Okay, so, I know we all have those weeks where everything seems to go wrong. It feels like "Monday" replays, over and over and over. Well what happens when it lasts longer than a week, or even two weeks? It is so easy to get overwhelmed with frustration and explode.
Not to sound dramatic, but I'm going to lay it all out there. Not for sympathy, but so you can understand where I am coming from.
Last week was another terrible week with work. Again, I do not want to go into details, but let's just say if some things do not change, I might have to make a change. I had to have a "talk" with one of my co-workers, that was probably one of the most uncomfortable moments of my life. I do not deal well with confrontation, and it is never easy to say things to someone that you know have the potential to ruin their day. Things are really rough right now, and every time I think there is a light at the end of the tunnel, a new tunnel comes along. I'm exhausted and needing something to change.
I was working late every night last week, and on Wednesday night I stayed up until probably close to 11:30, just working. I finally got into bed and fell asleep (it takes me normally at least an hour to fall asleep). Well, around 2:00 in the morning, I hear Ryleigh through the monitor. I have been really working on not jumping up the second I hear her. So, I laid there listening, as she rustled around a bit. Finally, she started screaming. I got up and turned the monitor all the way down. Fortunately, our house is not very large, so of course I could still hear her, just not directly in my ear. What started out as a little rustling, finally turned into an all-out fit. You moms out there know what I'm talking about. Ryleigh is at an age when she knows how to "turn it on" and really wail, letting me know she is unhappy with whatever decision I have made. Well, after about 10 minutes of this fit, I noticed a difference in the pitch of her wail. I got up, frustrated, and headed down the hall to her room. About halfway down the hall, I heard a loud thud. I ran the rest of the way, opened the door to find her face down on the floor. Yes, you read that right. Somehow, she climbed out of her crib and fell down. Needless to say, I sat down on the floor, holding her, and we both cried. I brought her back to my bed (there was no way I was going to put her back in her bed), but did not sleep all night, as I kept checking to make sure she was okay and did not have a concussion. It was a very long, sleepless night. The next day Jesse checked the bed, because we thought it was lowered all the way down, and had absolutely no idea how she climbed out. We were able to lower it literally to the ground, and now the front rail is above her head. I felt terrible. One of the worst mom moments so far. (The other including the time she fell off the changing table, while I was standing right there. Yes, it is a miracle that these little ones survive their mommies.)
Thursday morning, my sister-in-law, Gina, called in a panic. She had locked herself out of the house she was dog-sitting for. Her entire purse was locked inside. We thought there were extra keys to her car at her house, but it turns out both sets were in her purse. After leaving the dog there, we went back to her house and called a locksmith. Upon returning to the house, we found the dog was gone. The locksmith could not get in and was going to have to drill out the hole. He wanted a faxed copy of the owners approval...the owners, who were on vacation in Mexico!! Finally, on the "last try" he got it open. Once we got inside, there was a message from someone who had found the dog, and we were able to go get it. Just a long, frustrating day.
Friday I had to go into the office for several afternoon meetings. (Side note: who does that? Who, in their right mind, schedules afternoon meetings on a Friday?? And I had three!!) My sister-in-law, Jenn, watched Ryleigh for me. When I returned, she mentioned the rash under Ryleigh's arm. I had noticed the first little dot on Tuesday evening during her bath, but casually dismissed it, considering Ryleigh has very sensitive skin and almost always has a rash of some kind or another. Thursday night we had noticed it had started to spread and looked much worse. But once my sister-in-law brought it up, I realized it might be a serious problem. She and I got online and looked it up, and it looked just like chicken pox. I was still doubtful, since she is only one-year-old! When we got home and Jesse looked at it, he agreed it was a problem. Saturday morning, bright and early, Ryleigh and I went to the doctor. First they were upset with me because I did not call and schedule an appointment. (I did not know you could schedule appointments on weekends, and just assumed it was a walk-in-type atmosphere on the weekend.) Jesse met us up there, and we waited for an hour. When we got to see the doctor, sure enough, Ryleigh was diagnosed with chicken pox. The doctor said that based on the location of the pox, and the fact it was not spreading throughout her whole body that she probably did not have a "full" case of them. She had received the vaccine for the virus at her 1-year well-baby visit, and her body was reacting directly to it. The way I understand it, the vaccine is supposed to be injecting a very small amount of the virus into your system so that your body learns to recognize the virus and build up antibodies for the future. Well, in Ryleigh's case, her body definitely recognized the virus right away, and decided to fight it off with the usual method of breaking out in "pox." Luckily, with her being so young, she is not bothered by them, despite the fact they make me get the heebie-jeebies every time I have to apply the ointment to them. What started out looking like little acne, turned into big blisters that popped and looked like open sores. The worst part(s) of the whole ordeal was the fact that I had probably unknowingly infected both my sister-in-laws' kids, being around them Thursday and Friday, without knowing it. Not to mention we were then under house arrest, for fear of contaminating anyone else. Oh yeah; and when we were at the doctor, we learned Ryleigh also had a bad inner ear infection. Fun times.
