Here's to 2012 — by Margaret Hart

This is my first blog in the New Year, and I'd like to write something meaningful and inspirational, but I'm finding myself to be somewhat at a loss for words. I'm sort of temporarily tapped out.  Since early November, I've been running around like a chicken with my head cut off getting ready for this and that, and now that the excitement of all the holidays is over, the company has left, and my son goes back to school tomorrow, there is a satisfying lull in my routine. I have nothing urgent on my calendar until February. And I'm liking this peaceful time of nothing pressing to do.  

Like most people, however, I am thinking about what I'd like to accomplish this year. My to-do list is always a mile long, but there are a few must-do priorities at the top. I'm not a "resolutions" type of person, I'm a goals and priorities gal, and one of the top goals is to continue to make my health a priority. As many moms know, we often put ourselves second or third to our children, our husbands, our jobs, and our pets. I made a conscious decision in 2010 to make myself a priority and started working out with a trainer and seeing a nutritionist. Thankfully, my husband is supportive and my son, who is the most health conscious seven-year-old I know, rarely wants to eat anything fattening or sugary, so I get a lot of support in my household.

Another big priority is to continue to focus on the next phase in my career, which I voluntarily stepped away from when my son was born. While he's been growing, I've enjoyed freelancing at my own pace, providing me with the flexibility to be a full-time mom.  Now that my son is becoming more and more independent, the economy is picking up, and I am seeing more opportunities, I am reviewing my options. Many of the stay-at-home moms I met last year when my son entered Kindergarten have gone back to work; some out of necessity, and others because they missed being in the workforce. I am torn.  I miss being in the workforce. But I know I'll miss being a full-time mom.  And I'm scared at the prospect of relinquishing control to a nanny.  I'll just have to cross that bridge when I come to it.

One of the biggest challenges I expect to face this year is taking on guardianship of my younger sister who  has down's syndrome and currently lives in a group home near my parents in Maine.  My parents are now in their early 70s, and it's getting harder for them to supervise her care. It's time for me to step into a role I have been anticipating for many years.  I'll be overseeing her transition to a group home in Connecticut, and becoming her full-time guardian ensuring all  her needs are met.  Fortunately, she is high functioning, relatively independent, and social, so I'm hopeful she will be happy making new friends and getting involved in  new activities. 

I'm looking forward to 2012 being a year of positive change for me and my family.  And even though I say every  year that I'm going to slow down, not take on so many projects, and try not to do too much, I know that I will. It's in my nature. If  I'm not running around with my  hair on fire, I'm bored. 

So here's to the New Year!  As my son likes to say, "Go like the wind Bulls Eye."

Week 28...All I Want for Christmas by Liimu

All I want for Christmas is to be HEALTHY.

Week 28. Officially in the third trimester. We are in the final stretch, folks, and no one is more happy about that than I. (Funny thing is, I find myself still amazed and befuddled when I look down at my protruding stomach, thinking, "How did we get here again?") But I feel generally pretty good, other than a lingering cough from last week's QUARANTINE situation.

Last Wednesday, my 6 year old started complaining of stomach pains and before long was curved over the toilet, throwing up. Needless to say, she stayed home with me. I sent a text to my mother's helper and found out (through an inadvertent text she had intended to send to her sister that ended "WTF?") that she is deathly afraid of stomach bugs, so I was essentially on my own with it. Not too bad, since for the most part my daughter was pretty perky and I didn't have much on my calendar other than a holiday party, and the hostess was gracious about letting her tag along with me.

Sad for me, I had forgotten about the sneakiness of stomach bugs. How they can look benign and short-lived in one person and linger for days in another. Friday, as I went to bed, I start feeling like I was going into early labor, my stomach was hurting so bad. I could barely sleep. Just past midnight, I heard a scream from my 4-year old's room. She had just wretched in her bed. After finally getting her bed sheets changed and getting her settled down, I felt it coming on for me. I had endured 7 months of pregnancy without puking and this stomach bug was taking me down. An hour later, my 8-year old was calling out for help and back in our room, my husband was complaining of feeling queasy. It was going to be a long day.

