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Trying to be supportive to recently-widowed mother while suffering from long-term depression myself
It's a month since J's dad's funeral and his house is awaiting being sold. It's odd driving into town and not going round to see him! J is 'okay' and 'fine' and hasn't said a word about his dad at all. Nothing! He appears quite cheerful and is busily getting on with life, so I just leave him to it and make sure he knows he has someone to talk to, should hell freeze over and he wants a Heart to Heart. Very heavily starched upper lip, has J.
Mother is on the phone every day, obviously lonely, and I do my best to be cheerful and positive and so on. #1 daughter spent 3 weeks with her, helping to catalogue 2,500 books (some of my dad's library). That was fine, but when daughter got home, it transpired she had been bitten by some monstrous insect and the bite was horribly infected: as in Jabba the Hut living on the back of her thigh. Many, many, many visits to doctors, nurses and out of hours surgery later, she has still got a packed wound and has twice-weekly dressing changes by the pracice nurses. The infection has gone (I think) and she can now walk again, so that's good. It was very nasty but she's a stoical lass (unlike her mother).
Son is due to start work at Mercedes on Monday, an induction day, so he's raring to go. Quite a weird feeling, my little boy (16 and 5'9 and still growing) being a Working Man. Life is all change, isn't it... No standing still.
Stepdaughter #2 is now 36 weeks pregnant and has got to the fed-up stage (I remember it well) and just wants the baby to arrive and for all to be well. She was on heavy medication when she conceived (unplanned) so we'll all be relieved to see Junior here, fit and well, God willing.
I am in the process of reducing my dosage of my antidepressants, currently on 20mg, down from 30, in the hope of getting rid of them once and for all. I was down to 10mg every other day, last summer, before my dad's cancer became terminal, and that was the end of that. I've put on about 2 stones in the last 18 months (probably due to my own idleness, greed and nothing to do with the drugs or the menopause, which I blame for everything). I'm a bit fed up with being flabby and round but am making a big effort to move more and eat less and hope that makes a difference.
I find myself quite down and disheartened today: despite a letter telling me that my routine smear test result is 'normal'. On this site, of all places, that is great news, and I am SO thankful for it. Memo to self: stop whingeing and start counting blessings. Not sure if the reduced-level pills have anything to do with it, but I'm very tense and jumpy and tired, and not a lot of fun to be with. Trivial things are upsetting me and I don't like it!
End of ramblings: nothing really wrong, except in my head. Just wanted to tell somebody.
Oh Minima ..... for one reason or another we all get those down days and to be honest, I think that you have had more then your fair share of it all round. It's not easy when everything is surrounding us and it can be hard to know which way to turn first ...... so not surprising that you feel a bit blah just now.
But, looking on the up side of it your ' little boy ' has a really good job to go to ..... just think, discount Mercedes perhaps ? I bet you feel so proud of him. Thankfully your daughter is recovering from that nasty bite, too.
A death in the family is always hard to take ..... I know that feeling well as I lost both my parents, but we cope and carry on.
Good news on a normal smear test result ..... and something to look forward to is the safe arrival of that precious new grandchild, truly a gift. So sending you some comforting hugs ......
Love, Joycee xxx
Thank you, Joycee. I needed that hug!
Sometimes it's hard to be me: mum, daughter, wife ,daughter-in-law, sister-in-law, stepmum, employee, friend... Same for every woman!
Oh no, now I can hear Tammy Wynette in my head..sometimes it's harrrrd to be a wummman....dum dee dum dee dum....
Many hugs back to you, Joycee and thanks for listening x x x
I'm here anytime you need, Minima ..... just give me a shout.
By the way, your list was a tad short ..... housekeeper, gardener / handyperson, childminder and general ' fixer-upper ' when needed ( oh, and sometimes a walking cheque book for daughters / grandchildren )
So now I have Tammy Wynette going round and round in my head : ) Stand by your man ...... !
Love and extra hugs, Joycee xxx
Just sending you a big hug. Not a lot to say to all that except we all have 'meh' days.... and don't let it stop you reducing the medication.
And get to the gym hehe.... you get o relax by the pool afterwards and there are only the odd one or two nutters around.... ;)
Biggest hugs and good luck to son starting work!!
LM xxxxx
HUGE cwtchs for you ......... meh days are crappy, but quite normal considering everything you have been through!!
Lots of love
Ems xxxx
You are all so, so kind and helpful: I wish I'd found you years ago, but maybe the time wasn't right and I wouldn't have appreciated you enough back then... Thank you so much for being there: it's a new concept for me and it makes all the difference in the world.
x x x much love x x x
Hi Minima,
I know I'm late getting to you but my feeble excuse is I've been doing my saintly things - pauses to bestow blessings all round - meeting and greeting newbies in my new role as a champeen, & really didn't mean to neglect my old ( as in "dear", not longevity) friends.
