upheaval

Well I have not disappointed. I have continued to obsess. But things were, as things so often are, taken out of my hands. I left the blog to go to Wal Mart to walk off some nervous energy on election night. When I came home, ready to find out who the president was and then collapse blissfully into my bed - my father is coming out to my house (he lives next door) and saying that Husband needs to go to the veteran's hospital. It's a little over 2 hours from here and I hate going there. First of all, it's 2 hours away. Secondly - it's the middle of the effing night. Thirdly, I have to make a choice between my husband and my children. Fourthly, we have to wait up all night for them to make their minds up for what to do with them. They're unbearably slow at all they do.

The stomach flu he got on Halloween was either precursor to the gallbladder attack or the gallbladder attack was masquerading as a stomach flu. Whichever it was, he'd been sent home from work early for being decidedly yellow of skin and eye. And for all that noisy vomiting. Bad for business, you understand.

Daddy kept the kids, and off we went. I was exhausted, and the fuse that makes my radio work is blown - so it was fun trying to make it to the hospital without first visiting the ditch or oncoming traffic. Long story extremely short, he was admitted to the hospital for removal of the offending organ. First they had to do all manner of tests (the most alarming was the ultrasound where the technician stopped the ultrasound mid-swipe and went to find some random dr. and proceeded to exclaim and share knowing nods over the state of Husband's insides - and then leave with no explanation.)
They did an upper GI to look around and while they were in there, flushed a couple of stones that were blocking the duct to the liver, which was causing bile backup, and was what made his skin/eyes Simpson-esque.
They did the surgery the next day, and we were expecting the laparoscopic surgery, but it seems that this gallbladder thing had been going on for quite a while - behind the scenes - and his gallbladder was scarred to his liver!! So it ended up going into the enormous 8.5 inch incision across his abdomen, cutting through muscle and temporarily shutting down other organs and the whole nine yards.

Lovely?

Oh yes.

So he had nine days in the hospital. As did I. And let me tell you, I am of mixed feelings on this sick-husband-induced vacation from reality. On the one hand, I wanted a break. Like, maybe someone to offer to sit with my children for four or five hours while Husband and I went to do something fun, alone. I think a nine day severing of all ties with my kids is a bit excessive. I had never been away from the little one over night. From that to almost a week and a half is crazy. He didn't know what to think of us when we came back in. He was all shy and running back to my dad.
On the other hand...I got really used to the peace and quiet of the hospital. The return home has been hard for me on that plane at least. I guess it's good. It's let me realize how tightly I stay wound most of the time. I am probably more stressed than I should be, and it's mostly because of the noise levels in my home.

So now we wait more. Wait to see how long this recovery will take. Wait to see if Husband will be healthy through the process. Wait to see if he will keep full time at his job. Wait to see if we can make it through this financially. It is not good to have a six-week recovery ahead of you in the middle of a recession in a county with such a high unemployment rate, and factories shutting down and everywhere laying off...Merry Chrismas!

I feel so crunchy for not going out to look for a job. But he says, and rightly so, that it would be pointless. By the time I could find daycare and pay all the deposits and two months of daycare, there would be nothing left for the bills. So we wait.

I also am fighting with selfishness because I want a break again. I have been home all of two days, and I want a break again. I am so frustrated. I never realized how much I depend on Husband when he's not working. I depend on him to change diapers and fix cups and play with kids and read stories for just a little every day. And that little bit is all that has kept me sane. Now, I have the kids from wakeup to sleep - with no help. They're not so much trouble to need help...but they're on all the time, and I need a fifteen minute respite a couple of times a day to go breathe and remind myself that I'm a grownup.

Husband had been hopeful that his mother might take this moment of "family need" to remember that she has two kids, but it doesn't seem like that will be the case. She kept the baby one night out of nine, sort of accidentally. She got him from her daughter's house because she needed a break. My dad thought she was keeping him, and when I mention it, I think she felt guilty or weird or something. Bah. I don't know But she kept him. Then Husband's grandmother came down and wanted to keep both kids at his mom's house. The other seven days and nights, my dad had them.
The last day in the hospital, she called and asked if we needed "money or prayers", and he later pointed out to me that she was excluding herself from the kid watching detail.