As luck would have it, I also had some sort of head cold on top of everything else, along with a fever. So, while everyone else has mostly recovered (my husband still complains of queasiness), I am coughing like a 70-year old barmaid with a 2-packs a day habit. I'm still grateful that the bug ran through our house quickly, rather than taking us out one at a time. Christmas is the day after tomorrow and my girls are healthy. That's the most important thing. My husband and I are getting better day by day. This time next week, we'll be in Arizona with my sister and her family and that can only improve our situation.

So, all I want for Christmas is to be HEALTHY. If I get nice jewelry, or a trip to the spa, even better. But honestly, after surviving this last week of nonstop illness, I'm pretty focused on the basic things for which I have to be grateful: my wonderful family, a job I love that pays well, great friends who make me laugh out loud long and often, and of course, if nothing else, at least I have my health.

Stay warm and dry everyone, and be grateful for the little things. The things that you get for Christmas every year without even having to ask.

The Saddest Day - by Cara

I made probably the most difficult decision of my entire life recently. To end my marriage. Making this decision was so difficult that the only situation I can compare it to would be having a loved one in the hospital and having to be the one to make the decision to have them taken off life support. This decision was immensely heart wrenching, but it had to be done.

My husband is looking for the least expensive way to end our marriage and provide support. Because I have to look out for the needs of both my son as well as myself, I couldn’t afford to go the least expensive route. I chose to go through the much more grueling, difficult way. But it had to be done for the sake of my son and myself.

I also had to do it because my husband and I don’t have any semblance of life together anymore. And I grieve and hurt over this just about every single day. I have tried so hard to keep our family intact. My husband, however, keeps pulling farther and farther away. He has absolutely no interest in rectifying our marriage or family.

My own health has deteriorated significantly as well. I’ve lost 60 pounds due to stress induced irritable bowel syndrome. I can hardly eat liquids at this point and keep them in my digestive tract. My doctors have had to increase my anti-anxiety meds to a point where I think my brain is going to implode. I am weak, often dehydrated, often dizzy, and almost always nauseous. My body cannot afford to go on like this. Especially crying myself to sleep every night. I had to “pull the plug.” For the sake of my own health.

My biggest fear, besides my health, is my son. He will be devastated. And I am sure that this will impact his schooling. Since my husband is hardly around anyway, I constantly reassure my son that I will always be here for him. And I will never leave him, no matter what. He will forever be my number one priority. As it is now, we have established our own comfortable routine together. At least that will remain consistent for him.

The most difficult part of all will be telling our son that Mommy and Daddy will no longer be living together. I’ve been reading up on how to tell a young child that his parents will be divorcing. The most important emphasis from everything I’ve read is that both parents need to remain calm and unemotional when discussing a divorce with a child. I absolutely don’t think I can do it. I get teary-eyed just thinking of telling our son. But I want to hear what my husband says to our son, so I have to be present. I’m just going to have to take a few xanaxes before we sit down with him and try to hold back the tears. I honestly don’t know how I am going to get through it.

My husband and I had a child because we wanted to share the love we had for each other exponentially towards our child. The love for our child hasn’t changed, but I still continue to wonder where the love my husband and I had for each other went. And I still don’t understand how you can know a person intimately for 20 years and be married for 15 years, and have that love dissipate practically overnight. I guess I never will know the answer.

All I ever wanted was a happy little family who enjoyed spending time with one another and enjoying life’s experiences together. From last week’s blog, you could tell that I experienced my son’s first camping trip second hand, through texts and photos sent from my husband. And when my son and I leave for the Bahamas tomorrow, my husband will have to live our cruise experience, along with a stop at Disney on the way back, through scattered phone calls and shared photos. It is so utterly sad.

