Margm

A skeptic is a person inclined to question or doubt all accepted opinions. I always told Billy I cannot disbelieve but am not sure I believe. I have never seen a medium or psychic. My son told me I was psychic, but I told him it was really just psycho. Right now my mind is blank/blocked, but I sure wish I had my mystical, magical, imagination back again, or just plain faith. I do not know about psychics or mediums like you do. I live in the south and I guess we have voodoo in Louisiana, but I don't know about psychics and mediums. I am just a country redneck. Growing up in a small town, traveling, but not to the big cities, I don't know about things like that. But some do, and some have proof that it works. I cannot doubt their proof. I have had a phenomenon called dissociation, but it is a psychiatric word rather than mystical or magic. The mind is a powerful thing. Some people's minds more powerful than others. I am new to this forum, but I think if you stay on it long enough, just by reading, you and I both might learn the answers to your questions. .

Thunder, just my humble opinion, but your very inquisitive for someone that does not believe. I think you may be more open to this than you think.

Well Steve, I honestly think Kathy would understand just as Billy would understand. There are a lot of places I loved being, but without Billy I did not want to be there and I know he felt the same way. So, we will just hang together until we can be together. And, I am so sorry about Mindy. When my aunt lost her last dog she would not get another because she worried about what would happen to the pup should she pass before it. She lived until she was 90 and kept her nieces little Dachshund her last years, so she had her fur baby after all. I know the love and depression that went on after she lost one of her fur babies.

I've always said we could live in a tent and it was home if Billy was there too. In fact, before we got the last RV I suggested we get a big tent and go from national park to state campgrounds until the house sold. You would have had to know Billy, but his dream was to live like the mountain men of old times lived. I just needed a good potty chair. He knew we would not do that, and that is why he just off the cuff got the RV.. He would have loved living in a tent. We camped out many times. It was nice waking up in the mornings and Billy already had a fire going and coffee made. You could hear the pine cone remnants falling on the tent from the squirrels in the trees. Guess we were getting too old for sleeping bags anyhow.

Joyce we lived in our RV's fulltime for probably six years or a little more. We would go from RV park to RV park like we were fulltime RVers, which we were, we were just not retired yet. At retirement we just hooked up and left, we had gotten rid of everything. One park out west asked us if we were old enough, it was a 55 and over park. We were old enough and I did not want to stay but a few days in each park after retirement. I knew our time for traveling would be limited, and it was. Family could not stand us being away and one thing after another would happen that we had to come home for. Billy wanted to stay 2-3 months at each location but I knew we did not have months, and sure enough, we did not. We had just bought our last RV in March before Billy passed in October. It never left the blacktop driveway. We were cleaning out the house to put it for sale when Billy got sick. After that, time went and so did Billy. That is why I do not mind leaving this house. We were leaving anyhow, just not together this time.

Joyce, we offhandedly talked about what we would do. After-all, we were both approaching the age if some untoward event had happened, like has happened so many times, we would know what to do. The consensus was we would continue RVing and the other would take whichever went first's cremains along. But, being the age we are, I cannot keep up a house or an RV. Oh, I could keep up a house if I really wanted to, but again, we were not homesteaders. I would like to get a small car and do some traveling but I know my family will not let me go alone. I used to like to just get in the car and hit the road, going nowhere in particular.. Just do not like circle routes, hate to go back over the same road. That is why we had to get off the road RVing at a prime age for RVers, family could not stand us being away. That was our fault, we have always been enablers. So, we made the best of the situation that we could. Now at my age, if I have regrets alone, it just is not worth it. So, other than the loss of Billy, I will have no regrets. It is what it is, it was what it was.

I have to tell you that I do realize life goes on in a family, even when the main person passes away. I cannot understand my feelings of running away from family members, running away from family problems. My great granddaughter, meeting her for the first time only a couple of months after Billy left only left me cold feeling, detached. So many family problems to take care of and I feel so detached from all of them, except my 16-year-old granddaughter. Billy loved her so much that somehow I can feel his love when I am around her. There was an old saying something like "when there are no solutions, why worry." I know I probably got that wrong. My biggest fear/aggravation nowadays is when someone tells me "don't you remember?" No, my memory is like a freshly cleaned blackboard. I don't want to be so cold and detached from family, they need me, sometimes they need me too much for my comfort. I did not know what thread to put this under, but it seems I am always "reflecting and musing."

I cannot have my one cup of coffee in the morning without my honey in it. My dad started me on honey and coffee, I turned Billy onto it. No one touches our jar of honey. Save the bees. I have six pots planted with red petunias on our front porch, newly painted porch.

Ours will be together and I will have a monument in his hometown cemetery near his mom and dad. Kids know what to do. My mother-in-law had her burial outfit saved for years, and she was buried in it. The thing was, they dug the grave at the foot of her husband's grave. We left that cemetery with them digging a place by my father-in-law's. She already had the double monument. It was strange seeing all those laughing people at a funeral. Nanny would come out of that grave fighting if she was at her husband's feet.

