Tuesday, April 20, 2010

It's Raining in My Heart

I've been walking a fine line lately, the one between sadness and chaos. Alternating between feeling I should post here, but also being so private that I only want to post happy thoughts. Things aren't always happy, and the struggle to maintain wears us down, does it not? Sometimes the struggle for life just doesn't seem fair.

Because of life choices I have made, I have for many years lived far away from family members. I've been removed from their lives and they from mine. I have missed a lot, seeing nieces and nephews, and subsequently their offspring, grow up. I've found as I've gotten older, this matters more to me than it once did. Oh sure we see them several times a year, but the day to day stuff is what I miss. I feel like I am always on the outside, looking in. Hub has the same situation with his family.

I know how fortunate I am, at my age, that my parents are still living. However their quality of life has deteriorated the past few years and the reality of their ages has struck me. My father is 95, but has always had the vitality of someone 30 years younger. He has outlived all his brothers, and most of his friends. In my heart, I thought he would live forever, but in my mind I can see that he is not going to. Due to a fall three weeks ago, he has had a hip replacement, a week in hospital, two weeks in rehab, and now has been moved to an "assisted living" facility. My mother, who is 87, is not physically able to care for him on her own, but feels she can, so she wants him out of there and back at home. He is a fall risk, so this entails having 24/7 home care. There are so many decisions to be made, and my sister has had the burden of handling them because she lives nearby. We talk every day, but I need to get there as soon as I can, to be able to help out.
Since I have a bad shoulder, I cannot lift things, so what can I do in that regard? Just being there should make us both feel better, I hope so. The stress of other things in my life right now has caused my shoulder and back pains to get worse. Yikes.... One thing just leads to another, always. I've done very little artwork of late, and that is another thing that makes me cranky. So I am going to try to find a window of time to do a few artsy things today. My journal pages of late have been pretty dark and NOT artsy!

2 comments:

  1. HB and I are in the same boat when it comes to family. We live far away from almost all of our families with the exception of one of my cousins and her family.

    It does seem to get more unacceptable the older I get but then the question is which family member would I move closer to....they're all spread out around the country! I could move and then still only be close to one family member. It isn't easy when you have parents who need you. I'm sorry to hear about your father. I hope he is doing ok. I thought the title of this post was so perfect for what you described....it has rained in my heart many times, too.

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  2. We went through a similar situation with Gary's father and I took care of him in our home for seven years because he had dementia; it took its toll on both of our healths, now neither of us is in good shape. Plus Gary's sister did nothing to help out at all. Then having to sell our house we worked so hard on and move across the country took its toll on us too, we are finally just starting to get back to normal and my back isn't hurting so much. Going to a few places like a festival and the river and working in clay is slowing healing me. Stress can really make things a lot worse for sure and I know if I hadn't of had clay I would have gone off the deep end. All of my family (mother, father, sister) except my brother has disowned me and the stress of dealing with them and all their game playing was worse than not having them in my life, but it is still very sad to me. If you can - try to set aside some time each day for some art and once a week for a fun outing I just know that would help, it has truly helped me and helped Gary too. I'll be thinking of you. Can you send me your address and phone number, emails on my laptop were somehow deleted when I wasn't thinking clearly a few months ago and I'm now trying to reorganize myself and my life. Thanks; I sure hope your father improves; I know if there is anyway he can be back at home, that is best.

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