Proof and Motivation

Almost everyone I love or care about, suffers from depression, anxiety, addiction or substance abuse, chronic pain, chronic fatigue, or some combination thereof.

So, whether I would otherwise or not... I do too... It's different for me of course, but I do too.

And if you are in the same boat, so do you.

And if you are a primary sufferer, remember... those who love you are suffering through it too.

You may not see it, they may be hiding it from you, they may show it in different ways... and they most likely will not tell you, because they know you will just use it as ammunition against yourself.

And when you feel like you're alone, and nobody loves you... the fact that they are their suffering with you, is the most tangible proof you will ever have that you are loved and you aren't alone.

Tattoo it on your forehead if you have to, so every time you look in the mirror you'll be reminded.

Don't use it as an excuse to feed your depression and anxiety and pain even more... Don't use it as an excuse to justify the evil thought "they would be better off without me". Use it as proof that you're loved, and not alone, and motivation to drive on and live your life as best you can.

When you love someone... their pain, is your pain... And their "not wanting to hurt you" or minimizing or "leaving for your benefit" or anything else... I doesn't stop the pain, it makes it worse.

Use it as proof, and motivation.... it's the best that you can do.

Low Testosterone... It's not a joke, it's not hard to fix, and if you don't, it might kill you.

Since yet another friend has had this become a major health issue recently... And unfortunately, so many men still don't have good information about low testosterone, what causes it, and the impact it has...

Just a little primer for those who aren't familiar... It's a bit long, but it's the minimum to explain the problem... And it's important for all mens health.

After ages 18-24, 27, and particularly after age 35, and 45, there are substantial changes in average natural testosterone production levels, with lower shorter peaks in T levels, and longer lower troughs.

There are also changes in the bodies efficiency and effectiveness at taking up and using T in the bloodstream.

At the same time, the body tends to naturally convert more T into undesirable amounts of estrogens and other anti-androgens; as well as producing changing levels of Leutenizing Hormone, Human Growth Hormone, Follicular Simtulating Hormone, DHEA, and other hormones and , which impact general mental wellbeing, energy, focus, motivation and drive, muscle mass and tone, fat creation and retention...

...basically everything about your body, and a hell of a lot about your personality.

The higher your bodyfat is above around 14% (possibly as broad a neutral range as 12%-18%, but it appears that for most, the negative effects begin worsening at around 14%) the more testosterone production and uptake are suppressed, the less effective the body is at using the T it uptakes, and the more T is aromatized into estrogens and other anti-androgens (as well as all the other "good" hormones being reduced, and the "bad" hormones being increased).

Other illnesses such as diabetes and other insulin related issues can dramatically worsen this. As can thyroid issues, pituitary issues, excess cortisol, and other adrenal issues... Pretty much every endocrine disorder.

Also, if you have naturally higher levels of estrogens, for example if you are gynocomastic naturally (as a significant portion of men are, including me), this worsens DRAMATICALLY.

One issue that most don't understand, is that even a small thyroid deficiency... "Within normal range", but on the low end of the range, can HUGELY impact testosterone (and all of the rest of the endocrine system, your health, your energy drive and focus, and your wellbeing... "sub-clinical thyroid deficiency, should be eliminated from doctors vocabularies, because there is no such thing).

Also, what doctors regard as "low normal" levels of Testosterone, are essentially the same as 75 year old men. They are paranoid of the DEA penalizing them for over prescribing Testosterone, and are very reluctant to supplement someone unless they are persistently under 300ng/dl peak, and under 100ng/dl trough.

Testosterone levels this low, subject men to substantial negative health consequences, including dramatic muscle loss, fat gain, cardiac health problems, mental focus and acuity problems, depression (often severe), anxiety, personality changes, sexual dysfunction, sleep pattern disruption, developing or worsening other endocrine linked health problems such as diabetes, and substantially increased risks and severity of several forms of cancer.

These include a 50% or greater increase in the chance of developing aggressive prostate cancer, and several times the chance of developing male breast cancer. In general, low testosterone correlates with at least a 50% increase in risk of a lifespan reduced by at least 10%.

