t take off from work for an entire day just for shites and giggles; I don’t have many days left this year so I need to hold onto them in case I need them for real emergencies.  Although, wait.  Why isn’t my personal well-being an emergency?  Why is it that everyone else’s stuff is more important than my need to be alone and vent my insane frustrations, anger, anxiety?  When did I stop being important to the most important person in my life – me?

Bite Me

So far today can bite my bippy.  In fact, this whole week can bite me and if things don’t improve I may send myself to a deserted island or at least to the closest Amish community. 

Last night, while playing, Emily thought it was funny to bite me on the shoulder.  It hurt so much that it brought tears to my eyes and I actually had to walk away.  This morning she thought it was okay to hit me in the face as I was putting her into the car seat because she wanted to get something off of the seat and, apparently, I was moving too slowly for her.  I’m starting to get really frustrated by this feeling – I feel like I am her personal punching bag and I just don’t get why I get the brunt of it all.  She doesn’t bite her father or hit him the way that she does me.  This morning, I feel like I am doomed to have a daughter that hates me because I hated my mom for so long when I was growing up.  I hated her for being an alcoholic and for all of the insanity and chaos that came along with it.  I will always hate her, to some extent, for what she did to me and for what she made me endure.  That wasn’t my fault but somehow, I feel like this is some sort of karmic retribution even if none of that was my fault.

My job frustrates me every day and I am tired of my only challenge being things such as forcing myself into the loop on topics I need to be aware of in order to do my job.  I’m not challenged on a professional level; my skills are not improving, my resume isn’t getting more impressive as the years go on.  I’m doing the same exact work I was doing when I started here and it’s been four years.  I’m a little bored and frustrated by the same ol’ same ol.

My life frustrates me.  I do so much for that toddler, I am the one that is alone with her most often and yet, I’m the one she beats the crap out of and disrespects on a regular basis.  I worry about my Dad every day and I miss the hell out of my mom every day, some days more than others – I think today may be a ‘more’ day.  I miss my cat and I’m angry that he had to die within 6 months of my Mom; two days after my sister’s birthday and just a few days shy of the 6 month anniversary of my mom’s passing.  I hate walking into my kitchen and automatically looking down to check his food and water, and it not being there. I hate that I know I didn’t give him the quality of life he deserved over the past few months because I just couldn’t take him laying on me after my daughter had done the same for an entire day.  I hate when I open the refrigerator and Rob has decided to place his things in the front and the things that I need in the morning – like the milk for Emily – are pushed to the back so I am forced to rearrange things in order to get things done.  I hate coming out of the bedroom in the morning to find that there was food left out on the coffee table the night before, or food left out on the counter from the night before; it’s as if I should somehow magically know that it was there and it was my responsibility to clean it up even though he’s the one that put it there.  He’s being passive aggressive and I don’t like it.

My whole demeanor is one of frustration and irritation; I am pretty positive that I am  not pleasant to be around and I just can’t shake it.  I’m sad.  So sad that even as I type this, I am fighting back the tears.  I welcome the time in the future when this doesn’t happen anymore.  When bad days don’t just creep up on me, slap me in the face and ruin everything I do and prevent me from being happy for more than a few minutes or even moments at a time.  Anything ‘not good’ – like the face hitting in the car by the toddler – ruins an entire morning that was previously pretty good and happy.  I can’t get past that moment, or the biting incident last night, and it’s stupid, I know that.  I know that it’s ridiculous to let something so small ruin my morning and possibly my day, but that’s the way it’s looking. I can’t stop feeling like a crappy mom, and I can’t stop feeling crappy about myself today; I can’t stop feeling like its my fault that she’s hitting me and biting me – which logically I know makes no sense, but that’s how I feel today.  I feel like something is lacking in my parenting that is causing it and who knows, maybe there is or maybe I just suck at being a mom.  And all of it is stemming from this inability to put my emotional issues about having a dead mom to the side.  I can’t pretend that I’m okay all the time; I just don’t have that in me, especially not since she died.  I lack the patience I once had, I lack the stability that I once had inside me that helped me to maintain my composure when I was upset.  I lack a lot these days, the biggest one of all being my mom.  She wasn’t supportive, she wasn’t a cheerleader by any means, but she was my mom and I miss her every single day and her poor parenting and her poor choices make me look at myself and wonder what poor choices am I making to make my child act out the way that she is.  I didn’t act out; I sat silently in the background until I found my voice as an adult.  But my child is finding her voice more and more every day, and yet again, this feels a little too much like karma or at least some sort of cosmic intervention sponsored by my dead mother.

