A Lot of Us Go Out as We Came In – What a Horrible Cruel Joke

A good friend and I keep having the same conversation. It is all about how we come into the world helpless, and dependent on others, then as we grow and age we become completely self-sufficient, only to continue to age and, unless we are really lucky, start to become helpless and dependent on all others all over again until we die. It is a horrible cruel joke on all living things.

The first few lines of this horrible cruel joke have already been said in my mother’s life. She is showing signs of dementia, along with signs of possible strokes. She can no longer walk without a cane or a walker. She has trouble finding certain words in her sentences, and has made some very serious errors in judgment, such as giving out her banking information to strangers over the phone.

I find this stage of life to be particularly cruel when it comes to my mother. My mother has had a rough life. She grew up during the depression era, she lost her first child at age of 7 due to severe complications from cerebral palsy, cared for her mother in our home for 8 years during the 70’s, nursed my father through 2 major illnesses, and then, after several years of just beginning to enjoy their lives, she cared for him for 10 years in their home while he succumbed to Alzheimer's. After my father’s death, she was just coming into her own as a widow when she dropped everything to come to TX and care for my children for a year while my husband received cancer treatments at M.D. Anderson in Houston. She finally moved to TX in 2001 with the hope of being able to help me with my husband and children, and that we would be able to go out and enjoy being a family. Unfortunately, there has been very little time for us to do all we planned to do because of the demands upon our lives by my husband’s illness and my children’s schedules. My mother not only became completely self-sufficient in her life, but she helped many others hold their lives together.

Despite all the troubles she has had, my mother has had one great passion in her life, sewing. Through sewing she was able to keep herself and her children fashionable on a limited budget, and decorate the homes my father built for her to the envy of her friends. My mother loved to watch sewing shows and read sewing books. When my mother was at the sewing machine, she was a great artist. Now she can no longer sew. Oh, she can hand stitch a few things here and there, but operating the sewing machine is past her, as is laying out the pattern and putting it all together. It just breaks her heart. She recently had her sewing machine repaired because she said that was the problem, but we both knew it wasn’t the machine. She can no longer remember how to thread the machine, let alone select the stitches. I remember thinking when I realized she could no longer sew that her joke was a particularly cruel one.

Mom will be 85 years old next week. Having watched my father’s decline, and my husband’s slow, yet brilliant, death, I don’t know whether to hope for a quick punch line in life’s joke on my mother, or a joke that carries a few more laughs. However my mother’s joke turns out, I will do my best to make sure she enjoys it as much as possible.

Does Anyone Have a Copy of the Rules of Widowhood?

Widowhood is strange.

Suddenly people want to erase the last 25 years of my life. If I mention something my husband and I did together, or his opinion on a subject, or just about anything with his name attached to it, I get the strangest reactions from friends, and acquaintances.

Today when a friend called and was talking about a problem she was having with her house, I mentioned something about how Raymond and I had solved a similar problem with our house, and the topic was immediately dismissed as a subject of conversation with an “I’m sure you must miss him.” Yes, I miss him horribly, but what does that have to do with fixing the problem with the house? Why couldn’t we have just gone on to discuss ways she could solve her problem?

This instance today was not an isolated incident. It happens several times a week. It is so strange. No one ever changes the subject when I talk about my dad, who passed away in 1998. No one ever changes the subject when I mention my grandmother, who passed away in the mid 70’s. So why can’t I talk about my husband, who passed away May 31, 2006?

It is not like I’m weeping, or telling uncomfortable stories about my husband in general conversation. (I save that for my two closets friends.) I’m just mentioning him in a casual way. I’m also not bringing him up constantly and making him the whole topic of conversation. So why can’t I mention him without freaking people out?

One day about a month after Raymond died an acquaintance and I were discussing a restaurant we liked in a nearby city. I said that I liked a certain dish there, but Raymond had preferred a different dish. Well, it was like I had expelled a horribly nasty gas bomb into the room. My acquaintance was fumbling all her words trying to change the subject. I was dumbfounded.

