Hospice

My FIL was admitted to Hospice care after several months of increasing health issues. He was initially diagnosed with breast cancer in 2010 and even though after his treatments were concluded, he was told the tumors were shrinking. Unfortunately after one of his follow-up appointments they found tumors scattered throughout his body. When they attempted to treat one area, it would negatively affect another organ. Then when they would treat that next organ, another would fail. The cyclical pattern was telling: there was nothing more they could do as far as treatments.

This news has sent the in-law’s family into turmoil, driving a wedge between those who think the doctors gave up too easily and those who think he should be allowed a chance to pain-free and comfortable days. When I first heard that he was going to go through chemo, I was stunned. I didn’t agree with his decision, nor the encouragement of his decision, to go through treatments that would make him feel like crap with the slim chance it would actually add time to his life. If he was 70 instead of 20 years older, I would feel differently. In other words, I thought his quality of life was severely diminished.

And then the chemo DID make him horribly sick and now instead of spending quality time at home, he’s too weak and requires continued care in a nursing home. Not so say he wouldn’t have possibly spent time there if he hadn’t gone through chemo, but being laid out for weeks in a hospital bed prior to making the hospice determination is where I think his health was negatively compromised.

Sparring Partner and I are not seeing eye to eye on this, but I am trying hard to keep my mouth shut. This is not happening to MY dad; I don’t know what he’s really feeling. I just know he leaves almost every evening to see his dad and returns well after the kids and I are in bed. During the day, he is prone to moments of brooding and even tears. After all these years of hearing stories of childhood, I wonder where the sudden change of heart is coming from, but as my sister explained, for my husband’s family, their dad acted as the true patriarch of the family and was actively involved and had final say on anything they did. Not like my dad who was this person who would only say, “Ask your mom…” when there were decisions to be made (if not just an outright “no”).

It’s a strained atmosphere around here. Waiting for the other boot to drop.

 

The Royal Pain-in-the-Asses

Monday, normally the most derided day of the week, has been a godsend. It meant the end of the weekend. It wasn’t because of one major incident, but an accumulation of lowlights, only beginning Saturday afternoon when we all rushed out the door early to make it to Easter Mass at 5:30. We had dressed up and had sufficiently prepared Aitch’s diaper bag for the hour-and-a-half (minimum) we’d be sitting/standing/kneeling. I wasn’t screaming for everyone to hurry out the door.

When we pulled around the corner, I had a flashback to the prior year: we had arrived for an Easter Mass that wasn’t taking place. They preferred that the congregation make Sunday’s Mass since that is actually Easter so there was only one scheduled for Saturday. At 8:45 p.m. I’m sure the kids would be angels that late in evening. Apparently we have inadvertently started our own Easter tradition. Take note for next year.

When we got home, I changed and made a last-minute dash to WalMart for the kids’ Easter baskets. I was returning to my car after getting some things and saw a POS car with two adults in the front and a toddler standing between the bucket-seats as they drove through the parking lot. Coincidentally, they parked at the end of the row I was exiting and I watched them exit their car and walk towards the store. I parked next to their car and left this note on their windshield:

“Cute little boy you have. I hope you never have to watch him crash through your windshield because you are too lazy/high/selfish to buckle him in a carseat.”

I am unapologetic in my judgment.

The highlight of my weekend was later that night when I enjoyed a couple of beers with some friends we hadn’t seen in years. I climbed into bed right before 2:00 a.m., right after I prepared baskets and hid eggs filled with treats. I forgot to mention that I had found out early Saturday that one of my siblings wasn’t coming up for Easter. That’ll be important to note.

Sunday started way too early. Doodicus was up before 6:00 and scoping out where all the eggs were hidden. So by the time Aitch got up an hour later, he ran through the house picking up ALL the eggs leaving his baby sister in the dust. Luckily she didn’t care once she discovered there was candy in the egg she HAD found. My husband had to be nagged out of bed. Within two hours of waking, he was snoring on the couch.