Reaching Out

As I was enjoying my morning coffee today, I noticed that a friend posted on Facebook about having a heavy heart and needing a hand to hold.  I don’t know her circumstances right now but for her to say that aloud in a public forum raised a flag for me; I don’t do that kind of thing as a rule.  It’s very rare that I put anything out there for the world to see and if I do, it’s practically anonymous since I put it on Twitter where only a few of my real-life friends can see it.  To some extent, I can understand her public announcement of her current state; I’ve had a rough few days and would have given anything for an outreached hand or a phone call where someone asked “how can I help”.  I’m seen as a strong person, so it is rare that I get offers of help; everyone assumes I can handle whatever is handed to me.  I’m proud and stubborn, so I never ask for help unless I’m really desperate.  And that isn’t often either.  Even when my mom was sick, I took care of whatever I needed to with help from Rob – who thankfully just stepped up and did things without asking.  But there are times, like Friday or yesterday, when I just feel isolated.  Grief does that, so does being alone and being a mom.  I was alone with Emily this weekend again, and although my father and sister came by for a little while Saturday, they didn’t ‘help’. They sat and talked, my sister played with Emily in the backyard, but no one changed a diaper, no one made her dinner or a snack, no one entertained her while I ran an errand alone; being a mom sometimes means that you feel like you have to do everything for your kid, and it means that sometimes you feel like no one understands why you feel the way that you do – meaning, all alone even when you have this little person following you everywhere.  I had wanted to go to the cemetery last week, but couldn’t do it since Rob was out of town; our babysitter was busy this weekend so she wasn’t an option.  I was alone and sad.  I missed my mom, I missed my cat; it feels so strange to walk into my bedroom and not see him there or to get up in the morning and look over to see his food dishes gone.  I was alone in my house with my daughter and I was alone in my head, alone in my world.  Sad because I felt so alone, sad because I felt like I had lost so very much this year and because sometimes when I’m alone I feel like I am losing a part of myself because I can’t be who I want to be and I can’t do what I want to do because first and foremost I am responsible for this little person.  A part of me wanted to scream out loud for help – anywhere, to anyone.  But again, my pride got in the way.  Sometimes, I just need someone to say “why don’t I come by and give you a hand” or “how are you” and genuinely want to hear how I am – the good and the ugly.  It’s rare, way too rare, that either happen.

I'm Dwelling & Can't Stop

I told myself I wouldn’t dwell, but it’s seemingly impossible to not think about it.  To think about where I was at this moment and what I was doing.  We were at the hospital, it was the first time Rob had been there with me since she went in and it would be the one and only time. We knew it would be that day; my sister wanted to wait until the next to give my dad more time, but as my dad said before he left “what’s the point”.

You never know how you’re going to deal with something until you’re faced with it.  On the outside, I’m sure I appeared relatively calm and maybe even cold at the time.  I knew for days that we would have to turn off the machines; my sister was grasping at straws for days, had me call the Cancer Institute to see if they would review her file for one last chance at possibly getting her off the machines – I still struggle with the idea that they didn’t even attempt to do anything with the cancer, try to stop it from growing.  My dad was in denial, praying for a miracle that I knew wouldn’t come.  And as sure as I was that it was coming, that day, I didn’t know what to do with myself.  I paced, I rung my hands quite a bit and played with my hair nervously, I shifted in my shoes as I stood up against a wall and stared at my mom trying to think of something else other than I was watching my mother die.  And when it came, when I had to tell the nurse, when they came in and took all of the tubes out, and when she was gone, I didn’t know what to feel or what to do.  I didn’t feel “peace”; I didn’t feel much of anything except for “oh, she’s gone”.  We sat with her for over an hour before the nurse came in and said “she’s getting ready to pass”; they told us it wouldn’t take long but she held on for as long as she could.  She didn’t want to die – which is something that plagues me regularly.  There’s a part of me that continues to feel responsible, and I think I might always feel like this.  I didn’t force her to go to the doctor earlier, and when I did it was much too late.  I ordered the morphine, I told my father and sister we were keeping her alive for us.  I talked to the doctor, I talked to the rest of my family.  I feel responsible for letting her get as sick as she did, for watching her get sick, and doing nothing.

