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Apr. 11th, 2009 @ 10:19 am Weekend update, in the world of Raven
location: Home
Current Mood: sore
Current Music: Rain on the tin roof
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(x-posted to my Nephir journal)

I managed to survive the anniversary of my mom's passing with only a week long melt down, some of which embarrassingly happened at work. I'm feeling more stable now though, and less prone to random fits of anger and/or tears so that's of the good.

Yesterday was the Son in Laws (forever more to be called Soldier Boy) birthday. Poor Boy..... birthdays are chaotic and weird at our house. We like to go all out in ways, treat the inner and outer child, so you're as likely to get toys and candy as you are serious gifts. Favorite food preference is a must and cake.

So, he got computer games, books on tape, Pez, a dinosaur picture punch out book, little plastic cowboys and indians (we couldn't find army men), silly putty....you see what I mean?

He couldn't articulate what it was he wanted for dinner, so I chose to do pasta alfredo, garlic chicken, salad and steamed asparagus.

For cake, we had Cookie Dough Extravaganza ice cream cake from Coldstone. All in all, I think it was a good day for him. Tonight they are planning on going over to friends for another party, so it should be a good thing for them both.

On the down side, Middle Spawn (Soldier Boy's wife unit) lost her job, so she's a little less than happy with that.

In rest of the family news we're mainly doing okay here. My knee's been giving me grief like woah, so much so that I actually went to see the doctor yesterday about it. (I know, mark the date!) Xrays didn't show any fracture, but a weird shadow which my inner voice has decided is cancer (yeah...right, just paranoid). The still need to be read by the radiologist though. I'm gonna hold out for an MRI rather than PT first though. The manipulations for the xrays my knee kept me up most of the night aching and hurting so I really cannot even begin to imagine what PT will bring about. That was with taking two pain pills before I went to bed.

Yeah, no fun there.

I'm sure that the knee issue started on the trip home from California last year after Mom's death. I slipped coming out of the shuttle bus and missed the last stair completely landing flat footed with all my weight on one foot/knee combo. It ached and by the time I was done sitting trapped in a tin can and got home it was swollen and painful and just not happy. I didn't go see a doctor then (as I told my doc, I wasn't in the head space to do anything for months after that) and after several weeks it finally began to feel somewhat better.

Now, it hates me again, and I am tired of it.

On other news, I got sucked into the cult of Facebook, where I play a lot of Mafia Wars and that's about it.

Hope your spring is looking up for you where ever you are.
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Mar. 19th, 2008 @ 11:18 am More update and ramblings
Current Mood: crappy
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I realized that it's been almost a year since I updated -- which really sucks. I know that I'd been steadily dropping off when I was on LJ -- somewhat because I'd changed jobs and had a little less time, but more I think due to lack of the need to write for myself.

But once again there is a crisis in my life so I turn to my journal to give myself a neutral place to scream.

Mom is dying, there is no polite way to put it, she is at the end of her life and it hurts.

My tall leggy mom who loved to work in the yard and was so physically active is only a distant memory, not only to myself but to my children who best know her in an electric chair and on oxygen.

See, she's lived the majority of her life in the San Joaquin valley, and smoked for a bit of that time. She quite after I got out of school and got married but by then it was too late and the asthma she thought she had was actually emphesyma (sic).

I cannot say that most of herhealth issues are due to the smoking, all you have to do is go around Bakersfield and look at the number of older folks that are toting O2 packs. You cannot go anywhere without seeing them, and that is saying a lot. I live in a metropolis (Seattle area) that contains 10 times the amount of people and I rarely see the same sheer numbers of folks toting O2 bottles.

Its fucking scary and one of the reasons that I moved my family away. The biggest however is that I love my birth family, but tolerance for others is not high on their list, most notably anyone of color or gay. Sad but true. And I could not raise my children in that enviroment.

Back to Mom -- so she quits smoking and then her health really starts to decline, finally ending up in a chair with O2 24/7. Over the past couple of years we've seen a trend where she'll be doing 'okay'and then end up in the hospital because her CO2 levels are too high.

Its been happening more and more frequently, until now where she's in the hospital and she's not coming out.

So I am back in Bakersfield, waiting for the end. No comments, please.

(originally posted to my Nephir blog)
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Mar. 19th, 2008 @ 10:50 am Forever and a Day
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It's been forever and a day
Since last I wrote within
Yet it seems like yesterday
To me

I'm in California again, and to all my Bakersfield friends, I will call, once all is over and done with.

Mom's back in the hospital and won't make it out this time. They are having to keep her on 30-40 litres of oxygen just to keep the CO2 from building up too quickly.

She has her good moments and bad, but this will be the end for her. I wish not to prolong her suffering nor does she want any heroic measures(intubation, etc), and so we wait vigil by her bedside, giving support to one another as sisters, to my girls who are losing their only grandparent left, to her brothers who are losing their remaining sister, and to her grandson(s) that she raised as her own.

We've not told her mother yet, but choose to wait until the end, in the vain hopes of sparing her some pain.
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