When my husband received the divorce letter, he was visibly shaken and shocked. Since then, however, he has failed to discuss it. All he said about the letter was, “I don’t know what to say.” I thought to myself, “For an intelligent man, you don’t seem to know much about anything concerning our relationship.” He is acting more and more like a bachelor, is giving up more and more time that he could be spending with his son, instead choosing to spend it with his friends or doing a physical activity. It is beyond sad. For my birthday, he gave me a gift, “from my son,” which was completely self-serving and did not take my son nor I into consideration at all. He had a bike race to go to this past Saturday with a barbecue to go to afterwards. He gave me tickets to go to see the play, The Lion King, at a theater in New York City. He specifically chose the day of his bike race as the date for the tickets, so that my son and I would be occupied. Firstly, my son hates the Lion King movie. I have offered to watch it with him over the years, and as soon as it starts, my son starts screaming, “Turn it off! Turn it off!” Why would I take my son to a play when he won’t even watch the movie it is based on!! Secondly, knowing my son would not like the play; he would be asking to leave every 15 minutes. And with his ADD, he would not be able to sit for that length of time anyway. It would be a horrible, aggravating, miserable experience for both of us. So I gave the tickets away. And my son and I spent a quiet, relaxing, productive day at home. I think we both much preferred that.

My husband’s attorney has up to 60 days to respond to my letter, so we shall see how long he puts off responding to it. In the meantime, I am learning a crash course in how to be a single parent, taking care of a high maintenance child and two high maintenance dogs. I’m not doing the greatest job, so far. But as they say, with practice makes perfect, which I don’t expect to aspire to! I think “staying afloat” is a much more reasonable goal for right now! Time will only tell...

A Sandwich Generation Weekend

I've blogged on this subject before. While I hate to be a broken record, I feel the need to share again.

My dad is 90, and my son is turning 6 next month.

It was a long, snowy weekend here in NY, since yesterday was a school holiday. My dad stayed with us since his aide went home, and he just returned to his house 1/2 hour ago via a car service dedicated to the elderly. I'm glad that he didn't have to drive himself in the snow, even though he prides himself on being independent car-wise.

It was a tension-filled weekend for me, and I felt like I was snappy. I hate being that way, but I couldn't help myself. I'm thrilled that my son and dad got to spend quality time (they sleep in the same room...my dad in a rollaway bed), but my dad did nothing but complain the whole weekend about how he feels.

His life has become a rollercoaster of making doctor rounds. At times it feels like he's in search of a magic pill to relieve all his ailments.

I find myself telling him that as a 40 something mom, I don't feel as great as I did 20 years ago. In fact, my dad looked at photo in my office taken when I was in my 20s and had a fulltime job in PR. It happened to be a shot of me with Bob Hope...my company had done an event with him...and I was thrilled to have the chance to talk with him. But, yes, I looked younger, and my dad commented on how different I looked.

So, there you have it...we all age. As much as we might love to turn back the clock, we can't.

So, what to tell a 90 year old? Friends tell me to listen partly with a deaf ear when he complains. But, that's easier said than done.

I want to try to help him. I dropped an email to an integrative doctor we both use and asked a couple of questions on my dad's behalf. I await his response.

I try to be supportive for my dad, but after a while, I can't take listening to it anymore. And, there are so many elderly people I see who are way worse off. Is that any consolation to him? I suppose not. He just wants to feel half way decent, as he puts it. I want that for him too.

I'm sad that he feels his life isn't a quality one. He's made that statement too.

I actually wound up asking him if he'd prefer not to be living (I know it's an awful question to ask)? He just said he wanted to feel good.

Does anyone who is 90 feel good? I wonder. I'd love to know.

Do you know of anyone that age who feels as they would like to?

Is attitude part of it? Until my dad was 87, he had his share of health challenges over the years, but his age seemingly suddenly caught up with him. And, now he says it's not like him to complain. But, actually it is like him to complain...he just was lucky until 87. Since then he's been nothing but frustrated, and it's what I hear all day/every day whether in person or on the phone.

On one hand, I don't want him to conceal how he feels, in case I can help. On the other hand, maybe sometimes you just have to make the most of life despite it all?! How do people in wheelchairs cope? What about someone with chronic illness? What about someone with dementia?

Do they all hate their lives? Do they just vent incessantly?!

Don't get me wrong. I love and value my dad. I am grateful for him and all that he has done for me and for his on-going support, love, etc. I just miss the way he was. He was my chipper dad.

Do you have a senior parent in your life with health challenges and how do they cope? I'd welcome hearing your experiences.

Thanks for listening to mine.