It is so strange to me. How do I discuss my life without mentioning the man I shared it with for over a quarter of a century. Yes, we were only married 1 day short of 24 ½ years, but we dated for a couple of years before we were married. Am I to pretend that my children just appeared in my life one day without the benefit of a father?

If there is a set of written rules for widowhood, I wish someone would get me a copy. The first thing I would look up would be the waiting period before you can mention your deceased spouse in a casual conversation.

A Smile from Heaven

I went to my youngest son’s school tonight to watch him get an award for being on the all “A” honor roll. On the way home the moon was a bright little sliver in the dark sky at the end of our street. I commented to my son that it looked like a big smile up in the sky. What I was actually thinking was that it was a sign from my husband that he was proud to see that Hu was doing well in school and that his death was not keeping him from excelling in his studies.

Before my son went to bed I told him that the moon made me think of his dad, and that I felt as if it was a sign telling us that he was proud of Hu. Hu told me that the grades weren’t that big of a deal. I told him I knew that, but the fact that he had not turned to bad habits, hadn’t started hanging with a bad group of kids, or anything else that would have been different from the path he was on before his father’s death was something to be proud of, and that is what his father would have been smiling about.

I know my boys don’t like me to talk like that, and I try not do, but every so often I have to let it out. It makes me feel better to think of their dad, who loved his boys more than anything else in the world, being able to see them and enjoy their accomplishments.

Whenever I can’t be with one of the boys when they are traveling, or doing something that makes me nervous, I always ask Raymond to watch over them, and keep them safe. I won't blame Raymond if something bad happens, because I understand that life happens, but it does make me feel better to know that no matter what, Raymond is there with them. I don’t tell the boys about asking their dad to watch over them, I don’t want to make them upset or nervous thinking about him watching them all the time. That might freak them out.

It sure was nice to see Raymond's smile in the sky tonight. It was a very bright and happy smile.

Sometimes Cleanliness is Next to Insanity

I love my mother. At times she has had a very rough life, but she has always tried to do the best she could for her children. She will be 85 next month and for the last six months or so she has become very confused and has started making some errors in judgment. Some of the errors are frightening, others are funny and exasperating.

The most frightening thing she has done is give out her personal banking information over the phone, 3 times. Once it became clear that she was not going to receive anything in return for the money she gave out to this one company, not once, but twice, we were able to get her money back from the bank, those mistakes were in the amount of $390 each. This last time a different company took $29.95. I told her that I was done dealing with these mistakes and my brother could take over. She never writes down what she is supposedly getting for the money she gives these people, but I know that the first company was selling “premium healthcare cards” under the ploy that it would help with Medicare D. Medicare D has brought out some real scam artists.

The latest mistakes have been funny, but oh my, are they time consuming and exasperating. Mom likes things to be clean, and she is always cleaning. Unfortunately, she lost the sight in one eye years ago, and so her cleaning can be hit and miss. Now that confusion has been added to the mix, well, things can really get interesting.

Last weekend mom decided to mop the kitchen floor. When I talked to her on the phone Saturday morning she said that the stuff she had used on the floor had not performed as well as she had hoped. She couldn’t remember what the cleaning agent was, but she assured me it was definitely for floors. Hu and I went to her apartment Saturday evening to deliver her groceries and share some pizza with her that we had picked up on the way. When I walked into the kitchen with a laundry basket full of groceries, my feet flew out from under me. I was able to keep from hitting the floor, and push the basket onto the counter, but I was plenty perplexed. Hu was right behind me and I yelled for him to stay out of the kitchen. Mom started chuckling in the living room. I was not happy.