However, that isn't the whole story, by a long shot. One need not be nearly so severely deficient in testosterone to suffer significant negative health impact.

Testosterone levels under 700ng/dl peak, and under 300ng/dl trough, are not considered "low testosterone" by most doctors. In fact, they are considered "normal to high normal" for men over the age of 35.

However, at any age, testosterone levels persistently below 700/300, are low enough to make men depressed and anxious, lethargic and sluggish, lose muscle mass and tone, gain more fat, retain water, gain weight, have significant negative health impacts and complicate and worsen other health issues (as above), and generally feel like crap. This is aside from the common issues of loss of sex drive and desire, and intermittent or persistent sexual dysfunction.

You'll note, these effects are also those that suppress testosterone even further, driving it ever lower, in a vicious spiral.

By the time many doctors are willing to supplement, they have to work 3 or 4 times as hard, to get even above 300/100, never mind 700/300... And then, most are not willing to supplement enough, for most men to stay consistently above 300/100.

You have to insist on enough testosterone, frequently enough, to get your peaks above 700, and lasting at least a few days, and your troughs above 300, and lasting no more than a few days. You can force the issue with testing if necessary.

For most people, after the initial 3 months of supplementation (which may be at a higher level more frequently) that means injecting at least every 3 weeks, and may mean injecting every two weeks, every week, or even more often (though more than once a week after the initial period is rare).

It is also important to note, that once one has actually reached such a low level of testosterone that one is experiencing significant symptoms, or when one has bodyfat above 18% to 20% or so (and particularly above 24% to 28%); transdermal patches and gels are substantially less effective (in fact, they are essentially ineffective unless you have almost no testosterone at all) at raising available testosterone in the blood stream.

Even worse, they generally result in greater aromatization of testosterone into estrogens... Which actually suppress the action of testosterone even further.

If this is happening, raising your dosage actually makes the aromatization worse, but may show "sufficient testosterone in the bloodstream", on tests.

So you're counteracting the "sufficient" testosterone you have, and in fact making your symptoms of low testosterone and excess estrogens MUCH worse (especially the depression, muscle loss, fat gain, water retention, gynocomastia, sexual dysfunction, and increased cancer risks).

And yet, these treatments are also several times the cost of injectable T.

Unless you're skinny, with low bodyfat, and you aren't really very low on testosterone, you really need deep intramuscular injection.

Even with IM injection, many men on supplementary testosterone need aromatase inhibitors, to prevent the same issues with excess conversion to estrogens.

This is particularly true if you inject more than 1ml at 100mg/ml every 3 weeks, and almost without question if you have high bodyfat, gynocomastia, high estrogens in general, high cortisol, diabetes, or inject more than 2ml every two weeks.

Unfortunately, as with prescribing enough testosterone in the first place, many doctors are reluctant to prescribe aromatase inhibitors... Again, because they are worried about the DEA penalizing them, for prescribing "performance enhancing substances".

As far as the DEA is concerned, every man wanting to have their heatlh, sex life, drive, motivation, energy, and focus back to near what used to be... Is just another steroid abuser.

You have to advocate for your own health here. If your doctor isn't willing to do what is necessary, find a sports medicine specialist, or a mens endocrine health, or mens sexual health specialist, and they will.

You might not think it's worth the time, or the cost, or the pain of injections, or that it won't have a significant impact anyway... and it's just because you're getting older, or getting fat or... whatever justification you may have...

You're wrong.

I guarantee you, keeping your testosterone above 700/300, is worth every bit of trouble it takes to do so... and a lot more besides

The Real Victim

Stop calling people who commit suicides "Victims of suicide", They are not.

You cannot be a victim of your own conscious choices and actions. That's not victimization, that's consequence.

Victimization is an unearned and unjustified harm imposed on you.

Victims of the disease of depression and anxiety? Ok...

Victims of a society that has no idea how to deal with mental illness, and actively worsens it? Ok...

Victims of a "mental health system" that often seems like nothing more than a funding mechanism for a series of uncontrolled trial and error experiments? Ok...

