Margm

We are strong. We get up every morning. We do what has to be done. We live because the only other choice would be not to live. I have heard how strong I am. My son says it. We are strong because we have no choice. Being somewhere that we don't want to be, doing things we don't want to do, wanting to curl up in bed and avoid the world. If we do that, our minds are so active and we think. Thinking too much is dangerous, so we are strong and avoid thinking too much.

Big boy. Is this your first. Do they live close? So proud for you.

Anne, I just discovered a lot that you had put on about the holidays on another post. I am going back to read those.

Congratulations Kevin, on all fronts. Boredom is good. I always said that was how I wanted to die, of boredom. Went in my shirt sleeves out to the washateria a few minutes ago. Louisiana weather. Could be snowing tomorrow, but we always know it won't last long. Merry Christmas to you, and send us pictures of new grandson..

We are all concerned Butch. Possibly you could go to the school and get Caleb's lessons for home study. I'm sure the school would understand. I know you don't have time to let us know day by day, but you all are in our thoughts and prayers. You have to take care of yourself too. I know it seems hard to do sometimes, but remember, you are needed very much. Sometimes that need is what keeps us going. Sometimes I wish I had the mind of a child, but sometimes I think I really do.

How is Katie doing? From a mother's viewpoint, I hope she is holding up. I know you said she was blaming herself for not having Noah wear his helmet. That is what Mama's do. We blame ourselves for everything. This little Mama and Daddy have had so much to bear. Butch, I am so glad you are there to help out. They need your strength and you need your strength too. We do not know how strong we really can be until others depend on us. And your pictures of Gracie bring smiles on a cold, wintry day here in the south. Prayers still with you.

It did for all of us Finch. Let Crystal's family grieve the Crystal they knew. You grieve the Crystal you knew. If things are thrown away or burned, it is because they have no significance to the family, or the husband wanted them away from his and Crystal's family. You have no control over any of this. Please honor Crystal by not conveying Crystal's secret life to her family or friends. If it was so precious to you, keep it in your heart, or write your book about your Crystal. You cannot conjure up one atom of the Crystal you knew anymore than I can bring Billy back. We live with our memories. If Billy had another life, I do not want to know about it. I am not curious about it at all. And, honestly, he would not want me or his children, or his mom or dad if they were alive to know. If he kept it secret, he had a reason to keep it that way, and it is buried and gone, as surely as is he. All we have, any of us, are our memories, and let us keep them safe and honored. I'm sorry if it made you cry. The truth hurts. We cry a lot, all of us. And, we will cry more, as will you. But nothing we do, no place we go where they once had been, none of that brings them back.

I felt I had lost some of my dignity when Billy had to clean the bags I had to have attached to the hole my doctor had made to drain the infection from my colon. He never showed he minded. Our first year together, a week or so before our first anniversary he was emptying bedpans with the difficult delivery of our son. He did not show any thoughts of his that this might have been gross. Billy would have made a great nurse. Those last five weeks when he became totally disabled, my giving him bed baths (was a loving feeling of closeness I felt I shared with him.) I did other things that made him feel less a man to himself, not to me. After nearly 55 years together, he did not want me doing things for him that he could not do for himself. There are men on here that would have to face their own feelings about this. We women, we felt the maternal feelings that made up our whole psyche, we were caring for the person we loved so much.. But that person, being only in touch with his dignity side, not our maternal side, he did not feel it. My dad's blood count had got down so low, he was bleeding into his nephrostomy tube that had to be changed often, he hated Mama having to do that. He would accept help from Billy and our grown son, but he would not have let me help at all. He hated Mama having to drain that tube. My uncle (his brother-in-law) came to help once and my dad physically ran him off. He did not return. Billy knew I did not mind, but something deep inside him, something that made him what he was, he could not abide the things I was doing. "In sickness and in health" was something he shared with my being ill, but he could not tolerate having to be helped. He left me, he was trying to tell me he had to go, and I would not accept it. I now understand, but I physically and mentally feel I could and would have carried those over six feet around in my arms like a baby. He did not want this. I will change the words to the song "he's not heavy, he's my husband." But, I would not want to take away his dignity. I had to let him go.

