Reunited again

 Four years, one month and one day after my Mom passed away, my Dad followed her.  He never stopped missing her and gave up his will to live when we lost her. I think for him his cancer diagnosis was almost a relief because he realized it wouldn't be long before he saw her again. My Dad and I had a complicated relationship to say the least. As a kid I really disliked him as an adult I learned to accept him for the way he was and eventually totally loved him. His final moments are something I will never forget and I keep going over them in my head. Should I have stayed right next to him, was it wrong I was sitting away from him watching tv? He was sleeping finally after almost three days so I didn't think he would have passed so fast. My father had a lot of fear those last couple of days. I am sure anyone who is facing death would be fearful of the unknown. The thing that gives me solace is knowing my mom was waiting for him. He told me he could hear her calling for him to come now. He asked me if it was mean for him to want to go with her instead of stay with us and I assured him it wasn't. A joker to the end, as I sat next to him crying, he gave me a hug and told me he loved me then he proceeded to grab my nose and pretend like his thumb was my nose between his fingers. A little after that when my brother arrived, he was sitting in his bed making faces at me. That was my dad, always getting someone to laugh, the perpetual clown. I will miss him more than I thought possible. Where my days were filled with thoughts of him or being with him, there is now an empty void.

Answering questions

So things have been in sort of a holding pattern with dad. He is on palliative care for now, but I think we may be moving him to hospice soon. I really appreciate people asking me about him and myself, but there are days when I am just so tired of talking about it. Lately when someone asks how he is, I reply "he's alive." I think they get a bit annoyed, but in reality people do not want to hear the truth. They don't want to know that he is dying a slow agonizing death. That he rarely has an appetite and when he does eat,  he often chokes on the food because the cancer is slowly closing his esophagus. They don't want to know that he is choosing not to have a feeding tube put in place so all we have left to do is to watch him starve to death, he's lost 6 pounds in a month and I am sure there is more to come. He is now a shell of the man he used to be and hates the fact that he has to be a burden to us.(We do not feel he is a burden, that is his own thoughts.)  He is often confused and at times am not sure who I am or where he is. He is sick of living and wants to die. So that is how he is.

When I am asked how I am, I never really know what to say because people don't really like to know the ugly truth. The truth is that I am scared to death. I am stretched to the limit and it takes all I have to hold it together. I am so thankful for my kids and niece during the day because without them to care for I would fall apart. I don't want to lose my dad even if he tends to be a crazy, cranky old man. You never know how important your parents are until you have lost one. I pray every day that he goes quickly and peacefully yet I feel a tremendous amount of guilt because I am basically praying for his death. I don't want to watch him die, but I will also not allow him to do it alone. He misses me when I am not there and I have come to need that time with him as much as he needs me to be there. I feel guilt because I don't have the time, home, or resources to care for him. I feel bad when I can't make it by him for a day or two. I feel like a horrible parent and wife because everything in my life is lacking in some way. So when asked how I am, I say fine because otherwise I will completely fall apart.

I broke my son.

My beautiful, happy, fun loving little boy is broken and it is my fault. You see Alexander has always had a bit of anxiety. When you have an older brother with ADHD, ODD, sensory issues and possible Autism, you learn that life can be crazy and not always in a good way. Especially when that brother constantly threatens running away. Every time Nick would go into a fit as we call it, I would see Alex slowly inch his way to stand in front of the door in case this was the time Nick was really going to follow through. Well, it got better while Nick still has fits, he has stopped threatening running away. Alex is always worried about the dog running away because if she is off her leash she takes off, however she has always come back. The damn dog is afraid of her own shadow so she wouldn't get far. He has gotten better about that but you can see the effort it takes him not to panic when she goes by the door without a leash on. So here comes the part where I broke him. When I talked to my kids last month about my dad's health, I inadvertently added more anxiety to my baby. Ever since,  he has had extreme separation anxiety when it comes to me. He wouldn't even go on an outing with his Grandparents because I was not going and had made himself sick to his stomach. Now, it is rolling over to school and every morning he is sick to his stomach and close to tears. Yesterday afternoon he found out I would be gone all weekend and the poor guy was up all night with stomach pain because I won't be here. I kept him home from school thinking that perhaps it was a real stomachache, but an hour after the other kids were at school, he was perfectly fine. He ate breakfast with no issue and went back to annoying his sister. I called the school and got the ok to bring him in. As soon as he realized he was going to school, he had stomach pain, got extremely upset and cried all the way there. I offered to give him something of mine to keep in his pocket, but he said it would make him sadder. So like in the book The Kissing Hand, I gave his hand a big kiss and told him to squeeze it tight if he got upset and missed me. It took all the strength I had to make him go to school, but I know I wasn't doing anyone any favors by allowing him to give in to the anxiety and stay home. I am hoping that perhaps this weekend's trip will help with the anxiety when he sees me come home Sunday, maybe then he will realize the I am not going anywhere for a long time.