But those who chose to kill themselves are not "victims of suicide".

The victims of suicide, are those of us who are left behind to suffer the loss.

Lessons From the Well Spouse - Part 2, Post-Crisis Exhaustion

Or, alternatively, if things are getting better why do I feel so horrible?

As I explained in the previous Well Spouse post, there are certain challenges in being married to someone with an acute or chronic illness of any type.

I realize it's odd to jump from pre-crisis to post-crisis but I'm currently dealing with this issue that no one seems to talk about. No one warns you about how bad you'll feel after things start to get better.

Everyone has their own definition of "getting better" as well as their own ideas about what constitutes the end of the crisis.

For me, my criteria ended up being two-fold: 1. that Chris's symptoms start improving and he starts acting more like himself and 2. everything in the future treatment plan be something we've already gone through and therefore know how to handle. Since the future treatment plan is "nuke it from orbit again if necessary" I KNOW I can handle what comes next because we've already gone through it once. As for Chris acting more like himself, his ambition is starting to fully reappear and some of his most bothersome symptoms are on the wane.

You would think that being out of the crisis would lead to elation. Well, yes of course I'm thrilled.

I'm also completely exhausted. I'm not talking "need more rest" exhausted either. Chronic exhaustion or what is now called mental or emotional fatigue.

I hate those terms. Mental and emotional fatigue doesn't really describe what I'm going through. Chronic exhaustion of the "have to drag myself out of bed" variety is far more accurate. Some would mistake it for a major depressive episode. It's not. I still enjoy things, I have ambition and motivation. I'm very irritated at my body's unwillingness to follow through on my ambition and motivation and my brain's complete fatigue.

So why chronic exhaustion, and why now?

I think it's two-fold. One part is simply the effects of being in crisis mode for too long. If you've spent a long time (in my case years) grappling with a problem and pushing yourself to the emotional and mental limit, you're going to be exhausted. At some point the pressure lifts and your mind and body say, "yay, now we can rest and the world won't end!" No, you don't get a say in the matter.

The second part is re-adjusting to life with less stress. Once the huge cloud of medical crisis lifts there's considerably less stress to deal with. If the crisis went on for a long time you naturally adjusted to that stress level. With the crisis gone there's not near as much stimulus or adrenaline or pressure. Life becomes somewhat boring. It's really not boring at all, you just need to adjust to your new circumstances.

What this leaves you with is systemic exhaustion combined with no compelling reason to not sleep for 12 hours a day.

So while you'd love to be out celebrating the good news, the likelihood is all you want to do is sleep and rest. That's fair. You need time to recover from everything you've done during the crisis.

I think I'm finally somewhat rested, renewed, and adjusted. It took a fairly long time (4 weeks) but I'm almost back up to a reasonable energy level for a pregnant woman. I'm not very happy with certain things I've let slide but now I can tackle what needs to be done.

I'm very, very glad to be on the upswing at last.

Mel

I'm Not An Optimist, I'm a Recovering Pessimist

Late last night I was talking with a friend who was dealing with a problem. He belongs to a club specific to one of his hobbies and this club has a committee that leads the club and deals with internal problems between members. One member has made false allegations against my friend, so patently ridiculous that almost no-one is taking them seriously. The supposed incident happened at a private home outside of club activities but an aggrieved party has taken it upon themselves to complain to the club leadership directly.

The leadership, being stuck in admittedly a sticky situation no matter which way you look at it, has decided that they'll take both sides of the story and then determine what to do.

This pissed him off. After all it's none of the club's business, it happened outside of the club between friends, they have no jurisdiction, etc... not to mention that he's offended that they're even taking the allegations seriously. He was so pissed, hurt, and offended that he could not see why the leadership could be taking this stance.

I pointed out that yes, while the allegations are ridiculous and yes, they have no "jurisdiction" they must as leadership make it clear that all such allegations will be taken seriously. They also must demonstrate that while allegations are taken seriously they will take pains to get the whole picture and presume no malice on the part of the accused until they finish taking everything into account. How they handle these allegations, the accused, and the accuser sets precedent for future incidents. Also, if they determine the allegations were made in an attempt to victimize the accused then they set precedent for dealing with false allegations as well.

