Saturday, March 23, 2019


I was sick again this past week.  The last six weeks have conspired to make me feel like a very old woman, but I'm on the mend.  Yesterday at work a seventy-four year man assumed I was close to his age.  Ouch.  It's the almost white hair.  I hope.

My grandbaby hasn't made an appearance yet.  His mama has moved and is all settled in now and loves the house.  I took the dog for a walk last night and stopped by to visit her and see how she was doing.  She's good but big as a house poor thing.  Soon.

We had a code at work this week, a severe allergic reaction to the CT dye, something that happens but rarely are the reactions that bad.  The patient was fine in the end but scared the shit out of all of us.

One of the nurses I work with is a good friend of mine.  She has bipolar disorder and is sinking again.  She usually only last about six months at work and then ends up back in the hospital which always breaks my heart.  She's a smart, funny, kind woman who has a huge heart and right now I can see her fading.  She folds up and slowly backs away when she is suffering.  Her fur goes up and she gets prickly.  It's the disease but still I miss her when she's like this.

Same old same old.  Nothing much changes, while constantly changing.  The snow is receding in the back yard leaving behind snow mold and what appears to the stools of a hundred dogs.  I can't believe such a small dog can produce that much shit.  I suppose mine would look the same if it wasn't flushed down the toilet each day but rather spread on my lawn, waiting for spring.

My in-laws are coming for supper.  I won't hold my tongue today if my father-in-law starts talking about Muslims.  I'm done with letting him getting away with his racism because I try to respect my elders.  If he chooses to talk about racism I will respond.

Now it's time to clean.  There are muddy dog footprints on the floors which need cleaning up.  Supper to be made and a dessert.  I'll listen to the CBC while I putter around the house.  The big guy has gone into work for a few hours and I have the house to myself.

Wednesday, March 20, 2019

Trying to be a decent human being so I asked my ex husband if he wanted to meet his grandson.  This is what he wrote back.

I met my ex husband when my son was almost three years old.  When my son was five years old, my ex adopted my son.  The second name that is whited out is that of my son's biological father whom I've had nothing to do with in decades.

When I was married to that man, I believed I was crazy.  Turns out I'm not, it was just that I lived with a depressed, angry, vindictive man.  I'm so thankful that he's not in my life anymore and to be honest, I'm thankful he doesn't want to be involved in his grandson's life.  The big guy is already an excellent grandpa.

Friday, March 15, 2019

I feel so sad tonight.  I tried to reach out to a young woman with cancer who was being given a hard time on social media because she was angry.  Why the hell wouldn't she be angry?  But I think I messed it up and I feel badly.

And Donald tRump continues to spew his brand of hatred and bigotry and fear and others pick up and run with it and now a lot of people in New Zealand are dead.  And I want to tell Mr. tRump to stop.  Stop hating.  Stop sewing seeds of hate.  Stop lying.  Stop being a horrible human being but when I go on his Facebook page people leave comments about what a wonderful president he is and I feel sick to my stomach and I want to cry and cry and cry.

And I worry about the world and I worry about what we're all doing to each other.  And I wonder how you get to a place where you think it's okay to gun down innocent people, men, women and children, in a house of worship.  How do you end up with so much hate in your heart?

And did Donald tRump get his hatred from the same place?  And is it contagious?  Or are all human beings that horrible and we just pretend to be good?  Is it just a thin veneer that stops us from hurting and hating each other?

Monday, March 11, 2019



My kind of humor.

I've been sick off and on for the past four weeks.  I hate being sick, hate sitting down, hate being tired and full of mucous all the time, hate laying down in bed at night knowing that I won't sleep well because I can't breath, hate waking up in the middle of the night with a mouth so dry it feels like a desertscape, although maybe that was a dream, I'm not sure.

However, I'm feeling better this morning.  My grandson's mama, Gracie, is now on maternity leave but doesn't get enough money to live on, just cover her rent and nothing else.  So Gracie is going to move in with Nicole, the young woman we rent our house to.  Gracie and Nicole met yesterday and both are excited to start living together.

Gracie is big as a house now and due in two weeks, although the doctor may induce her sooner because the baby is big.  She decided that she would rather move before the baby is born rather than after he's born so she's moving next weekend.  She'll be a short walk away from us which makes me feel that I designed this but I didn't.  I think I feel guilty because something good will come from all of this.

I've taken a couple of days off to paint her bedroom a nice color, scrub floors and hang some curtains.  She's excited to be moving out of her apartment and into a house with a yard and nice neighbors.  Where she lives now is not a good place to raise a kid, there is a massage parlour across the street, her words, not mine but they are true.

She is becoming a part of our family.  Gracie and her parents came over for supper last night so we could get to know her parents and it was nice.  We have nothing in common except for our grandson but that's enough.  We all want what's best for him.  Gracie even gave me a hug as she left which pleased me so much.

My son still doesn't get it.  He posted this on his Facebook page.