I was chilling out as well, checking out Facebook while the kids gorged themselves on chocolate and taffy. I went to wish an IRL friend happy birthday and happened to notice that the Friends In Common looked off: My SIL and her daughter, who I had bravely accepted as FB friends months ago, were not pictured. They had conspired to unfriend me at the same time and within the preceding 24 hours of me noticing.

Sparring Partner suggested that they figured there wasn’t any dirt to get from my updates so they dumped me. I hope that’s true since I had my filters set up to not be visible to the people I knew in real life. However, Facebook has let me down before. I’m still undecided as to whether I will confront either of them. I know that ultimately, I shouldn’t care. They made their decision and raising a stink isn’t going to help anything except to satisfy my selfish curiosity. I didn’t take it all lying down though: I blocked her, her kids, and her husband from being able to even see me on FB as well as deleted all the tags I had on the photos of her grandkids from my albums so they will no longer show up in their photos. I’m Queen of the passive-aggressive.

And finally, SIL was hosting Easter lunch at her home but we hadn’t heard what time to be there, so my SP called and was surprised to hear, “In 15 minutes.” Why didn’t anyone tell us? he asked. “Yo-yo Mama said you were having Easter with her family.” Now that was true up until I found out my sister wasn’t going to be able to come up. I guess it was my failure to inform her and I felt like a schmuck. Unfortunately, the timing coincided with Aitch just going down for a nap and Doodicus didn’t want to go. So SP went by himself. I was actually relieved.

Apparently, I’m the Queen of Passive-Aggressive.

And Aitch is Princess Star Wars:

And Doodicus is our silly Jester:

 

Little Annoyances

Yes, I’m blowing off the Photo Ops. It’s called “procrastination”. Get use to it.

Tailor Wannabe?

My husband noticed that I had “fabric glue” written and struck through on the grocery list, because during one of my errands I picked up a bottle. Sparring partner asked what kind I got and I just looked at him stupefied. “Uh, the kind that glues…fabric…?” As if he knows anything about fabric glue.

Related:

I used the fabric glue to adhere some fleur di lis patches to the back of my daughter’s jeans, which were initially very plain. To ensure good adhesion and to keep them flat, I grabbed a concrete paver from the front deck to lay on the jeans while the glue dried. I finished my project and hung up the jeans and set aside the brick. Sparring Partner asked why it was in the closet of the bedroom. I explained. Are you going to take it back outside? he asked. If it bothers you, take it out now. I responded. Hurumph was his reply. I just walked past the closet. The brick is still sitting there. Apparently it bothers him enough to roll his eyes at me but not so much to take care of it himself.

GAH!-la

My ex-employer has an annual fund-raiser. It’s a hoity-toity affair. During my employment I did attend a couple of times. Since I’m no longer employed there, I don’t go. Obviously. My SIL works there so she’s always getting FIL involved with contributions. He asked Sparring Partner if we want to go to the fundraiser and my this was husband’s response, “Not just no….”

I “contributed” ten years of my life there for what?? Did I ever tell you how my ex-boss emailed me while I was on maternity leave “strongly urging” me to make sure I contribute to the expansion project?! I did and was fired a month later. If that wasn’t enough, when the stalking co-worker gave my ex-boss a sob story about her empty pockets, he contributed in HER name. Oh boo-hoo, bitch. So, yeah, no. Thanks for the offer, but we won’t be going to the gah-la.

 

The Title Is Just Too Obvious

So yeah. First Holy Communion. It was April 18th, right? On February 4th, I sent an email to the in-laws, specifically the in-law who is my son’s Godmother, to give them a heads up – a “save-the-date”, if you will – about the date and our expectations and even our hopes for their presence.