Well, now I'm here I have to admit to meh days and I've no excuse to offer! You deserve your friends and you deserve a bit of coddling now and again so consider yourself well and truly coddled. Funny, I fell in love with a Wedgwood egg-coddler on Ebay a couple of years ago, bid like mad for it & won it - and it's still sitting inside the kitchen dresser, in pristine condition ... oh the guilt.
Good on you for cutting down the anti-deps, but not too fast too soon eh? I'd just started cutting mine down to 10mg when I got that dratted diagnosis last year & went straight back to 20mg a day. Now I'll have to give it another go. And I still miss the fags, aren't I a pain? And tomorrow it's dental checkup day with hygienist thrown in for a grisly bonus - don't let me depress you or anything! Teeth have always been my Achilles heel. (Do I really mean that? there must be a better metaphor..)
Anyway, you can as you know always be sure of a warm welcome whether you're happy, sad or just meh. So don't be shy.
With love and hugs,
Twirly xxx
.
Huge hugs and lots of understanding Minima xxx
( I blame everything on menopause too, but don't tell the men that ) !!!!!!!
Love & lots of hugs
Roobs xxxx
Evening Minima
Just wanted to send you some more hugs
Glad that your daughter seems to be on the mend, that sounds horrendous, did they ever work out what it was that actually got her?? Does it have a name? We'll have to put pictures up all over warning people to stay away!!
Good luck to son for Monday! Is he nervous?
Like the others have said, everyone has bleugh days and you're allowed to whinge and tell us all about anything you want, you've had a proper manic time lately, so much happening, so you're bound to have up days and down days. Good for you for trying to move more, I always find that exercise gives me a bit more energy. Or maybe its chocolate that does that. Hmmm.
A new baby on the way is exciting news! Bet you all can't wait. Do they know what they are having?
Lots of love xxxx
Thank you, my lovelies (me hearties) for continuing to prop me up. Today has been a better day, thank goodness. Every time I feel a bit low, I forget that everybody does, from time to time, and I immediately suspect the return of The Fear and depression.
A colleague at work is getting married in our October half-term break and had asked me if I would take some photos at the wedding in addition to the official photographer. I assumed that this would mean J and I would be invited to the actual wedding (the important bit, to me anyway!). Yesterday we received our invitation but it was for the evening party, so I was a bit disappointed. I love weddings (I've had three of my own) but never seem to get invited to them!
J's daughter (the one who already has a little boy) got married about a year after J and I got together and I foolishly imagined that I would be invited, at least to the evening party, but no. There was a very awkward time when I knew I wasn't going but it wasn't etiquette to ask why not, and J wasn't going to mention it at all. It all came to a head one afternoon when he and I had visited his friends: the blokes went off to watch football and we women necked a large bottle of wine. Thereupon ensued a 'conversation' of great emotion and weeping & gnashing and so on, which shook J good & proper, he of the stiff uppers and keep calm & carry on. He claimed, rather feebly, I thought, that he hadn't realised that I might want to be there to see his first daughter get married, and was allegedly shocked at how I reacted to being left out. The thing that really got to me was that nobody EVER said anything: I felt that I was so insignificant that nobody had thought for an instant that I might mind. It's their anniversary tomorrow or Tuesady, and J has got them a card, as he does every year, and every year I remember my little Cinderella moment...
About that time, my divorce from Alky dad came through, and J was in the throes of telling me we couldn't live together: I had my 3 kids (his all grown and gone) but he was my boss at school and he didn't want to move into my house in the town where school was and couldn't afford to buy anywhere for us all and he'd already bought a tiny house for himself... And every so often he would bring himself to talk to me (usually after a considerable amount of red wine) and would sorrowfully declare that he wasn't sure if he loved me 'enough'... So I reacted in the only way I knew how, and promptly had a breakdown. Months off work, counselling (didn't work) then cognitive behavioural therapy with a stellar Israeli female psychologist, who did an excellent job, and helped me metamorphose into the well-adjusted woman you read before you.
So the non-invite yesterday struck a chord, for a little while. Then, with a little help from my friends, I Got A Grip and remembered to be pleased to have been invited to S & A's wedding at all, that J was a numpty when his daughter got married, and Not Right In The Head after a putrescent marriage to a Vile Harpy who made him a bit weird. And, basically, Fuck It. None of it matters. And for the record, I am a Model stepmother to J's daughters and have been sweetness personified All The Time to them. And for that wedding years ago, I made a rather nice cross-stitch sampler, because that's the kind of person I am. Ha.
And as a very long response to something The Wise Cruton said, the 'down' of yesterday didn't last long, and I haven't gone into a decline, and I am ok. Just like a normal person, then. Almost. And I love my mac friends/sisters/brothers. x x x x x x x
Lots of blah around at the moment - well, there's you and me, and that's a start. Best not wish for excitement, though, you never know what you may end up with, and I think your daughter's infection was enough excitement for a lifetime. Or at least a couple of weeks, anyway.
Hurrah and good luck to your son!
You take my antidepressants from my cold, dead hand, in fact, I'm thinking of increasing my dose. And thus the universal equilibrium is restored.
xxxx