I want to tell him that this starts with showing up when you say you're going to;  it means showing up at prenatal appointments.  It starts with making sure your baby mama has enough food to eat while she's pregnant and a roof over her head.  That being a dad starts before your baby is born.  I don't know what the future will bring.  I hope he does better but I doubt it.  I hope and pray but I'm not holding my breath.

The sun is shining through the window this morning.  A woodpecker was just eating some suet and it's going to be above zero all week which is lovely.  The dog expects walks again now that it's warmed up and her feet don't freeze.  She watches me while I brush my teeth and change my clothes, hoping for a walk.  I was a huge disappointment to her yesterday as I ran out of time to walk her.  I shall have to do better today.



Miss Katie is doing well.  We took her out last Sunday and she wanted me to take this photo of her.  She's sees young women taking photos of themselves and each other all the time at the mall and she is a young woman, so she insisted I take a photo.  

The last year was rough on her.  Last April she had a few very bad meltdowns, one which including attacking me, another, attacking a caregiver.  I didn't know what to do so I took her to emergency.  There is not really any good psychiatric care for people with developmental disabilities.  After eight hours we finally met a wonderful psych resident who recommended valproic acid as a mood stabilizer and after eleven hours, we left emergency with a prescription for valproic acid.  

I can't say enough good things about the drug.  It has dramatically changed Katie's life.  She is no longer anxious, or rarely, and when she does become anxious, it is short lived.  Her attention span has increased greatly and she is trying to fingerspell people's names and tries numbers as well.  Because she's more relaxed and has quit attacking people, she only goes into her wheelchair when she's tired.  The cape is gone, except when she's on DATS, because of an incident that happened six years ago.  She attacked a bus driver, pulled their hair.  When we wander around the mall with her in wheelchair, legs crossed, she holds up her hand and wants to high five everyone.  She hugs freely as well.  A lot of people who work at that mall know her.

She's more like her old self again.  She's happy, smiling and enjoying life.  Her sense of humor has returned and she laughs often and hard.  She gets so excited at times that her body vibrates but she doesn't tip over into anxiety anymore, she's just excited and then it passes.  

We were at the mall on Sunday and there was an International Judo competition going on.  She's not a fan of conflict but when I explained that the contestants were "playing" she was okay with it.  She sat in her chair and watched, mezmerized.  She loves watching people.  When we had to continue on to meet the big guy for lunch, she asked if we could go back to watch the fighting.  I said later and she remembered that and held me to it.

During lunch the big guy asked if she wanted to go to the petting zoo and Miss Katie looks at me and signs fighting, later.  I started laughing because I had already forgotten about that promise but she didn't.  I kept my word and she made her choice, Judo over animals.  

On the way home in the car she asked me to ask her caregivers if she could go and watch the swimmers at the nearby pool, so I did.

She's learning and growing and it blows my mind that after years of regression that she is now blossoming.  I am thankful.





Saturday, March 9, 2019

Saturday, March 2, 2019

I was going to write about my mother and her death six years but I am beyond angry this morning and I need to get this shit out of my head.

We rent out a house to a young woman, in her early twenties, and her little boy.  This young woman, I'll call her Nicole, is a lovely young woman.  Hard working, kind and gentle, forgiving.  Far too forgiving if you ask me.  Her boyfriend and his brother, both grown men in their thirties and forties, lived in the house with her.  They treated her like shit.  When she had tried to break up with him in the past he threatened suicide and at another time, threatened to take away her son from her.  They are both pigs, immature and manipulative and the ex-boyfriend doesn't think he should have to support his child.  The money should go into an account for the child which the child can access when he's eighteen.   That's called an RESP you fucking moron.  Child support pays for diapers and food and clothes and school.

She finally gave them both the heave ho.  She has been attacked on facebook by the "boys", I'll call them boys because there is no way in hell they are adults, mother.  She has been called a liar, a thief and bitch by this woman.

When the "boys" moved out on Wednesday, they literally threw her things around and left her with a huge fucking mess.  And not just a housekeeping mess.  Her boyfriend lied on his taxes and now she owes the government a shitload of money that she doesn't have.

These "boys" are also angry at us because they wanted to stay in the house with the cheap rent and make her move out.  I told them that the house is cheap because of Nicole.  She is the daughter of a good friend of ours and she is a single mom.  She is staying there, they can move out.

I know things will get better but right now she feels like she is drowning and it breaks my heart.  And then the furnace quit and it was -30C last night so the house is freezing.  We had a guy there last night to fix the furnace but it must have quit again during the night.

I remember being a single mom and having no money and that feeling of drowning.  Nicole has a wonderful, supportive family but still she has to get through this herself and it's just so damned hard right now for her.

This young woman also gives the best hugs ever and loves with her heart wide open.  She deserves better and I want to hurt someone because of this.  I know my anger will pass too but right now I'm going to clean my house down to the last cat hair in the last corner and exorcise this anger.