I could not leave Billy's ashes Kay. I have a friend that has heart trouble and rheumatology problems. She is going into assisted living a street over from my apartment. Another friend lives close too. Daughter lives about two miles away and Mom and sister live about four miles away. All my other friends and relatives, the ones that are left, are close. I think Billy would approve. I cannot stay here. Cannot stand to be here.

Thunder, I worked in the basement of a hospital 11-7 shift for seven years. Never even got scared. Then I went days and the girl that took my place was accosted and taken to the dark laboratory by elevator. We were all alone in a big state teaching hospital. She was not raped, she talked him out of it. He had just graduated high school, an honor graduate. A live spirit.

Joyce, right now it is not helping. I keep finding things that trigger pain. I just cannot stay here. If we had lived in this house 30 years I might have to stay, but we were RVers and not homesteaders. My whole life my mama has looked at me like she wondered where I came from. I know she actually was ashamed of my carrot red hair and freckles. She and Daddy were brunettes. She got asked by people all the time where I got the red hair. She finally told them "from her daddy." They said, Elvie doesn't have red hair. She would say, "no, he doesn't." So, if you ever saw a band of gypsies that were carrot topped, those were my folks. But, I will be chained to an apartment too, but not for long probably. Cannot stay here where he left me. Cannot stand keeping up a house.

kay, that hit my heart. Thank you. I wish my heart would melt that ice off of it. I guess it really has or it would not break so often.

Billy's mesenteric arteries were involved. They put in stents, but it was too late. Starting August 31st, everything he ate hurt him. We just knew he had the brain aneurysm then, did not know about the cancer until he had to have the stents. I cooked his favorites, he ate and he suffered so bad that the hydrocodone they gave him, overnight I gave him 6 or 7 and he was in intolerable pain. At the ER they gave him Dilaudid and it took care of the pain. He shut down eating entirely. I could not even get fluids down him and the week he passed we were at the cancer center every day for fluid boluses. I swore off cooking. All these people around me, I buy frozen stuff and things they can fix themselves. I will use the slow cooker, but have only used it twice. I will cook no more forever. .

My husband did not believe in anything paranormal, supernatural, magical, mystical, etc. My mind is blocked to everything I used to think was magical. I do think faith will bring it back. I did not come on here to debunk anything, or investigate. In fact, some things scare me. It is like I always told Billy, I don't believe it, but I don't disbelieve it either. I have a friend that has spirits living in her house. Too many people have seen them at work. Too many groups, religions have tried to rid her of these. She even moved and built a new house. They moved with her. This is a very straight forward woman. These "beings" aggravate her but they do not hurt her. There is so much we do not understand, not even skeptics, probably the meaning of that word. If a person does not believe and wants to debunk it, then why? Why not just not believe in it and let the people who do believe in it alone. We used to have people that were schizophrenic come into the hospital where I worked and they thought they were Jesus Christ, Elvis, a king or a queen. And we dope them up to not believe this stuff. If I want to think I am Martha Washington (a despicable woman, to me), then let me believe I am Martha. If we do not have murder or mayhem in our hearts, but just believe we are someone else, what does that harm?

And I hope those are hearts. Don't have my glasses on.

Kay, when I covered up that brown with bright yellow, it took about three coats and you could have peeled it off like wallpaper. Attributes? I think I must have been hiding when God gave those out. Hate cooking, hate housekeeping, hate yardwork, and I hate getting this house ready to put on the market. Doing it slowly. It is like watching grass grow. And my sister got the book smarts. Top of her class in every degree she got. Degrees don't feed you though. I am proud of her grades and I know she did not realize Jindal (Governor) would kill education in Louisiana.

Mitch, I think of this house as a death house. He did not die in it. He died in one of the hospitals I retired from. I go from blaming myself, the hospitals, Arkansas for his death, but he had to have the tobacco all his life and went to the smokeless tobacco, and could not give it up. The cancer was all over his body. We just thought it was his bad back. Also did not know about the brain aneurysm, that might have been the cause of death. Does not matter now, when they are gone, they are just gone. The house is not at fault in this case. I sleep in our bed and am not disturbed doing it. The yards are two acres, the house is like me, it is old and needs paint in a lot of places. It needs repairs I cannot keep hiring done. I may be wrong, maybe this is a male/female thing, but I hate trying to get everything repaired. Billy was not Mr. Fix-it and I certainly was not Susie Homemaker. We have rented before, but most always owned our houses. I am not a decorator. Billy told me to look in those magazines to get ideas. I spent a lot of money for paint for the bathroom. Had it mixed and when I finished painting, it looked like bathroom "doings" had been smeared on the wall. S___t mongly brown. I prefer something I don't have to worry about breaking 24/7. This house is a worry. Too much so for an older woman. I might be only a breath away from assisted living. One of my widow friends goes into assisted living next month and her friend is going to follow her. They will be one street over from my apartment.. And, there will be some things I miss about it, feeding all the different birds, the crows, squirrels and the little chipmunk that his calls echo all over the forest, which also is all around me. But the house owns me, I don't own it. If I hear water dripping anywhere I go into conniptions. The pipes had burst under the sink and we had to have the flooring removed and redone on four floors. If I hear a change in the AC noise, I get anxious. I want to live where the house does not own me. Billy was fixing it up to leave, he wanted to leave it too, just not the way that he left, I am sure. Houses were my Mama's passion. I repeat, I am not a homesteader. My mom was. Lots of people get comfort from their home. My friend lives in the house her dad was born in.. They will remove her only one way. I only cried leaving one house and that was a 1996 Holiday Rambler RV. Family called us away. Home means so much to some people, even if it causes them pain. It causes me pain, only because we did not get to leave it together.

