holidays without one

well it is a week now since we buried one of us and it still feels kind of numb. maybe it will always feel that way. you have to go on but the blank spot shows up everywhere. preparations for thanksgiving are being made and I simply have no desire to be involved in any of it. Not totally because we lost kaye but so much is so backwards in our family. my dad and his brothers all did their rounds with alcohol and I guess we expected it to be different for us. 4 of our children are plagued by the disease. although each of them have IQ's much greater than most, they can not get the addictive part lassoed. I thank God my girls didn't get into the drinking or drugs heavily. My daughters 3 wouldn't even think about it at this point and amanda's 6, well they are still pretty young so I am praying that doesn't play a big roll in their lives. Joe has gotten into football and loves it and that gives him a reason to be very careful about any cuttin up with either. Right now the finances are the worst they have been since I have been with mom and I am looking for a job I can physically do and keep up here. I took the responsibility with no resentment or expectations from anyone. the boys are going to have to put up some funds for the running of the house. jacob is still working and in school and jamie is working at home depot. jamie is still not comfortable driving a vehicle and I told him, it is not a requirement, just a convenience. but helping him find work and apt and all where he can be independant in this world is a difficult task for him. their mother is not doing well. She now has a feeding tube and hospus around the clock so it may not be long til we have another leave us. of course we know no one has the promise of tomorrow and God knows what will happen next. The toll on mother loosing a child has really been something we all didn't expect. she's not perfect by any means(like all of us) but she has prayed deligently for her kids. I have to tell her that we had kaye much longer than most in her condition but that doesn't give her much peace. she does find some in knowing that kaye had suffered so much the last few years and will no longer have to fight for each step, each word, each smile, each decision. I put the wheel in front for a while and it will be gone soon. we have to go on. prayers for all Mercy for all  love to all

sister

what does that mean. it means even if they don't like you, they love you. they will be the first to tell you, you are wrong, praise you if you're wonderful and stand up and throw down if anybody hurts you. we have lost one sister to heaven. I have so many mixed emotions right now I can't even begin to understand them myself. I think I hurt sue more than I realized with a wrong choice of words trying to understand her better and I know she's kind a lost her best friend. she and kaye were quite different than the rest of us. they had to go through things and help mom grow up and help raise the rest of us. I kind a got tim when he was born but they were in a different zone. when your parents start out it takes a while to know what to do and as you grow into a family, you learn so many things. so they got the first hard knocks and the rest of us got it a little better because they were there. I appreciate the difference in their dreams and goals. mine has been mostly nursing everyone I could physically and emotionally care for. we had to go through the hardest time for our family in all our lives. we had to give up one of us.we have lost a lot of loved ones but this was so much more painful. she was only 63 and fought with more than many would be able, to hang on and stay with us, but she just got too tired of the fight. she told mom not to worry, that she was ready to go and was so tired. she fought a hard battle and with pete's devotion and determenation and prayers, she was with us longer than most in her condition.with the sorrow I have had wonderful things also. I looked at my little AJ as a man today. he and his wife joined the church. tiffani,his wife, was baptized and they dedicated their precious little new baby to God. laurie and her family came to the funeral home and they all looked so nice and loving as usual and I was so proud of them. I actually got to talk to my daughter,amanda, about the situations that purely broke my heart and do feel some better about her and my relationship. my grandson joey got offense lineman of the year at his school and is part of the team winning the regional and going to semistate now and he is so proud to be part of it and doing more than great. so with all the hurt also comes joy.  little scarey, makes me wonder if something else is gonna happen, but I will try not to think with paranoid and worrisome thoughts. now if my brother jimmy could come around . I worry about him so much. he's dug himself into a hole we can't drag him out of and is not coming to many of the family. he did not come to the funeral home nor will he make the funeral probably. it has been a hard year and I think he will feel more guilt than anything else when he wakes up. I pray god will have mercy on all of us. I don't know what will bring him back.well I gotta get some rest. very hard day tomorow. we have to say our final goodbye and leave her alone.prayers for all and god bless

