Mom

Yesterday was emotionally draining. I spent the better part of the day at the ER with my mom. Not that it was physically demanding, really I was just sitting there, but to see her so old and frail, tired and worn out, it was just another reality that my wonderful mom is passing away.

My sister called to tell me Mom was transferred from the nursing home to the ER. She couldn't make it up there and was worried that they might put her on a ventilator (something my Mom really does not want). Hearing that of course I think that she is very bad off, and I offer to go there to be with Mom and make sure the Drs don't do anything she doesn't want. I get a little teary telling my husband Jonny what is going on but hold it together. All the way to the hospital I am thinking..."this could be it. I could be the one making it possible for my mom to die". From what the nursing home had said my Mom could not breath and her O2 stats were very low. Of course I was not expecting her to be sitting up in the bed talking to the nurses when I walked in the ER room. Happy that she was...yes...relieved...very! They had her on some oxygen and she was doing very well. After the chest x-ray confirmed that it was pneumonia they gave her a diuretic and she started breathing better and her O2 stats went back up without the oxygen.

After sitting there and watching her Stats for about an hour they decide to send her back to the nursing home...Good. Better for her to be there rather than in the hospital. What made me upset was that the EMT's bring her in and place her back in her bed and no nurse is around to make sure she is all set, in need of anything, or even to help the EMT's (who, by the way, are fantastic!). I came in and my poor mom is wrapped up like a mummy in three blankets and looks at me with her weary eyes and says "I really have to pee!" Do you think I could get a nurse to come to her room? Nope! I rang the bell on her bed and then the little old lady next to her kept asking me to bring her to the bathroom. So, I rang her bell...still nothing...now the both of them are really needing to go to the bathroom. I walk down the hall to the nurses station. Three of them are standing around, chit chatting (about what I am not sure, it could have been a patient). I inform them that 2 ladies have to use the bathroom pretty badly, could we get some help. Instead of one of them coming to help, they look around for a LNA. Is it beneath a RN to bring people to the bathroom?! God I hope they don't think that way, especially working in a nursing home.

Holidays and Horrible days

I do love the holidays. The music, the lights, the excitement...but then some of these days turn just horrible. Really, I have been having a hard time at home with my kids and husband. Most days, one if not more of us are so miserable it turns the whole family into grumpy Guss'. Understandably, the kids get over stimulated, Jonny is on edge because of money and I just am a miserable person (apparently). Some people feel that way about me. I usually feel like I am a good natured person...

On to other news...The kids are growing by leaps and bounds. Ryan needed a little help with reading and spelling so he has been in a tutoring program at his school. It seems to have helped but his teacher would like him to do one more session. I am torn about it...He is at school from 9 am to 4:30 pm on the days he has Academy (M, T, W). I notice the on Wednesday he is a little grumpy and worn out. Is that worth it if it is getting the help he needs so that he doesn't struggle in school...Probably. Ryan has also been having a really hard time with not getting his own way and everything being "unfair" to him. I am not sure where this is all coming from but I will keep working on it with him.
Griffin is just Griffin. He loves school, his friends, and his trucks. Griffin has this love of trucks that I have never seen before. He will sit at the table and drive his little trucks around, loading and unloading for hours. He has his little quirks...he whines all the time and is very sensitive about being physically hurt and getting his feeling hurt. But overall he just goes with the flow.
Zachy of course is still the little devil. I swear he has horns growing. He can be sweet and funny and loving, but then will turn around and do something that he knows is wrong. He does naughty stuff all day long. From getting into the dog food or toilet to climbing on the table and pushing every button in our house. He is also going through this temper tantrum stage. When he gets mad he will throw himself on the floor and/or bang his head on anything near him. We have started using time outs which work for now.

Terribly Sad

Right now I am feeling terribly sad. I have this dilemma that I just don't know how to deal with. Let me start by saying I have never left Zachary with anyone other than family. And when I say family it is just a couple of them. I am not comfortable leaving my children with anyone, I chose to have them so I should not "pawn" them off on other people. I understand that I need to sometimes and it is healthy to leave them with others. Anyway, I have been thinking about bringing the big boys (Ryan and Griffin) to the bowling alley or driving range. Which we know from experience that the bowling alley is no place for Zachy...

I would love to leave him with someone so I can spend so time doing these things with the big boys. They need more of my attention, since Zachy gets so much of it lately.