You can see the chicken pox in the above picture. They pretty much stayed on the underside of her right arm, in her arm pit, and on the right side of her chest and rib cage. She got a few on her face and a few on her legs, but that's about it. She did not seem to mind. =)
Well, so now I'm caught up until last week. Last week, since we were home bound, we figured we would take on another home project: my office! Over the weekend I worked diligently to scrape the ceiling, paint the ceiling, prime the walls (I had bright red that required two solid coats of Kilz primer!), and begin painting the walls a light blue. It was a lot of work. I was about to tape and begin painting the trim work, when Jesse came in to inspect my work. He came up with a plan to modernize the room, by ripping out the current molding work and redoing it, all along the base boards, around the door frames and window sill. He went to Lowes to get the necessary hardware and I went to his parent's house to borrow his dad's saw. On the way back to our house the car started to overheat...again. And again. And again. I had to stop four times on the way home to let the car relax, then drive another few blocks, until we finally made it home. Needless to say, by that time, I was mad and so was Jesse. He has been driving the car for about a month now with no problems and the first time I drive it, it does this. I'm not joking when I tell you that the car is possessed. It knows when I drive and it hates me. It seriously has never messed up for Jesse- the problems only occur when I'm driving. I'm the one who ends up stranded. Nice.
Jesse did not have time to work on the car, so, all week, I had no vehicle and was literally under house arrest. I was going to go crazy. I do not do well cooped up, day in and day out. And I get agitated. And mean.
Then Wednesday morning I received a call from my mother-in-law informing me that they had taken Jesse's grandma Gertie to the ER Tuesday night and ended up admitting her to the hospital. There was no word yet as to what was wrong, but she said they did a ton of tests the night before and should know something soon. Wednesday afternoon, I got another call from my mother-in-law, though I could barely tell it was her, through the tears and crying on the other end of the line. They received the test results, and were pretty sure that Grandma Gertie had liver and colon cancer. Please keep in mind that Grandma Gertie is going to be 88-years-old next month. I'm not saying that she can't fight the cancer, but I'm sure it is a much harder battle when your body is older. Needless to say, we dropped what we were doing and headed straight to the hospital. Jesse's mom and dad were definitely struggling with the diagnosis, and needed someone there to take their mind off it. Ryleigh provided just the distraction. =) Grandma Gertie was in good spirits, and never once mentioned the word cancer. The doctor's need to do a colonoscopy to learn more about the cancer in her colon, see how quickly it is progressing, and figure out a plan of action. Unfortunately, her blood was too thin and would not thicken enough to clot during the procedure. So, in the mean time, they are giving her large injections of vitamin K and getting her to eat a lot. Hopefully they will be able to do the procedure by Monday of next week, and we will know more. At this point, we know there are masses throughout the liver and colon and the mass in the liver has metastasized there. No, I do not know all the ends and outs of cancer, and truth be told, I was hoping to not have to learn all of this lingo for awhile. Please forgive my terminology, if I'm speaking out of turn. When we left the hospital that night, Jesse's dad walked us out, and we could tell he was really torn up about the whole thing. His dad passed away over 30+ years ago, so he has been taking care of his mom ever since. Now, no one is sure how to take care of her, and what the best solution is. We both hugged him and told him we would be on our knees about the situation.
Thursday was snap day. Literally. I snapped on Thursday. I wont go into the details, but know that it was not pretty, especially for Jesse and Ryleigh.
Today, I feel better. I spent a good deal of time in prayer last night, and I have peace about a lot of the trouble situations we have faced and will continue to face. Tomorrow, I get to go meet some friends from college whom I have not seen in a long time. I'm looking forward to seeing them, getting out of the house, and spending some time by myself (in the car).
If you have made it this far through all my rants, complaints, and negativity, thank you. I'm sorry this is a "downer" post. Things have been pretty exhausting lately, and I have found that getting it off my chest and pouring it out, whether to a comforting friend, the faceless blogosphere, or on my knees in prayer, I feel better.
Please be praying for Grandma Gertie, as we are still facing a lot of uncertainty right now. Pray that the colonoscopy will be easy and will retrieve the information they need. Pray for the oncologist as he/she determines a plan of action for treatment. Pray for Jesse's family, as they are all very close with their mom/grandma, and are all taking this news very hard. And please pray for Grandma Gertie specifically. I do not know if she is saved. I can not be sure of her salvation, and that is scary at this point in time. I also ask that you pray for her own state-of-mind. She is one who is constantly on the go, and I pray that her spirits stay good during this slow down period.
Thank you, friends. Thank you for letting me "bring it all" to the table.
1 comments:
Sometimes you just need to vent!
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