I don’t know if I could have saved her, if some doctor could have saved her, or if I could have prolonged her life – and I know that if she had been in treatment, what life she did have probably wouldn’t have had much “life” in it.  I wish that I could know, but I never will.  I will live with this doubt and this guilt for the rest of my life. And today, as I am forced or force myself (depending upon how you look at it) to relive that day, the guilt and the feeling of responsibility are greater than they usually are.  And I miss her more today, because it’s been more than 6 months since I last saw her smile, last heard her voice, last saw her in the kitchen cooking and complaining about my dad/the stove/the fact that too many people were in the kitchen, and it’s been too long since I saw my daughter smile at her.  6 months go by quickly, even if sometimes it feels like an eternity.

Uncelebrated Anniversary

Today, I'm trying not to think about it. Today, I want to go about go about my business like it's any Friday that I'm working and taking care of my kid. I don't want to listen to the voice in my head that's reminded me a few times already what day it is. It was 6 months ago - January 11th - that we turned off the machines and I sat with my mom as she passed away. I try not to think about that day often; now, it seems like it went in the blink of and eye but at the time, it felt like a very long and dramatic movie. Or at least a Lifetime special presentation. It's a day and a time that will always be with me, and I know the pain of that day will fade with time. But today, it hurts to the point that I feel numb. I can't really feel anything right now.

I will sit here this morning, at 7am, and I will watch the birds eating on my porch, and I'll wait for the ducks to come around. I'll get the toddler up and start the day. And I will think to myself, as I already have a few times, how much I miss my mom and how much I wish she was here for things like the silly stuff that my daughter does and days, to tell me how to cook the beets we got from the farm, and to celebrate my sister's birthday this weekend with the rest of us. Today, I'll miss her a little more than usual and I will do my best to think of how she was before that day in the hospital and before she was really sick. I'll try to focus on the times we had, good and bad, and not just the times that I had with her sleeping body in a cold, sterile hospital room. I'll try to remember her smile, as long as it doesn't make me cry, and her laugh and the really good food she used to cook. What I would give to have her back so she could make some eggplant parmesan! I miss her, and I hope I can do her memory justice today and every day.

Goodbye, my friend

This weekend, my cat died.  I took him to the vet on Saturday to see if they could give me some guidance; I knew he wasn’t well and he most likely would not get better. I walked in thinking I was putting him to sleep, but after talking with the doctor, I knew that I needed to know more.  So we agreed that a blood test was the way to go, so I would know I was making the right decisions.  Saturday night, he seemed okay – even though I was warned that he might be “off” due to the stress of the appointment.  Sunday morning, we woke up to find vomit and some poop on the bedroom floor; when he wasn’t in bed with me during the night I knew something was wrong.  He was laying in the hallway outside of my daughter’s room; Rob thought he was dead.  But not yet, he picked his head up when I reached down to pet him.  He laid there for a while, rolled around a bit, slept, responded to me when I petted him and almost held my finger when I put it under his paw.  But, somewhere around 11:00, he stopped breathing and he was gone.

It felt very strange to have him in the house, but he wasn’t really “there”, much like how it was to sit by my mother’s bedside knowing that she wasn’t really there.  My sister came over after work, picked him up and took him to the office so I wouldn’t have to do it this morning.  It was strange to hand him over to her; I put him in the carrier and put a towel over him – I thought it was the right thing to do.  That’s what you do when someone dies, you cover them with a sheet.  I cried when I picked him up and put him in the carrier, and I cried when my sister took him from the house.  It feels very strange in my house today.  I threw most of the day-to-day things out – his litter box, the mat under his food dish – and the rest got cleaned up by the carpet cleaner.  It’s as if he wasn’t there at all, much like my mom.