In other words, the behavior of leadership didn't reflect on him or whether or not they actually believed the allegations. Their behavior is all about them, how their leadership is perceived (fair or arbitrary) and what they think will be best for the club as a whole. This has nothing to do with him or his friendships with the leadership.

At the end he thanked me for my "optimism". I contend it wasn't optimism, but instead harsh reality. I believe you can't make an assumption until you gather all of the possibilities and determine which is most likely (or test until you find the answer).

Gathering all of the options and weighing their likelihood isn't the act of an optimist. An optimist seizes upon what they perceive to be the most favorable scenario, much like a pessimist assumes what they perceive to be the worst scenario.

I'm a recovering pessimist and alarmist. I choose to handle my pessimism and panic by laying out of all of the possibilities and taking the scare out of the bogeyman. In other words I replace my fear and uncertainty with knowledge, hard facts, and odds.

Let me give you a real-world example.

The day Chris and I walked into the endocrinologist's office for the first time we didn't know what was wrong nor did we expect to have any more of an idea by the time we left. We expected blood tests to be ordered, theories to be raised, follow-ups to be scheduled.

We did not expect the PA doing the intake to find a thyroid "nodule" (the catch-all term for a growth of the thyroid of any type) nor did we expect to be sent straight down to imaging for an ultrasound. Yep, there it was. Definitely a growth of some type.

Our response (other than scheduling the biopsy) was to go home and do our research.

99% of all thyroid nodules are benign. Only 1% turn out to be cancerous. There's some good news right there, right? The odds are low enough that you can just ignore that possibility and assume the best, right? After all, the graph is really, really, comforting.

We can't be that unlucky, can we?

Wrong. That line of thinking is guaranteed way to fuck yourself up later if it turns out the odds are not in your favor. Also, leaving yourself with a vague bogeyman doesn't do you any favors.

Cancer is an extremely vague bogeyman. There's several different types with several different manifestations, several different likelihoods of survival, and several different levels of suckitude. Just "OMG CANCER" with no idea what it means in that context leads to reacting from emotion, not reality.

The key to avoiding pessimism is to react from reality, not fear.

So when I found myself left with the fear of OMG CANCER I knew it was time to dig a little deeper. Gather all of the possibilities and all of the data about the possibilities. Here's what I found out.

So what's the scariest bogeyman out of all of the possibilities? Anaplastic. Look, the worst possible outcome now has a name.

If it has a name, it has a treatment or a way to deal. If you can name the fear and make a plan of how to deal with it the fear loses all power. Also, by identifying the worst possible outcome you automatically turn everything else into a sigh of relief.

When the news that the biopsy came back "fibroid encapsulated mass with mixed papillary and follicular structure showing poor differentiation and grossly enlarged nuclei" almost everyone not involved was shocked at my reaction. I knew enough to know that almost certainly meant follicular thyroid cancer (cannot be confirmed by biopsy, only removal). While everyone else was going OMG CANCER, I was saying thank God it's not Anaplastic. I was relieved, almost giddy. I'd already memorized all of the important figures. 96%+ survival at Chris's age. Relatively easy to treat. Not going to kill him immediately.

When your named fear is a cancer that kills quickly and is hard to treat, finding out its a highly treatable cancer that 96%+ cases in the age range survive - now that's something to be relieved about.

Several people asked how I could possibly be upbeat, optimistic, downright silver-lining about cancer. That's how. I'd sought out all of the possibilities, gathered all of the knowledge, and developed that most elusive of mental states: perspective.

I fight my own pessimism and panic with hard facts and knowledge so I'm prepared for whatever happens.

When I lay out all of the possibilities and compare them and take the fear out of the worst cases, that's not optimism. That's fighting pessimism and being prepared for whatever may come.

Mel

Lessons From the Well Spouse - Part 1, Pre-Crisis

I've been a "well spouse" for 2 years now.