I prepared my son’s invitations and sent them out a couple of weeks before including a RSVP. On April 6th, I followed the invites up with an email to those same people (who have never bothered to RSVP in the past so I wasn’t expecting them to now). I knew that the time of the get together wasn’t wholly convenient, which was at 5:30 Sunday afternoon. We were serving supper after mass, which was at 2:30. Our options were a bit limited as you can see. I was also aware that the Godmother had two young children herself, add to that, she didn’t live here in town.

However, when I heard back from her that she had a “time conflict”, I was livid.

It’s not like I didn’t give her plenty of “warning”. She lives no more than a 90 minute drive away, and her husband was more than capable of staying with the kids, which is so ironic considering she runs them up here all the time to spend time with their grandmother. Also, even if the party had turned completely WILD and lasted longer than 7:30, she still would have been home early. And it’s not like she had to work the next day…

Yeah, I suppose 10 weeks notice was not enough time to make sure she was available. Oh, wait. as a child herself of a pious family and a Catholic school alumni, I guess she only had 8 years to be prepared for this event.

And yes, I checked. You cannot “annul” a Godparent. We’re stuck with her now. So chose wisely the Godparents to your child(ren). Don’t pick someone just because you think it’d be nice to include in-laws in your family’s special and important moments. I can hear the grail knight from Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade stating matter of factly, “He chose poorly.”

Actually, I’m annoyed over the principle of the matter. My son never asked about her, and if it hadn’t been for the fact that I knew she wouldn’t be there I probably wouldn’t be as annoyed.

 

A (God)Blessit! Event

My son’s First Holy Communion was this past weekend. We did get him a gift (a crucifix that he himself picked out that probably cost me an arm and half a leg but have no idea since I had a sizeable credit at the jewelry store and didn’t ask). We did put him in a suit, complete with an adult tie I had altered to his size because all the children’s’ ties I could find locally sucked. We did have a party where notably absent was his Godmother *, but present were a couple of friends of my SIL who happened to be in town so my SIL invited them along…uh…sure…I guess they can join you even though they don’t know Doodicus from a stain on the floor.

Actually, the entirety of the weekend seemed to be consumed by this one 90 minute event because Saturday the school scheduled full dress rehearsal and pictures at 8:30 a.m. Yes, in the morning. Thank you baby Jesus for letting me go through this the first time with a boy. My friend, a hairdresser, had at least two girls scheduled prior to dress rehearsal to get their hair done up. Before 8:30 a.m.! (Note to self: really talk up the wonders of a pixie cut to my daughter in six years.)

Of course, I was running slightly behind Saturday morning because I couldn’t find his dress shoes that I had bought months ago and stored somewhere safe so I was driving hell bent for leather into town. Just as I was coming around the bend, my soccer-mom senses started tingling, but it was too late. The city cop already had his patrol car in gear waiting for me to pass. I swore. (Yes, I said Fuck. Out loud. While my son was in the backseat on his way to his 1^st Holy Communion dress rehearsal, wearing a tie and suit. A memory to be sure.)

Since I was barely running on time, thanks to my Mario Andretti tendencies, I wasn’t going to let a speeding ticket put me behind. My exit was coming up. I turned down the street. Cop just then turns on his lights. I continue down the street to my next turn. I turn, and turn again. I pull into the rear parking lot of the church – still with the patrol car following patiently behind. I threw the van into park, told my son to run up to where they were supposed to meet; handed him his jacket for his suit; and instructed him to RUN! because goddammit! I just ignored a cop trying to pull me over to get him there on time!

It was wishful thinking on my part to hope for a warning. While my ticket was $132, it could have been considerably worse because:

1)      I was speeding in a construction zone (63 in a 50);

2)      I didn’t have my registration on me **;

3)      And my tags were expired **

Sparring Partner was pissed. Also, I’ve had to complete several forms in my various job applications about the status of my driver’s license, which has been accident and ticket free for years. So now that’s been shot to shit.

The thing is, we weren’t THAT late. It’s not like they would have told him he couldn’t participate. Totally not worth it. That $132 would have certainly been better spent on a botox treatment or my trip to Boston or some new shoes.