Once I had gotten over that weird feeling you get when you have avoided a situation you know would have hurt, I looked down at the floor. I had left sliding marks in some kind of goo on the floor. I asked mom if she had spilt something and she said “no, that she had told me that the soap for the floor did not perform well.” I immediately asked her what cleaning agent she used. She told me it was right there on the counter and to look for myself. I did look, and there it was right on the counter, a bottle of concentrated Palmolive dish soap, the kind that says Oxy clean.

I was still confused, why wouldn’t a little dishwashing liquid in a bucket clean the floor? I asked mom how she used the soap. She said that she has squirted it on the floor and then mopped it around and it made the floor slick, but that when she tried to put water on it there were just suds. I almost sat down and cried, but instead I told everyone to sit down and eat the pizza while it was hot.

It took that evening, and another two days before Hu and I were able to get all of that soap up off the floor. The first evening was just scraping and wiping with rubber spatulas and paper towels, because mom was right, you couldn’t put water on that soap. (She used over ½ a bottle, Sam’s Club size.) Hu and I disposed of all the dishwashing liquid and then made sure she didn’t have more since she puts everything in the dishwasher we figured she could get by without it, but might break her neck with it. The other two days we poured white vinegar on the floor and wiped it up until no more suds appeared.

This Saturday, yesterday, February 17, 2007, I received a call from my friend that helps me by cleaning areas of mom’s apartment that really need to be scrubbed regularly. She said that mom had put a cup of dishwashing liquid in the dishwasher, there were suds every where, and she did not know what to do. Well, I was experienced with this type of cleaning mistake, mom had done the same thing over the summer. I told my friend I would be there as soon as I could get there, and out the door I went with salt and vinegar. The salt dissolves the suds, and the vinegar was in case the floor was slick again.

I love that my mom still wants to have a clean apartment, clean clothes, and wants to do it herself, and I know that her mother taught her that cleanliness was next to godliness, but right now, to me, cleanliness is definitely nest to insanity, mine, not mom’s. She is just confused.

Panic Attack Over Children/Dealing with Death

I’m sobbing as I write this. I was watching a story on “The View”

about Kate Atwood, an inspirational woman who lost her mom to cancer when she was just a child, but has turned her loss into a healing place called "Kate's Club", a non-profit organization that helps children cope with the death of a loved one by creating friendships between those who share the same experiences. For more information, visit katesclub.org.

This story brought on a major panic attack about my boys. I truly have no idea how they are dealing with the death of their father. My oldest, Ha, was 9, and my youngest, Hu, was 5, when their dad was diagnosed with cancer. We never lied to the boys about their father and his condition. They have been present while their father screamed in pain, puked his guts out hour after hour from the chemotherapy treatments, and have helped me time after time rush their dad to the car to go to the emergency room. They were there when he came home from his last trip to the emergency room only to enter hospice care here at home. They were there when he drew his last breath. They both say they are fine and do not want counseling. But are they? How will this affect them for years to come?

I can understand their reluctance to go to counseling. They have had enough of that forced upon them from outside sources over the years. Especially when they were young and I took my husband to M. D. Anderson for a year for cancer treatments and left them here in the care of my mother. I am sure that many of these people were well-meaning, but most of the time they just scared our boys.

At M.D. Anderson my husband and I were taught how to deal with explaining to our children what was happening to their father, and most importantly how being honest with them would be the best thing for them in the long run. We took that as gospel and made sure (with a couple of exceptions that were impossible to avoid) that whenever we had news to tell, good or bad, they were the first ones to hear it from us. We did not want them to hear it from anyone else because we didn’t want them to think we were hiding anything from them. The few times that was impossible, we made sure to apologize to them for not following policy.

After watching the story on “Kate’s Club” I had this overwhelming fear that my boys were suffering in ways that I cannot imagine. I have no reason to really believe this, but it was so important to my husband that his death not destroy their lives, and I am so afraid I will screw that up somehow. It takes my breath away, makes my heart pound, and tears flow to the point I am sick to my stomach.

How funny life is, as I’m pouring my fears out on this page my oldest calls laughing and carrying on with his friends asking me if I know anything about old typewriters.