Me too.

That is so true. I am not sure I am ready for a medium yet. I don't know if I am a believer or an unbeliever. I am a scared person for sure. Faith is there, it is just a lot shallower than it used to be.

Talking about "signs" on another thread/forum/other part of these forums, I called my old psychiatrist early on. I got my "sign." She had just retired. She knew me, did not care to introduce myself to someone else. Besides, now they would send me to Geriatric. That would hurt my feelings just like the first time Kroger asked if I wanted my senior discount. The nerve of some people!!!!! After I got to thinking about it, it was a good idea, the `10% paid taxes anyhow. Only offered on a Tuesday, I think, and that was so many years ago I don't know if they still do that.

Tylenol PM is a good choice. I did not take a full prescription of Ambien. I took it a couple of nights. No luck with it.

Back in 1982, it was okay to advertise God in public. The buses in Houston that ran around to the different hospital complexes would have Bible verses, etc. When I was going for my final results of the staging of my cancer, a bus ran right in front of us.. It said "I will give you health" and a picture of Jesus on the whole side of the bus. Billy saw it too. But, when I mentioned it again later, in front of people, he would not admit to seeing it. But, to me, it was a sign. Back then the doves feeding on highway 59 on the way down to Houston every week end, they were a sign to me too. Billy passed, and my mind is blocked. Finding the wedding ring nugget, I cannot explain.. I had looked in that jewelry box more times than I can count. But, still I picked it back up and there it was. I had been looking for the black cord it had been on, but still, why couldn't I see it? I could not move on, I could not clean out his clothes, I could not even make plans at all until I found it. He has come to me in a dream-like almost asleep state of mind, but so did my granddaughter, and she was just in another state.. When he told me "it's enough" I knew I had to leave the house full of relatives. But the magic I used to feel, the imagination, all of it is blocked. I think that goes along with my blockage of my faith.

Karen, the effects are almost immediate. Certainly within the hour. Antidepressants do not act immediately. Lots of side effects with antidepressants. Do not mean to sound like an expert, but this is my experience. They might make you sleepy at first. I do take one at night to sleep. Ambien only lasted me two hours so I did not pursue it. Tylenol PM is pretty good too. But, during the day when I feel like a panic attack is coming on, they do stop them. I never knew a true panic attack until I had cancer and I did leave a full buggy of food behind in the checkout line. Was going to a psych doc at the time, quite a few years going to one. Did not have them again until after Billy passed. They do not come on as often now.

Kathy, I have tried to answer this but always delete it before sending it. I just feel so ill equipped to answer or help. I do know that family dynamics in my life are really driving me to a real break and I don't know which way I am going to fall. I do know since it was not your son's dad, he cannot understand. The reason I have deleted my answers is because I have no answers for my own family problems and am so inept at helping anyone else. When I met my great granddaughter for the first time all I could think was "why now, Billy would have loved to meet her and you could have brought her, why now?" I did not say this. I will tell you that my heart is frozen solid sometimes and I cannot communicate with family members like THEY want me to. My solution is to run and hide, but that is no solution, my family won't let me hide. I think you are in the same fix I am in. We have to face these problems and still try to take care of ourselves. I have no solutions, I just wanted you to know I commiserate with your problem. How can I help someone else when I cannot help myself. But, I do understand where your son is coming from and know it would be different if it was his father you were mourning. He has two children he wants to show off and he cannot understand why everyone is not as excited as he is. And we cannot understand why people won't just let us be.....just for a little while. I am pulled in four different directions at once. I know how you feel, but have no answers. Except the anti-anxiety drug. Some people say "no." I say "yes" and believe it has saved me. I do meditation through my earbuds at night, I do not know if it sinks in. Lot smarter people on here that are further along than we are, but am sure they can help. I just reread this and only repeat myself over and over. I can only tell you my heart is with you.