This whole situation hit me personally, I know how much I hurt my family). In doing so, I hurt myself also. Billy was the one who died though, but he had forgiven me.. At the end, we had no secrets. Some of them were hard to tell, took years to tell, and I risked losing him. I did lose respect and trust. But, in the end love won out. I am sorry the affairs of the heart did not get to finish with some people who were left wondering. But in one case there is an immediate family to try to save, in the other, an inquisitive person and two people gone, who were loved by many. If they had wanted their families to know, they would have told. I got a chance to and a chance to beg forgiveness. You want her family to know the secrets she felt, the plans she was making, unless she was planning on making those changes to her life in your house, please do not add this Crystal that you knew, the Crystal her children did not know, please honor her enough to let her family only know the Crystal they knew. You had many years, they had more. You want to honor the Crystal you knew, write it in a book. It will not help her family to know she had secrets they knew nothing about. It will harm the family. Please do not harm their memories. I do not think that is your intention. But, like all of us are having to learn to let go of someone, so is her family. We have our memories. They have their memories. You have your memories. Keep them as your own.

Sometimes they will make them do a sleep deprived EEG to get adequate results. You have got to know it has been over 20 years since I typed these and got to look at the print outs and see the spikes and cannot remember what all they were called. I do know they give them a flashing light exam during the EEG and sometimes that will throw them into a full blown seizure. But the tests themselves are painless, like having an EKG, the electrodes are put on you just like with the EKG (on the head though) and you feel nothing. They will just read the brain waves at different times with different reactions. The sleep lab (polysomnograms) was part of the EEG lab and that was the most boring things to type, like watching grass grow. Yet it must have been important because they would dictate four and five pages. The only thing I remember for sure is they do not want to do an EEG until awhile after the first seizure. But they can control them. There are a lot of different types. The grand mal seizures I misunderstood and called them grandma seizures. I think they call them tonic-clonic seizures now. The postictal state is when it scares you, they will have a seizure and then go into a deep sleep. I held Brianna after one with Kelli driving 40 miles to the doctor and she was just limp. I thought she was dying and then she just "came to life" and was normal. My daughter has a sleep study this Thursday. Let us know how he is doing please.

Thank you Kay for keeping us updated. Dear Butch and his family have had too much to bear. My prayers are with them.

George, glad you can get rest. I hate anniversary and "special" dates that bring back those memories.. Maybe one day the memories will comfort us, but right now the "scar tissue" covering our wounds hurts. George, will pray for your sister. Hope I can get them further than the ceiling. In our group of friends we have prayer warriors and I always feel safer with them praying for me because they are warriors. I am just a fledgling private in that fox hole that no atheists abide with me in that place. I have my faith the size of the mustard seed, and I hope it grows. You and your family are close. That means so much.

Gin, I worked four years in the EEG lab at the teaching hospital. They cannot get an accurate EEG after a seizure.. What they call the "postictal" state is the most scary because they seem lifeless.. Brianna had them as a baby if her fever would go high. My daughter has some that do not show up on EEGs, called stress seizures. They like to wait until they are seizure-free to do an accurate EEG and tell what part of the brain the seizure is coming from. My daughter will go into a seizure if she is given a steroid. Luckily my granddaughter outgrew hers and her EEGs afterwards were free of any irregularity. They are very scary to the people that witness them, but they can be controlled now and live a normal life with medication. To the parents though, and friends, witnessing one is very scary. My daughter took too much Wellbutrin, a known antidepressant that can cause seizures. One made her feel good and this retired nurse decided more than one would make her feel great. She can no longer take this medicine, which really is a good antidepressant without the side effects of others, if you take it right. She was student body president of her college and was giving a speech to visiting politicians and other people when she had her first one at the podium.

I''m sorry Cookie. I get carried away sometimes and write too much. Sometimes though remembering that "I am him and he is me" makes me think he is still with me. Sometimes that helps for a tiny second or two. Sometimes where one thing helps, if I try it again it has the opposite effect and I will go off in deep depression. So, will have to drop that. Like taking his hats and putting them in the truck with me, I talked to those hats for 40 miles to the city and 40 miles back. I discussed everything, the bad and then the good. I felt a load had been lifted and I sat those hats in the other seat on my next trip and cried all the way there and back. That was this time last year though. I don't cry as much now, but I keep a roll of paper towels close cause I will cry at commercials. And, I would so love to hear some of your stories of "living off the land." One time Billy wanted to raise minks or chinchillas on the garage floor. He wanted to be his own boss. That would have been disastrous, but we had a lot of those times.