But the problem is...Courtney (who is my niece that almost always watches Zachy) got a job and will not be available to me. My sister is so obsessed with her dogs she can't seem to keep her mind straight enough to watch the kids. And my MIL is just "too busy".
What makes me so sad about all this, you ask. My sister used to watch my boys a lot. They loved going to her house, but she has taken this strange turn in her life and is so whacked about her dogs it is so uncomfortable to be at her house. The dogs have the "right of way" in the house, to the point that they come out of the pool soaked and jump up on her couch to dry off. This leaves no where for the humans to sit. Not to mention her younger dog, Daia (which is no longer young enough to be considered a puppy) has no manners. I just don't like that Daia is "allowed" to jump on, nip, and slobber all over my baby. My sister never disciplines her and seems to think it is the kids fault that Daia is all over them. To top it all off I don't feel that Zachy would be watched well by my sister because she is so overly concerned about her dogs she may neglect to see a danger. He may wander outside, because the door is always left open for the dogs, and find his way into the pool and she may never notice. I am so sad that my sister puts her dogs before anyone else, not just my boys, but her own grandsons.
Secondly, I am sadden because my mother is so old and ill she can't watch my boys. When she is in her right mind (she has dementia), she would love to have the boys. It kills her that she can't take care of them. When I was young she always had my nephews and nieces over. She babysat for everyone and honestly I don't ever remember her saying she was "too busy" for her grand kids. My MIL on the other hand is more often than not, just too busy to babysit. And when she does babysit it is always will stipulations. We have to be home by this time or she can only do it at her house and it is usually just the older boys. Honestly I don't know if she can handle Zachy. I can't remember the last time she babysat Zachy. I think it may have been when he was 6 weeks old and I was in a wedding. It just makes me so sad because my mom would love to watch them, if only she could.
Now this may seem petty. Like I said it was my choice to have kids so I shouldn't expect people to babysit for me. My MIL has raised her kids, it is not her "duty" to babysit. My sister has every right to choose to put her dogs first priority. And really, it is about time that Courtney has a job. It just makes me so sad that I don't have my mom ready and able to help me, like she was for my sisters and their kids.
I wish I could put aside my issue about strangers watching my children just long enough to get to know someone outside the family. It would certainly make my life a little easier in the long run.

Oh the Drama!

I can't even begin to tell you the drama I deal way too often. Let me try to explain this one as nicely as I can. Easter plans were changed do to the fact that Griffin was sick. Jodi did not want Griffin around baby Jacob for fear he would get sick. Understandable? Yes. A little paranoid? Maybe. But that isn't the drama. I had no problem staying home with Griffin. But after talking to Jonny and the boys we decided it wasn't fair that Ryan and Jonny get to go to Easter at Grammies and Griffin had to stay home. So, we all would stay home. As we tell Jonny's mom (Lynda) she gets upset and tells us that Jodi changed her mind and wouldn't mind us going down even with Griffin being sick. Not that I didn't believe her but I told her I didn't want to bring Griffin and have Jodi be worried and uncomfortable the whole day. Jonny and I then come up with a great idea that we would do Easter dinner and the egg hunt on Monday. The boys were thrilled because the still get to go to Grammies and Jodi won't have to worry about Jacob getting sick. Everyone, including Lynda seemed content with the idea. So off we went to celebrate Easter at my sisters house with my large, rather crazy family. Now, we had a blast (other than my sisters puppy endlessly jumping on Zachy and scratching his face), dinner was great the boys played outside with their cousins and we had wonderful conversation. Not once did we think about bad feeling surrounding Easter at Lynda's. When we get home it was another story...we walk in and find that Lynda had brought all the boys Easter presents including the eggs for the hunt on the kitchen table. The boys got upset...they were not happy to have their stuff here. They wanted to go to Grammie's in the morning like we had planned. To me and Jonny it was kind of a slap in the face. Jonny was upset and angry. Does it end there? Oh no! Ryan calls Grammie because he wants her to come pick up the eggs and hide them at her house so they could find them in the morning. Jonny then speaks to her and she tells him we were overreacting. WE were overreacting! I don't think so. We just did what was asked of us, keeping Griffin away from Jacob. Somehow along the way we became the bad guys. Not that there was anyone involved that should have been "the bad guys". But there we were...the ones that were overreacting and messing up Easter. For some reason, Jonny's family likes the drama. Instead of just being happy we could do it another day, the drama had to be brought in. So today when we were supposed to be at Lynda's eating and watching the boys find eggs, we are home, angry because we have to explain to the boys that Grammie is not in the mood to have us. I just want to scream "stop the attitude and drama and lets just live".

This story may seem minor, but this is always what happens. Plans change and send the Melen'stale spin. And Jonny says my family is crazy. Well we are, we just don't let the little things effect us because we have to deal with the big things. into a

Hello????

Sorry, another bitch fest. Ryan and Griffin are driving me nuts. Ryan used to have a lot of common sense for a 6 year old. All of a sudden he has none. I think when they go to school and start learning academics they lose their common sense. Must be not enough room in that little skull for all the info. For some reason he thought it would be fine to glue small pieces of wood together on the carpet in the living room...WTF! So I stop him and ask "Do you think that is a good idea?" "No" he says to me. I ask him why. He tells me it would make a mess. So, if he knew that why would he do it. I tell him to go in the kitchen and he proceeds to show me the glue isn't coming out well and what happens...All over the carpet. Again, WTF!! He just told me it would make a mess. I don't know, maybe I expect too much from him.

Then Griffin...Lucky he is cute or I would ship him off. I am up stairs trying to nurse Zachy and lay him down for a nap. He is at the stage when he hears something he has to look so he hasn't been nursing well. I have told the boys not to come into Zachy's room when I am nursing him unless someone is bleeding or the house is on fire. So, Griffin, comes in which I am not thrilled with but he is being quite. Next thing I know he is talking to the dog in the annoying baby voice he uses. I tell him to go down stairs but it is too late, Zachy is up looking around. I still try for the nap and lay him down. After a lot of crying (Zachy not me) I go back upstairs and try to nurse him again. I know (now that I am writing this) it doesn't seem like a big deal but at the time I just was at my limit.

Now Ryan has his friend over (Dillon) who is a very sweet boy. Ryan just has a hard time sharing his friends. It could be a long afternoon. Soon both boys will be on Christmas break for two weeks. I have a feeling it is going to be hard. I will have to schedule a lot of play dates for them.

Now I am off to make lunch.