When was your last traffic ticket and what did you do to “earn” it?

* I wasn’t planning on this post being about traffic violations, but more about the Godmother situation, but that’ll wait.

** Sparring Partner had earlier in the week taken the registration out of my car to take to the County Treasurer to get my new tags. The new tags and the registration were at home.

 

And the Banjo Responds

My dear husband has the emotional sensitivity of a rhino in heat. During one of the five years we dated, we were going through a particularly rough patch over the Thanksgiving holiday, which the family decided to pack up and carry out in Des Moines. Because we weren’t getting along, Sparring Partner didn’t attend. And me, being a sappy girl in love, called him several times, and in one of the phone exchanges I wailed into the phone hoping to instill some guilt, some emotion, from him: “You don’t LOVE me!” to which he replied, “No. Not as much as I use to.”

KaPOW!

Obviously he fell in love again and after threatening him with an ultimatum, marry me or I’m moving one (who’s PWND now, mister!), we were able to accept each other’s emotional – and lack thereof – responses.

Last night we went out with the in-laws. SIL exclaims, “Did Sparring Partner tell you the news?!” and most anyone who has gone through years of infertility will always have the first thought be that someone’s pregnant.

My first thought was correct.

“Number 5!” she announced excitedly.

So Daughter#1 is percolating Baby#3. Didn’t I mention not long ago something about Dueling Uteri. Cue the banjos:

• D#1 had Baby #1
•           D#2 had Baby #1
• D#1 had Baby #2
•           D#2 had Baby #2
• D#1 is due with Baby #3

All within the past four years.

 Mark your calendars for next year…

But that’s not really the point, or at least the one I care to get into right now. The reason I mentioned how insensitive SP can be is when we later walked out to the car, I told him thanks for the heads up *sarcasm*.

And he said, “I didn’t know that it would still bother you.”

“You wouldn’t.” was my reply.

Yes, it still bothers me. It will for a very long time. I would love to meet that person who it DOESN’T bother and maybe they’d share their secret with me, and then in turn, share it with you.

 

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#29 – More of the same.

Thanksgiving day we originally and tentatively planned on having supper for his side of the family at our house. We have the most dining space, plus it would be easier to manuever the MIL and her wheelchair once we snuck her out of the nursing home for the afternoon. But SIL said that we shouldn’t bother. Let’s go to The Club where they’ll be serving a buffet and just let someone else do all the work. OK, I thought, that’s cool, especially since everyone here was sick in some form or fashion.

Wednesday evening I discover that SIL is having dinner at her house. See you there! Ugh.

I used the rest of Friday to prepare the dinner for my side of the family at our house. Potluck style, which worked out really well. Except for the devilled eggs.

Care to guess how many dozen eggs it took for me to get enough decent for serving? Go ahead, guess.

We were up late Friday night cleaning up and Sparring Partner offered to take the kids to McDonalds in the morning so as to both keep the kitchen in order and to keep everyone out of my hair while I did some last minute prepping. It was a good plan until Aitch woke up once again vomiting Saturday morning after a couple days of appearing to be better. It wasn’t a huge mess this time, but I kept her home with me while Sparring Partner and Doodicus went out for their Scottish breakfast. I gave Aitch half a bottle and plunked her in the high chair while I worked on the eggs, emptying the dishwasher and polishing my fancy glasses (when I say “polish”, I mean dust them off since the last time they were used was when I put them away in the cabinets – four years ago).

Within minutes of finishing her bottle, Aitch lost the entire contents. It wasn’t pretty. It never is, is it? I was thankful it was in the kitchen just because it meant not pulling out the carpet shampooer yet again.

Are you sick of hearing about us being sick yet? I’m sick of telling you, so don’t feel bad if you are.