I want to take Billy's flies that he has tied and put them in a shadowbox for the kids and grandkids with his picture fly fishing in the background. I will do it one of these days. Maybe after 500 days I can open the box. That was a wonderful thing for your grandchildren. I go back to my grandmother's "book" often. They published some of her writings at some colleges. She wrote about the times she grew up in from 1899 until she quit writing in probably the 1970's. When your grandchildren have grandchildren of their own, this will be their history. This is a very good gift for them Brad. Sometimes I get carried away with my memories.

I'm sorry Gin. Please let us know how he is doing. They may be in an area that they cannot use their phone. Some areas make you turn them off. They will see that you called and get back in touch with you. Again, let us know how he is doing.

We were both so blessed to have her in ours, and I wish we could have protected her from some of the bad she had to endure, I think sometimes you learn. My mom treated my sister and me the same way. She could not help herself, we did not know it at the time, but it was mental abuse. Sometimes you learn lessons from your parents though. Luckily I didn't suffer my mom's mental illness and so sorry my daughter did. Billy's family never said "I love you" at any time in their life. I felt so sorry for kids that were beat down and was determined mine were not going to be, and Billy said "I love you" a hundred times a day, to me, to his siblings, his children, my folks, and my folks did not say it much either. I know my granddaughter did not inherit that "mean gene" because she was adopted. And, from Billy and me, she learned to love and be loved, so she willl pass that on to her children.

It would be double grief for those left and still would be some sort of relief also that their parents, grandparents, were so close they did not want to be alone. Doug Flutie's parents died one hour apart. My friend's brother-in-law passed and at the "viewing" his wife had a heart attack and died. I am sorry, I thought this was a show of utmost support from the other person, not being able to live without the other one. I read such things to Billy, but I honestly think he had more time to think about this, you see, I think I was not expected to live and it was touch and go for months. But they did not tell me I was supposed to go. Anyhow, he said the one left must stay. And, I admit, it kinda hurt my feelings. And, I so wanted to follow him. And, I was not thinking about anyone but me. And then amazingly, you sometimes get a reason that you have to try to hang on a while longer. So, maybe Billy was right. He would be doing exactly what I am doing, only from a 23 foot RV, and she prefers more room. So, he may have had to change his plans. Will never know.

It is ironic how our thoughts are the same, yet they differ on many things. I look at those happy older people and I think "one of them is going to go through this pain." I look at them with pity. I am happy they still have each other, but I know soon, one will be hurting. Genet and Jerry, our friends through our children, enjoying each other's company so much. Jerry left at Thanksgiving. My heart is with Genet. We know my mama could be a witch at times. Actually, her name meant witch/sorceress. After Daddy passed away she was still in her 60's, she did date a friend from her high school years a few times. She was a knockout in looks and had a sword for a tongue. A little plump woman had just married a widower in their "circle" of acquaintances. She was telling Mama how nice she looked (and she was meaning since she just lost her husband). And Mama, in her blue jeans, shirt tucked in, and sneakers did look pretty. She huffed and said something to the order of "well you would too if you would just push away from the table." Those were not her words, but the ones she said were so unkind that they meant the same. I don't know if that was just Mama's "way" or if she was jealous of the woman for remarrying. Personally, knowing my mama so well, I figure if she had been born in another time and place, she never would have married. She would have been the business woman, that she wanted to be. The man she dated, she put him aside and he worshiped her from afar. I think he had done this while she was married too. Mama didn't like him because he "put her up on a pretzel." I loved her way with words sometimes. She would have been a good sidekick to Norm Crosby, if I remember him right. I wish we all could still be holding hands, but you know that one of them will feel our pain and I envy them so much the less for that. I read where a man came into the house, his wife had had a heart attack, I guess, he was trying to give her CPR and passed away while trying. Now, in my screwed up brain, that is what I envy, they left at about the same time. But Billy said the one left must stay. He knew me so well. I wanted to follow him.