My breath is coming back. Maybe they will be okay. The last counselor (one we chose) my oldest saw said he was well grounded and not to worry. We did not go back after my husband died, but my son carries his card and promises he will call him if he needs him. My youngest seems to be doing fine, and begs me not to make him go to a counselor. I will continue to keep a close eye on them, and stay in contact with their teachers and others in close contact with my boys to make sure I am not missing any signs of distress.

Yes, their lives will never be the same, but hopefully they will not allow the death of their father to be the only defining moment in their lives.

The Balance Scale of Life

Life is one big balance scale, like the ones used to show the scales of justice. Only the balance scale of life has more than two pans to place the experiences of our days.

I was so excited to get on the scale this morning and realize I was down to 206 pounds. On January 2, 2007 I weighed 216, the most I’ve ever weighed! I have been a member of TOPS (Taking Off Pounds Sensibly) for about 6 years. When I started TOPS I weighed 208 pounds. I often hear that the program must not be working if I still weigh so much, but I consider it a blessing to have such a group. If I hadn’t found TOPS, and the friends that came with being in TOPS, I could easily weigh about 100 pounds more.

On my husband’s 40^th birthday he had a biopsy on his left pelvic bone. On my 40^th birthday he was diagnosed with osteosarcoma (bone cancer). We battled his cancer together until he passed away at age 47. Food was a comfort to me a lot of times when my husband was ill. Without TOPS and the accountability of going into the weigh-in room every week, I might not have been able to control my weight as well as I did.

I have decided that this is the year that I need to put myself close to the top of my priorities and gain control of my eating habits, and taking care of my health so that I could be here for my boys, and hopefully my grandchildren. I have been walking at least 12 miles a week, and making better food choices. I am trying to keep my average daily calorie intake at less than 1300 calories, and staying away from fast food as much as possible.

So today when I stepped on the scale and saw the scale move down, I saw a boulder being lifted off one side of my pans on my balance scale of life. Unfortunately, the boulder just seemed to move to another pan.

I don’t know if the balance scales of life are ever in perfect balance. I think the secret is to enjoy the days that are close to balanced, and accept the days they are all out of kilter, and do the best we can to have more balanced days than not.

My scales are in balance when I have had a chance to hold my boys, speak to a friend, read a couple of chapters in a good book, have a conversation with my mom that did not end in total frustration, and I have not had any new problems arise with my house.

Love/Hate url

I think you call it the "url", I just call it the link. Either way, I love/hate the link for this blog. I was so excited when I met a goal by starting a blog, that I didn't think much about www.weightofit.blogspot.com. When I was reviewing the blog today I glanced at it and read weigh to fit, and I became very upset. I was going to delete my account and try the whole thing over, but then I realized - so what. I am weighing to get fit every week at TOPS. So I took a deep breath, and said "move on," and I am, little by little, minute by minute.

Naming the Blog

I have wanted to start a blog for a long time, but I never could come up with a name for my blog. Tonight I was planning my schedule for the next few days, and thought to myself “oh, the weight of it all.’ That was it. I decided right then and there to stop what I was doing and start my blog.

It helped that I am currently reading J.A. Jance’s Web of Evil, a mystery in which the main character has a blog.

Why do I want to blog? I want to blog because I have a lot of things I want to say, and since my husband/best friend of almost 24 ½ years died in May, 2006, I no longer have anyone to pretend to be listening to me all the time. With this blog, I will be able to say what I have to say at any given time, and I can pretend someone is reading what I have to say.

Why did I decide to call it "The Weight of It All." Well, currently I am feeling the weight of:

Raising 2 teenage boys, 16 and 13
Taking care of my 84 year old mother, who is showing signs of dementia
Learning to take care of a 30+ year old house without the advice of my husband
And continuing to work on my almost life long goal of losing weight.

So the title just seemed to fit my life.