She had no dairy for the rest of the day. My mother felt it necessary to shovel her full of cranberries and corn until I sternly told her to knock it off. “She’s hungry!” “Then feed her some of this applesauce and make her some toast, because DUH!” Okay, I didn’t say “because DUH!”, but only because I was just too tired to start any shit with her.

Today we all feel a bit better. Aitch kept everything down, but she hasn’t been eating much. It’s been a full week since this all started and while I understand that stuffy noses and coughs can linger, vomiting randomly is not the norm. I’m hoping for a better week to follow.

 

#21 – Hit me over the head with a frozen drumstick, please.

My sisters asked if I would host Thanksgiving at my house next Saturday. They said that it will make things easier for mom. I think it’s because the menfolk like that we have satellite whereas my mom and dad have a TV that plugs into a wall and all four channels get their programming from the antenna on top of the house that doubles as a lightning rod.

But I don’t mind. Really.

However, Sparring Partner thinks it’d be really nice if we play host to HIS family on Thursday. I don’t want to. For MY family, we are doing potluck. Mom’s cooking the turkey and bringing it over. For HIS family, we will have to do everything, and I am a horrible cook. Seriously. I’m so bad that one of the reasons I DON’T want to become a stay at home mom is because then I would be expected to prepare supper, and that does not mean having the oven preheated for the ready-made pizza Sparring Partner picks up on his way home.

Plus, the house is a disaster area. Yes, yes, we all complain about messy houses, but while my messy house is perfectly fine for MY family, it does not meet the muster of the in-laws since both my SIL and MIL employ cleaning services (which really?? My SIL and her husband live alone in their house and she works part time…WTF do they need a cleaning lady for?).

So the deal I struck with Sparring Partner is this: this weekend we will clean and pick up (which we normally do on the weekends), but the kicker is that the house will need to stay neat and tidy until Thursday because I have to work Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday and I won’t have time Thursday to make the house presentable, much less prepare a Thanksgiving meal for HIS family. If the house does NOT stay neat and tidy, we will not host dinner for HIS family.

I don’t think I’ll even bother to make a grocery list.

However, if you would like to share one of your really easy recipes for a side dish, I’d be forever in your debt!

 

Latecomers

Sparring Partner and I are what some would refer to Latecomers as it applies to starting a family. He was over 35 when our oldest was born. I was over 40 with the youngest.

The situation is not all that unfamiliar to either of us since my mom was in her late 30s when she had me and Sparring Partner’s mother was 40. And while not unfamiliar, it has created a bit of fission within my husband’s family. My in-laws have great-grandchildren OLDER than Aitch, who is their youngest grandchild. Their second-to-youngest grandchild? That honor is bestowed yet again on our family as that would be Doodicus.

To put it another way, out of the 11 grandchildren, only two are under the voting age. Obviously they are our two.

Sparring Partner has a couple of siblings who seem to think that since he lives the closest to his parents that he should be at their side at a moment’s notice. They don’t understand when they come in from out of town, why we don’t want to go out to dinner every night they are here, which means getting home from work in time to put everyone back into one vehicle and getting home later that night just in time to put everyone to bed. Forget about baths or homework or laundry or cleaning up.

Just this past week Thursday we went out; Friday they all came to our house for supper; Saturday night we went out. Last night? They were going to do supper at the SIL’s home. We told them thanks, but no thanks. I’m sure that by declining the invitation, we were criticized our seeming ungratefulness.

I have to give props to Sparring Partner, who when on the receiving end of an eye-roll from one of his siblings after a similar incident, responded, “You had your turn to raise your children. It’s my turn now.” I think they forget that while he’s the youngest in the family, he most certainly isn’t their boot-scraper and going to take their shit anymore.

We both love our families, extended and otherwise, but right now our priorities lie with who we tuck into OUR beds under OUR roof. And if we feel we are being spread a bit thin in trying to make EVERY one happy, we know that while there’s other family around to take care of our parents, no one else is there except Sparring Partner and me to PARENT our children.