I feel sad for him. I wish he was close to his family. He feels that absense so keenly, but he isn't close to any of them. I don't know how to help him.

My little world has been a little crazy lately, but I'm hanging in there. I would elaborate more, but this blog has already reached such lengths that I'd be surprized to find anyone still with me at this point. So I'll leave you with two last hospital ephphanies:

Pinochle is much harder to spell than to play, and I don't really get the point of it.

Houses of cards are pretty simple to build, and I have less respect for gravity since learning this fact.

Let It Be

Well, I did my thing today. Voted. And then I did my other thing. Obsess. I said I wouldn't. I said I wouldn't sit and watch the news or hover over the computer wondering who was winning and who was losing and getting hopes up and dashed and up and dashed as the exit polls try to predict the outcome with about as much accuracy as those late night tv psychics. I mean, they have a 50/50 shot at getting it right, but nothing is final until the last votes are counted or until one candidate or the other cedes the race.

I just can't help myself. I hate change. So I quietly panic until I see how things will go. I just hope whatever happens that things will start to look up for this country.

Other than that...went shopping today. Great sales. Fun stuff. Daddy bought dinner for me and the kids. Husband felt well enough to go to work. I am tired, and no closer to my answers than I was yesterday. But I feel sure I will blog later tonight as the election draws to a close.

For now I am hoping I can rest easy in the knowledge that things are out of my hands.

God Bless America?

True to form, I obsessively post a blog mere hours after the first. When I find a new outlet, I must abuse it immediately. 2:30 am, and I'm thinking about the election tomorrow. I always fear change, so however thoroughly Bush has messed things up in the last few months, he's predictably stupid - and therefore preferable to either candidate. Which, sort of, my dog would be preferable to either candidate. But that's another story.

I was praying about the election today. I know who I'm voting for. But my prayers lie in a different direction. I am praying that the best man will win. Not the one I like the most or the one who goes with my values. I want the man who will do the best for America. Don't mistake me - I'm not what you'd call patriotic. I am glad to be American and all, but that's about as deep as the red, white and blue run in my veins. But I know that we're in an uncertain place right now, and we need the right leader. I am not sure in myself that McCain or Obama is that leader...but this comes down to whether I trust God.

So I put it in His hands, and let it go. In a few hours I will go down to the polls and cast my vote. Then I will sit back and relax in the knowledge that God heard me and all things will work together for the best.

I always hate the "first" blog. When I would get a new journal, it was wonderful. I would have grand hopes for those new, white, blank pages. I would think giddily of the potential of this blank canvas for my thoughts. Why is it different for a blog? Maybe because there is no clear end in sight like with a journal? Maybe because I just hop right in with a journal because I knew they were my private thoughts, and with a blog, I know that it's there for anyone who wants to see - so I think I owe the web at large an explanation? Whatever the reason, it feels different.

This blog especially is different because I already have a blog. I just needed somewhere new...to formulate my thoughts.

So I was watching this rerun of Extreme Makeover Home Edition. They were doing this home for this woman named "Sweet Alice" or something. She lives in this place near LA where it's supposed to be a scary neighborhood. She's like an urban Mother Theresa. She feeds homeless people every day - not a soup kitchen, she feeds them from her kitchen. 20 to 40 people eat her food every day. On holidays she feeds hundreds. Christmas she gives toys to thousands. And this flood came and ruined her house. she's feeding all these people, and her own daughter is living across the street because the house is in such bad shape from the flood.
Long hour of tv short, this lady really gave me a slap in the face. When they gave her the new house and she was looking at it, it was not - wow, look at this incredible thing they've done for me! it was, WOW. Look at all the good I can do with this place...because that's what life is all about, isn't it?

And it made me think, again, what am I doing with myself? What am I doing for others? What am I doing for God? I am just living. Day after wasted day, counting my worth with loads of laundry washed and diapers changed. What am I doing? For what purpose do I exist?