oh the pain

I am so confused right now. About life, family, God, love.  My sister is gone and everybody is stressed and at odds, spitting out venom, that is totally, what has either been discussed at the round table or thought to be and definitly not what is. I have to say, I too have some guilt there. It's easy to tell someone else what to do when you haven't walked in their shoes. I just think they could all ease up on mom. If she don't respond to their wants, they throw out some baloney to make her feel bad. Why is it necessary for her to take that long drive to ekron. yes it would be less stressful and yes it would give her a chance to see the place her child will lie in rest, but also make a hard week-end harder. It's cold, she's sad and undone, hurt. sue said we wouldn't get off our lazy asses and go over there to see kaye. not so. we did go when we got the ok from pete and mom was able. many times kaye said don't come or pete did when she felt up to going and offered to sit with her while pete worked in the yard etc. that was a no too. she 83. arthritis,heart problem,stroke, bad bad knee. IT IS HARD FOR HER TO GET UP AND GO TO THE BATHROOM MOST DAYS and when she cooks, she does so through me. I get the stuff out for her, I get the ingredients ready, I get the stuff from the garage she needs and I watch the flipping stove when she can't cause she has to sit down. do they not understand that. yes we smoke but you get tired of being told you stink in front of their social friends or that your feet are dirty or your bags look awful or you aren't dressed right. I got a whole the size of a quarter in my tongue already.pete didn't want a mom person to go with him, he wanted to try to make mom comfortable with kaye being in BFE when new albany has been her home most her life and all her family are here.they said nobody visits the graves. well I got news for them. YES they do. It is not for the dead, they are gone. but some of us feel a bit of comfort just to go be as near them as we can and just remember and cry a little and smile a little. we aren't idiots because we do. don't anybody realize that all people are not the same. I do commend him on trying to make her comfortable to ease his stress but her mind won't change and obviously we have no say so in it. mother would not mistreat pete knowingly, ever and would jump square on anyone that did, just like her own. he is our own and has been since he married kaye. he has been dad, uncle, fixer, teacher, best man, to proms, you name it he's been there, all the girls have helped with kaye and I thought my job was taking care of mom so they could. apparently I was wrong again.I was denied even seing her in the er after i did cpr to save her and the reason was that I would spaz and tell everybody what to do. so I guess that's how my family sees me. not that I kept a bad thing from happening because of my experience and when I don't know, I research til I do and keep my mouth shut or ask relevant questions. they call the ole spaz when things get gritty though. oh well such is life. we all have those days when you wish you could crawl in a hole and just cover it up. first sibling gone. we are ALL out of sorts. god help us all