I’m trying to sequester myself a bit today.  I’m sad and I don’t want anyone to know why.  It’s okay if they think I’m just being bitchy or whatever; I don’t really care.  I just don’t want to have to say that my cat died.  Saying it out loud makes it more real and just harder overall.  I’ve learned that it doesn’t matter if they walked on two or four legs, it doesn’t matter if you were prepared for them to go or not.  If they are a part of your family, your immediate family, and they are suddenly gone, it still hurts just about the same.  I hate thinking that my mom is laying in a coffin, in a drawer. I hate knowing that at some point this week, my cat will be burned in a fire until he is just ashes and that fuzzy little face with that little tuxedo on that made him look like he was formally dressed for all occasions will be nothing but a pile of dust.  I  miss him terribly and I hope that, just like my mom, he is healthy and happy again and can run and jump and have fun like he did before he got old and sick.  Getting old sucks for the one getting older, but watching someone age and get sick – at least in my opinion – sucks even more.

Feeling More Today

Today, for some reason, I’m crying.  I started this morning in the car on the way to school.  A Jason Mraz song was on, not sure what it was called but it was a sweet romantic type song.  And then one of my favs – Life is Better With You by Michael Franti came on and as soon as it started, the tears came.  I don’t know why they did, but they did and they didn’t stop.  I don’t know if I was having a “I am so lucky” moment or if I’m just an emotional mess right now so anything even remotely emotional makes me weep openly (very possible).  Between my sister’s birthday tomorrow, the impending ending of my cat on Saturday, having to prep my 2 year old for the loss of the cat – who she went to find last night to show him her flashlight (I can’t explain how much it broke my heart to have her look at me and go “kitty!” and run out of the room to go find him, knowing that in a few days he will most likely be gone), I just have too many emotions to deal with right now and no way to really deal with all of it.  How do I handle feeling horrible for my sister, feeling my own grief for her over the loss of our mom that she will feel tomorrow, the anxiety I feel over possibly putting my cat the sleep and the associated grief and pain with that, the anxiety I feel over dealing with my daughter and her first real loss (she really didn’t understand my mom’s passing, although I try to remind her of my mom and explain to her why she’s no longer here).  I have no idea what the f I’m doing right now, which is frightening in and of itself.  The only stable situation I have right now is my job, and my relationship which is affected by all of my stuff so I don’t know if “stable” is a good word to describe any relationship I’m involved in at the moment.

I’ve felt overwhelmed quite a bit these last 5+ months, which I suppose is natural but still, it sucks.  No one likes being overwhelmed; this control freak hates it more than I can put into words.  I hate that I can’t help my sister get through this weekend without pain.  I hate that I won’t be able to help my daughter make sense of losing the kitty that she loves and will miss every day for who knows how long.  I hate that I can’t stop crying.  I hate that I already feel this higher level of grief, knowing that the six month anniversary of her passing is next week.  I don’t know why I feel “more” knowing that it’s been six months; it shouldn’t matter how long it’s been, but for some reason it does.  I guess there’s this part of me that just doesn’t want time to move on because the further away we are from that date, the longer she’s been gone, the fuzzier the memories will become.  I already can’t remember things about her, I don’t want to lose more as time goes on. Today, if I’m afraid of anything, it’s losing my mom more and more as time goes on.  Each time I have difficulty remember something about her, it’s as if I’ve lost her all over again.  I don’t know if this emotional cycle will ever end, but if it does, I will welcome that ending with open arms.

Hesitation

Today, I hesitate to pick up the phone and make a call that I don’t want to make.   To some extent, I feel like it’s January all over again and I’m the one saying “we’re keeping her alive for ourselves, not for her, and that’s not fair”.  I am currently faced with the decision to put my cat to sleep, and it’s one that I don’t want to make.  I know that some of you may be looking at this thinking “you have GOT to be kidding me, did she compare her mother’s death to her cat???”.  Yeah, I kind of did.  I was the one that kept saying she wasn’t going to get any better, I was the one that ordered the morphine.  Now, I have to keep reminding myself that he isn’t going to get any better – he went completely blind about a week and a half ago and is now peeing and pooping all over my bedroom, and he’s only eating some days (probably the days he can find his food).  But I’ve had him for 14 years; I got him when I was still married.  He was my first baby.  He used to greet me at the door, sleep next to me, cuddle with me on the couch when there was no one else to cuddle with.  Even after I had the baby, I would bring her into the house in her car seat, set her on the floor in the kitchen and he would come in and sniff her and check her out while I was feeding him.  Those days are gone now, though.  He stays in bed except to eat and poop/pee.  He doesn’t play anymore, he purrs when I pet him which is a good sign but he was always a happy and friendly cat so that doesn’t surprise me much. He’s lost so much weight that he’s skeletal at this point, I think.  And it kills me to know how hurt and sad my daughter will be when he’s gone; she sings this song about who will be home when we get home from school and he is in it every time. There are nights that the first word out of her mouth as we walk in the door is “KITTY”.  Sometimes she’s afraid of him, but I think that’s just a fear of the unknown – she doesn’t really get what he is.  I know she’ll still look for him and not fully understand why he isn’t there anymore.  I have to figure out how to explain it to her both before and after, so it’s not so confusing that her confusion makes the sadness worse. 

