Holy Holidays

I survived the holidays but I am thinking about changing my religion. I get annoyed with the way Christianity steals and ruins perfectly lovely pagan holy days. Rather than lift Rich's spirits, the holidays just exhausted him, and had I kept it any simpler, it would have been cancelled.

I've said it before and I'll say it again... I can deal with anything as long as Rich can smile and be hopeful. When he is suffering and hopeless, it sucks the life out of me; I have to work five times harder to keep my game face on. I'd like to tell you that the long spaces between my blogs are due to a flurry of happy activity but that's not the case. I think you all must be getting awfully tired of reading about this. I'm running out of ways to make this journey enlightening or purposeful.

In the past few days Rich has had a return of the doubling over, excrutiating pain. A few hours of that totally wrings him out. His depression has barely lifted with the medication—I ask him to call Dr Kelli and he doesn't want to bother her. I'm watching him sink into the “why bother, this is hopeless” mentality and the only time I have his full attention is if I rise up on my hind legs and growl in his face quite loudly with my eyes flaming and teeth bared. THAT is exhausting.

There is a local center that provides emotional support for cancer patients and he promises he is going to go there “after the holidays”. When he finally agreed to this (not because I've been begging, but because his family doctor recommended it) he also suggested that they have support groups for family members. Obviously my husband has lost all concept of who he's married to. I just gave him a Look, smiled and continued with my chores.

Seriously? Seriously. We've been married for fourteen years and 650+ days of cancer have obliterated my essence from his brain?! Nice. I'm thinking a good ten percent of my blog readers can sense the wrongness of such a suggestion.

I am NOT a people person in the general sense of “people person”. As a child I wanted to be a farmer's wife because I thought that meant I could be Mrs. Charles Ingalls in a little house on a prairie. Then I saw the movie “The Education of Little Tree” and discovered heaven—if I ever win the lottery....

I lived a childhood of silence for survival. It's ingrained. It worked.
A room full of people who share a diagnosis with me is hardly the basis of trust and understanding. Something tells me they are NOT going to get my sense of humor.

Because I don't care to sit in a room with strangers and vent does not mean I'm not venting. Venting is the Number Two reason for my Blog. AND, I have Lynn and Christy to vent with and they Get It.

The third time Rich mentioned my joining a Group for this, I calmly took his face in my hands, looked deeply into his eyes and softly said, “Tell me, my sweet....Close your eyes and picture me sitting in that circle.... what do you see?”

It took 3.7 seconds for his eyes to open in shock and horror at what he'd missed. He said “by the end of the first meeting everyone would be trying to latch onto your energy and you'd be helping one or more of them and then it would be just another job for you.”

So now we agree that I'm not joining some “partners with cancer” group. At least not right now.

I heal and recharge by creating. Knitting, sewing, painting, beadwork, writing. What do those things have in common? Solitude. What with the holidays, the learning curve of a new job, and sitting with Rich, I've had to put those things on hold. I'll get back to it. The past few weeks, I wake early and as I'm working out on my Pilate's gym and/or treadmill, I watch PBS shows on painting, sewing, quilting, knitting. My way of holding onto the threads of me until I can get back to me.

Which brings me back to the Number 1 reason for my blog. I don't think I'm the only one who is not a Joiner of Groups. Being from West Virginia, there's a social mandate that “you don't come empty handed”. When I have something to bring to the gathering of partners with cancer, I'll be happy to attend, but right now I'm struggling not to be empty. Sorry, but I don't get filled where people think I should get filled. I go to a different Well. I haven't even tended to this blog lately because I felt I had nothing to offer.

In a society of mass consumption (especially this time of year), greed and fast food, drive through fixes, I don't expect a great deal of understanding for my position.

In fact, I'm spending a lot of energy resisting the urge to jump ugly on patients demanding I call an antibiotic to their pharmacy NOW because they woke up THIS morning with the sniffles.

I'm developing a very special smile for the 24 year old , 213 pound unemployed women, wreaking of cigarette smoke, who tell me “you just don't understand how I suffer with these menstrual cramps.”

I give special care to the paperwork for the 20-30 something year old men who (despite negative test results) are applying for disability for back pain. And of course I assure them that the next time the drug rep leaves Viagra samples, yes,I promise, I'll put some aside for them.

Don't even get me started on the EVIL of Scooters and Hover-rounds!!!!!

Yoh!! Mr Obama.... anyone on your staff thought to consult “Main Street” health care providers?????

Holy fruitcake, Batman.... all of this because I had a rough Christmas? Sorry.