seven to six

It feels so strange to know that kaye is no longer a living breathing soul. She, had suffered such great horrors with her illnesses. I have felt anger, love, sorrow, hurt, insecure, and many other things during her last years. I didn't know if I had done the right thing when I yanked her into the floor and did CPR the first time. In my mind, time was still and she was not breathing so I decided in what seemed like an hour to do something. My mind was hearing what she'd said to me once before, "don't let me be like daddy, I don't want to not be able to take care of myself" but this time, I could not do nothing. they finally got there and started O2 and IV's and got her to the hospital on time to save her. 
she had Openheart surgery and was ok.  then the fall, bump on the head and now back to the hospital with more surgery for the brain injury she got with the fall. she'd told me before that she didn't think she'd live to see her grandchildren and see david happy.  so she did get to see those things. I can't say if David was happy, but he did try to help his mother and knew she was his best friend. it will be so hard on him. I love pete with all my heart but have been so angry at him over some things that I can hardly talk to him sometimes and through all of it, I respect and admire him for being so devoted and caring to kaye. His worst fault through it all was not allowing people who could help with some of the decisions to help. I am quite sure this is what my sister preferred as well.
she didn't much like him out of her site. He will be lost for a while. every family member I have cared for had a bittersweet end. I was lost, but unburdened, missed them so, but had to go on. left with a sad heart and nothing to do(so to speak) I guess I haven't been too close to any of my siblings since we all got older. I don't see or feel anything like they do. I guess the closest like me would be timmy. Jimmy and I are alot alike although he wouldn't admit it. but for one to be gone reminds me of the song will the circle be unbroken. I feel broken. 1/7 of the whole is missing. I hope she finds daddy quickly and all the loved ones we've lost. I feel I wasn't allowed to make things even a bit easier for her with my experience and that is what I could do best for my family and have learned through her illness that it may not have been what anyone wanted.  I wanted to protect them from idiots who paid no attention and I could get things done quicker and easier if I'd worked there and I had worked a lot of places. I couldn't be there too much because I wanted to be here for my mom and getting older and not being able to do more for kaye cut me to the bone. but thats what I do. when pete and tiff came over it sounded more like a business than the death and arrangements for my sister. no one was allowed to give any opinion or thought of what was to be and that was strange because everything was, even through disagreements, done as a whole. Tiff gets aggressive and says things sometimes that are very hurtful. may be how she handles stress. she hasn't had the benefit of a well mom and grandma so I suppose that takes a toll on you too. she is a good person but much like her folks. I love her and wish I could be there more for her and her kids too. you can't say how you feel cause mom won't allow even a loud voice let alone an arguement so all is kept quiet and pushed aside and covered up. so all of us try to keep the peace. I don't know why they are moving her body from the funeral home to the church. I don't know why she has to be burried way away from where her home has been. charge it. if pete is that bad off we would all chip in if need be. we certainly have before. I don't know why it has to be so stipulated instead of feeling like a warm celebration of her life. I know someone has to carry the ball and what I think or feel is not important but I would have liked to have been able to at least voice my feelings or opinion even if none of it was used or listened to.
she was this family and our sister too. it ain't like for the last few years everyone hasn't been involved in some way. but I think a little family meeting for those who wished to attend would have been in order to at least let us have some feeling of helping and quite possibly having a suggestion that would be relavant. I can't even write all I feel right now, I am so sad and I already miss my sister being there. I see my mother just fading and I didn't think she would have to lose a child. she's not perfect by any means but I have heard her pray each night and morning for god to protect and be with her kids. although I don't want to loose her I have prayed for god to let her gently go home before she had to loose a child. I didn't want her to have to experience that cause her kids have been her life. I know she will survive and I know god is the only one who knows the plan. I pray for god to let me be strong and sane until she no longer needs me. I look at my little new grt grandchild and think about this world and feel sad again. my children have had to struggle so hard for anything. a lot because I had to be the nurse when my family needed me. I saw too much to allow them to go to hospitals or surgerys etc without someone with some knowledge of what to watch for. I knew just enough to scare me to death and fear for my family but you can't explain that. I can't research fast enough to keep them safe. How do you instill that just cause the doctor or nurse says it don't make it so or good for a particular person, or if you do this or that it is easier on the person or not allow unnecessary tx's and rx's, and it happens all the time. like the sleep apnea test for mom the second night in the hospital when she had come in with an exascerbation of COPD and couldn't even breath hardly at all. how in the hell could it possibly be accurate. why put someone with horrible arthritis on bedrest. lack of exercise hurts both arthur and copd cause if you don't move about, you get pneumonia on top of the problem. Roy was continent of bowel and bladder. I left for an hour to go home and get cleaned up and come back to him in a diaper and couldn't even understand how to get help cause he was too weak. he'd called and got no help and tried to navigate an 8 legged IV pole into a 2 foot bathroom door and had an accident so incontinent was added to his dx and a diaper put on. YES, I went in and raised nine kinds of hell. that's what causes most elderly to become incontinent and get bedsores. how do I help them understand me. things are not important. I can not help how I am but I guess I have been a sourse of irritation for my family. I am very serious about most things and can be very funny and they don't see that often anymore. I stay away because I do not wish to be told how imperfect I am anymore. I am fine with myself. I feel very lonely sometimes and I am beginning to know my grandson charlie and he is alot like me and that may be why I couldn't seem to be close to him. he can't be still, is concerned about all things, and involved in too many to be great at them but is pretty good at whatever he tries. hes had broken bones and injurys over and over as I did and still do and just get up and go on. I realized we were alot alike. well I guess I have expounded enough to relieve some of my gut, so I will say my prayers, ask god to forgive me for being so hateful but feeling better. I do love my family so much. I know they love me but I also feel they don't like me much but it is what it is. we go on the six with the sweet memorys of the one gone.