Hey there! Did you miss me?

Or should I ask if you even knew I was gone? Things have been well, hectic, although that doesn't really encompass all that has been going on in my life. My mom, my best friend, the person who I speak to on a daily basis has been very ill. She was rushed to the hospital on February 20th and has been there ever since. She has been diagnosed with Stage 4 lung cancer and the prognosis is not good. She already had COPD and Emphysema so her lungs were shot to begin with. I have been coping as well as I can. I feel like I am on the never ending roller coaster. Just when things start to look hopeful, she has a set back. She has had to be intubated twice and the doctors are now considering a tracheotomy.  I used to pray to God to save her because I want her around forever. Now though, I just pray to God that he makes the right decision for HER. I don't want to lose her, but I don't want her to be miserable either. She is a tough fighter and not giving up. She obviously has more things to do in this life because she has been on his doorstep a few times and he has sent her back home. She is looking forward to having a new grand baby to cuddle and love. I have a feeling I will be bringing this little one to the hospital to meet his/her grandmother, but at least they will meet.

I have about 4 weeks or less to go and I myself can not believe how fast time has flown by. I guess a lot of that has to do with the fact that my mom has been in and out of the hospital since September so I haven't really had a ton of time to think about it. I was just thinking the other day that I started my pregnancy years with a parent with cancer (my father was diagnosed with esophageal cancer when I was pregnant with my first) and now I will end my pregnancy years with a parent with cancer. They say God doesn't give you what you can't handle. Well, apparently he has a lot more confidence in me than I do. Besides the stress with my mom, my son has behavior issues and we are dealing with that. We also are no way close to being ready for this baby. Thanks to some wonderful friends, we have some already prepared meals. I did one load of baby clothes and have packed my hospital bag. Outside of that, things are at a stand still. I am just worn out physically and mentally and just don't have it in me to do much more than what is necessary. 

I saw my doctor this week and she put me on Zoloft for depression. She gave me a screening for depression and I apparently scored a little high. In the past I have been against meds for depression, bu t I realize that this time around  I need a little bit more help. To date I have gained ten pounds. We'll see how much more I gain by the end. I see the doctor again next week and every week until I deliver. I hope my little bundle of joy will show her/his mommy some mercy and come just a little bit early. I am already waddling and forget getting out of bed in the morning, that is a feat in itself. LOL I'll include the latest belly picture and some baby info. 

 Man do I look huge! It isn't me, it is the computer camera and my husband's sweatshirt making me look like that. 

Your baby is still packing on the pounds — at the rate of about an ounce a day. She now weighs almost 6 pounds and is more than 18 1/2 inches long. She's shedding most of the downy covering of hair that covered her body as well as the vernix caseosa, the waxy substance that covered and protected her skin during her nine-month amniotic bath. Your baby swallows both of these substances, along with other secretions, resulting in a blackish mixture, called meconium, will form the contents of her first bowel movement. At the end of this week, your baby will be considered full-term. (Full-term is 37 to 42 weeks; babies born before 37 weeks are pre-term and those born after 42 are post-term.) Most likely she's in a head-down position. But if she isn't, your practitioner may suggest scheduling an "external cephalic version," which is a fancy way of saying she'll try to coax your baby into a head-down position by manipulating her from the outside of your belly.

So the shock has worn off, now the worry sets in...

This pregnancy is no different from the others in the beginning. The fear of a miscarriage is in my almost every thought. I have never had one, but that does nothing to reassure me. I had three relatively healthy pregnancies, (with the exception of preterm labor the last one.) and I feel like I'm tempting fate this time around. Every little pain or cramp I'm positive that something bad is happening. sigh I know it isn't in my hands, but it doesn't make it any less scary. I won't stop obsessing over it until I hear the heartbeat, that gentle whooshing sound that is possibly one if the sweetest sounds in the world.

So I made a decision about school, I dropped one of my two classes. I was just worried that it would be too much stress to take two. It was going to be stressful to begin with, but throwing the pregnancy into mix changed things. My last two pregnancies resulted in me being sick all day long. If that happens this time around, I don't know how I would be able to handle two classes of homework, plus the kids, house, Girl Scouts and taking care of me. The last of course being extremely important. So, I'm taking Composition 101 which is basically a prerequisite for everything. I'm not giving up on college all together, my plans have just been delayed.