I feel bad for him, and although I know that this is most likely the right decision, I can’t bring myself to do it.  I hate the idea that, yet again, I will be the one to look at a medical professional and give the okay to administer the drugs that will ultimately kill someone that I love.  And yet again, this is another individual – for lack of a better word –  that I have to sit next to watch pass away.  Well, technically no one says I have to but he deserves it, no one and no animal should die alone if they were important to someone. I’m sure that it will be a faster process than with my mom, but still.   I hate that I have to  be the one to do it, but again, there is no one else to do it.  No one else was strong enough to do it with my mom, and there really is no one this time because he’s my cat – I had him before my boyfriend was in the picture.  So it has to be me.  And making this call is the first step.  I have to take him in to be seen by the doctor, who will do some blood tests and I’ll know in a few minutes if there’s anything big medically that’s causing the problems.  In my head, I know that whatever it is cannot be fixed, but in my heart I am praying it can be because I just don’t want my cat to be dead and I don’t want to be the one to do it.  There have been times that he’s gotten me SO mad; he’s stood outside my daughter’s door at 6am on a Saturday crying so I would get out of bed and feed him.  At those times, I’ve thought to myself ‘GOD sometimes I wish he would just die in his sleep”.  Yeah, I have thought that type of thing when I was at my worst; I’m not proud of it at all.  But no matter how mad I’ve been, I still don’t really want him to die. He’s been a good companion, and he tolerates my daughter better than I ever thought he would.  I wish that I could do more for him at this point than this, but I don’t think I can. There comes a point when there’s just nothing else that can be done but to let them go and be at peace.  It’s the right thing for him, no matter how much it sucks for me.

I will pick up the phone and dial the number, make the appointment, but I might need to eat a cookie or two before I can bring myself to do it.

Another Birthday

I wish that time would stop, just for a little bit. My daughter is getting bigger by the moment, milestone after milestone. My dad gets older, day by day there's always another thing - a doctors appointment, a procedure to have done. And now, my sister. Her birthday is July 4th and I know how she's feeling, even if we don't talk about it. The phone call that won't come, the snarky comments about how old we all are, the dinner cooked commemorating the day. All of it just makes the day painful and it's hard to consider it a joyful event.

I know what this is like, the first birthday without our Mom.  There will be no phone call, and I know I already mentioned it but that was the hardest part for me; there will be silence and memories and tears. At least that’s how my birthday was.  Her husband doesn’t know what to do; in the past he’s done things that he thinks are helpful but actually aren’t – he’s not the brightest light in the sign – so I’m almost happy that he hasn’t gone and planned some big party or something like that.  Months ago, before my birthday came and went, I thought a party would be great.  She’s turning 50, that’s a big deal!  But now, I don’t know what’s right or wrong and I think she needs to say what she wants – whether she just knows that she wants to stay home and relax, pretend it’s not her birthday or she wants to get together with all of us and celebrate.  I would be happy to do either, whatever she wants.  On my birthday, she texted me.  She didn’t call, and I understood why.  My Dad did, but I understood why he did that, too.  Thankfully, she has to work on her actual birthday so I’m hoping that distracts her from it at least for some of the day. My mom would have called her at night though, so I know when the clock hits a certain time, and her phone doesn’t ring, her heart will break just a little bit more. I know mine did at 12:23pm when my phone was silent.