"Rationality" has different specialized meanings in economics, sociology, psychology, evolutionary biology, and political science." Rational is so boring. My habit is to jump, I never look or think it through, I just jump. Jumped into marriage and woke up many nights thinking I had got out of the frying pan into the fire. Turns out that jump worked out okay, but it sure took a lot of work. I jumped into moving away from that house that was so quiet I knew I would die from the loudness of that quiet. I am needed, some times too much. Sometimes I resent it. I have fear so much and I sit around and have no idea what I am afraid of, but sometimes I feel I am having a heart attack because I will be so scared I have to take deep breaths and I fight taking a Xanax. I am alone. I have people around me but I am alone. It is not like being alone in a big house, it is like having lots of people depending on me. I am old. I am supposed to have people I can depend on. One woman asked me if I went to get Ferris-Yaris by myself and of course I did. One day I decided I was a danger to other vehicles with that damn truck bed. I don't judge distances good. So, off I go and jump and buy Ferris-Yaris. Gwen, being rational is so overrated. We are not living a rational life. I don't advise anyone to leap before they look, like I do, and I just am not jumping so high anymore anyhow. But so far, I don't regret but a few things.............nah, I don't regret nothing. I would do it all over again. I just miss him. I don't have any answers to our lonesomeness. I don't want any of you being where you don't want to be, but how can any of us be where we want to be anyhow. Anniversaries, holidays, seven days of the week, any day, birthdays, they are all the same. We have a vacancy that can never be filled.

You have virtual hugs coming your way. Sorry it's late. I hope it was as wonderful as it could be.

Gwen, I cannot swim, but to me you are just treading water. Are the panic attacks so bad they will not let you drive? Doesn't the Xanax help with the panic attacks? I hate to see you a prisoner in your own home. I am just the opposite. Sometimes I just want to be able to have a whole day to myself, and saying that I feel guilty. I really do not begrudge the time with my granddaughter. I hope I can help her have a life that she will love, I hope she meets a good man and marries, I hope she finishes school, I hope so many things for her. This is one thing I cannot show to her though. She has had a lot of mental anguish all her life and now, with this counselor, she is learning to have her own voice. I cannot impart any of my own voice, wishes, expectations on to her. I never really thought about "finding myself" because like Billy, I would not read a map. I would tell him sometimes on our trips that we were lost. I don't know what it is with men, but they will not admit they are lost. "They just do not know where they are" at this particular time. Semantics. But with her, I cannot make suggestions, because they are my suggestions. This is like a dark hole she has to find her own way through, I am just there to protect her. She is a beautiful, kindhearted, not a mean bone in her body, type of person. She does not have faith in her own decisions, and the counselor is helping very much. I make no demands. So see, I cannot think of just myself. I am not alone. I have a project. And, even though it ties me down, I have to be glad I can do this project and help her out. She was adopted, so she is not susceptible to the mental gene in our family, but that gene has beat her down until she could escape it. Part of her heritage is Thailand, and letting her know that she has the mental ability to thrive and be who she wants to be is the only lesson I want to give her. I let the counselor help in ways that I cannot. She has let her know she has a voice, and she is not afraid to use it now. I have hope. I moved back to my hometown. Some of you cannot leave your homes you shared with your husband. I understand that. If Billy had been a homebody and loved a home, I might not have moved. We were leaving that beautiful, comfortable, friendly, quiet place long before he passed away. We had bought this RV (I think our 5th one) in March, before we found out how sick he was in September. We had already gotten rid of some things. All that was in that house was a quietness so loud that I could not stay no matter what. "One size does not fit all." What works for me does not work for others. In fact, I did what I was not supposed to do and I keep on doing this.

RVing was mine and Billy's main thing to do. I never liked interstates. I cannot head out west again because that was mine and Billy's place. I would love to take my granddaughter to New York City to see Broadway plays. That has always been the thing she wanted to do most. I have enough money to help out my family, a lot, a whole lot, sometimes making me run out of money by the end of the month and I do not see any relief from that. We have not even had my mom's succession and with my sister losing her job, that is another expense. I do not know how long it will take her to get on disability and she won't ask for anything, but I have to be there. I think I am going to have to start playing the lottery if I have very big dreams. Anyhow, if I can get a good tax return, and I had them take lots out, then maybe my granddaughter and i can take a trip somewhere. I am like you, I like the backroads, but her dream is a big city. When I was growing up in my small town, just going to Shreveport, we had what they called the Bossier Strip where all the nightclubs were. Those city lights just fascinated me. I got to visit that strip after graduation, and the bright lights were really not what I thought they would be. I would not squash any of her dreams though.

May be a "taboo" subject, but one that nearly everyone has. When I used to read "Dear Abbey" (or whatever her name was), she, or her sister, would post that we all have thoughts that might embarrass us being in print, but everyone has those thoughts. Everyone. I will go to another book I recently read. And, yes I do sit around looking for books from widows and widowers. It is like going to a counselor who has never even lost a pet, you want to go to one that has experienced the problem we seek help for. We want their opinion. We might not follow it, but we are looking for guidance and whether we take it or not is up to us. Shirley Jones was married to Jack Cassidy for about 18-20 years. Jack had just asked Shirley to go back with him, she turned him down, and he went to sleep with a cigarette in his hand and his house burned. So did he. She was noted to say in her book "Shirley Jones, a Memoir" that she would love him until she died and her then husband Marty Ingles, he knew it. She was married to Marty for about 38 years when he had a stroke and died last year. In her book she tells widows (about sex) to take things "in their own hands." She had the last part of her book written about this. She is now 82, and this book was published when she was 79, so I guess she was saying that women have urges the same as men do. I will say I have become much more of a prude at my age than I was 30 years ago. I doubt that she meant for the old women to hang out on street corners or pick up someone at a bar, and Shirley told it in plain English what to do to take care of your urges. I'm sure this "secret" was not a lost art, or a surprise either. You are young enough that you still have a lot of living to do. Do not be ashamed of your urges, like the girls up above told you. Unless you decide to be a nun and go live in a nunnery, or whatever it is called, in plain language, you learn how to handle things yourself. You are young enough you might develop feelings again with someone. I think very many on here have been married more than once. Many of my friends have been married multiple times. One of my best friends was married five times. She was a widow with a child when she was 17. I think the last husband, who ran off with their marriage counselor, was her last husband. Her son, a grown man with children of his own told her "Mama, you don't seem to have much luck with men, have you thought you might like women." No, this gal just liked the men. And now I will put the shocker on here. If you are not looking for romance, you won't develop romantic feelings to a battery operated object. Maybe I should not have said that. ADDENDUM: I particularly like in the article Marty posted: Of course, since the subject is sex, if is not often explored or written about and I approach it with fear and trembling that is only offset by my desire to make some folks feel normal and alleviate some guilt. ADDENDUM TO ADDENDUM: Recently on an old TV show about the 1970's the teenager son walked in on his parents in their bedroom. They did not notice it, but in talking to his friends they all were freaked out that parents did such things. I think the word was "disgusted" really. Billy would always tease me about sex even around the grown grandchildren. I just ignored him. His sense of humor sometimes did embarrass me around others. I would just say "He is all talk". What goes on behind closed doors is our own business, it is natural, but the door is closed for a reason.

Okay, I clearly have no answers, have a hard time helping myself. So I delete. I don't want anyone to have to be alone. I did not want Billy to go. The only thing I know for sure is he is not coming back no matter what the day is. I don't want to buy presents. I gave Bri my credit card and turned her loose on the computer, like Billy liked to do. (She had a limit, she kept within the limit, and she had a ball). Making her happy is what I am here for. The rest will get Visa cards and buy what they want. We will throw together some kind of dinner because my sister has no one now but me. Poor thing. It is not the same. It will never be the same. I figure that is why my grandmother wrapped all the kids presents with toilet paper one year. What was the use of going to town and buying more paper. And, she kept the drawers full of presents given to her for birthdays and Christmas and Mother's Day. It was funny when she recycled the giver's present back to the giver. It is what it is, it was what it was. No more.