Actually,  I've been a "well spouse" for almost 7 years now. I never thought of myself that way until the cancer, but it was just as true then as it is now.

For those of you who aren't familiar with the term "well spouse" it's the common name for someone who is married to someone who is in some way incapacitated. The other person may be ill, have a chronic disease, a long-term injury or a disability, doesn't matter. What matters is that one spouse is unable to do what are considered normal and necessary activities and the well spouse makes up for it one way or another.

In the beginning all I really made up for was Chris's bad knees and lack of mobility. If it required lots of walking, I did it. If it required repetitive lifting, I did it. If it required crawling around the floor for whatever reason, I did it. If it required standing for any extended period of time, I did it. Grocery shopping, Costco, at-home oil changes, hooking up cables, hauling in groceries, laundry, whatever.

By the time Chris got REALLY sick I was already quite used to picking up whatever he couldn't do. It helped that he earned the income and could still lift the really heavy things, it's not like I was attempting to do everything in our lives by myself. I had more than enough time to make sure everything got done.

Not that everything got done. Certainly depression and anxiety and ADHD got in the way. But I could have gotten it all done.

I never expected to be in the position I've been in lately.

Knee problems are pretty predictable. Sure the pain can change from day to day but there were certain things I could always depend on. Chris would be smart and working hard. Chris would be fairly able to take care of himself no matter what.

Diagnosing cancer and going through cancer treatment is completely different. Nothing about Chris's symptoms is dependable. He can be completely awake and energetic and raring to go one day, and unable to move the next. There's no rhyme or reason, nor is there any way of preventing the bad days. The tasks he needs me to do change constantly.

Such undependability and chaos takes a lot out of a person. Worry takes a lot out too, as does financial stress and emotional stress. And then you add in a surprise pregnancy and...

Yeah. Exhaustion is too tame a word for what I'm experiencing at the moment. Completely tapped out is more like it.

So with that in mind, here's some lessons I wish I'd learned BEFORE the crisis.

1. Life is composed of creation, order, entropy, chaos, and divine grace. At any point the ratio of those forces can change. Just because life is humming along fine doesn't mean chaos and entropy can't hit and destroy everything. Conversely, just because chaos and entropy are kicking your ass doesn't mean creation and divine grace aren't coming around the corner. At any point things can change for good or ill.

2. Never, ever, EVER live at 100% of your resources. Obviously this applies to money, but it also applies to other areas. You have a finite amount of mental energy, emotional energy, physical energy, and time every day. You can borrow against tomorrow, but you CANNOT run at 110% forever without burnout. Also, your resources can be reduced at any moment. Lay-offs happen. Stressful events happen, sapping your emotional and mental energy. Stress will reduce your physical energy as well. Sudden illness or pregnancy can also deplete your energy levels. Oddly enough, crises and surprises also tend to require more resources from you while reducing the amount of resources available. Life's funny that way. Don't set up your life to take everything you have.

3. Streamline your life as much as possible. This means reducing your number of expenses, worries, and obligations as much as possible. It also means streamlining your work processes so that you're as efficient as possible. Sure you don't "need" to right now, but when you need to you will be dealing with other issues. There's no time better than now.

4. Now that you've reduced a much as possible, only add obligations that you can drop at a moment's notice. Sure you can handle it all now, but if you were to lose 20% of your time every day and 20% of your energy could you still handle it? Sure livestock farming looks like an awesome hobby and is fun for you but if you suddenly became ill could you devote as much time to it? Or would you have an obligation you'd be unable to meet?

5. Lazy isn't always a bad word. Laziness, not necessity, is the true mother of invention. You'll appreciate being able to devote the absolute minimum amount of time to life's necessities when you no longer have free time. Designing life so that you take as few steps as possible is greatly appreciated when you can't get further than 3 feet away from the toilet due to morning sickness.

6. Don't feel guilty or apologize for your massive amounts of free time. If you're healthy and life is going smoothly then you should have a ton of free time. You do not need to fill that time with something "productive". You are not "available" unless its something you actually want or need to do. You are not being "lazy" if what life requires is taken care of and you choose to indulge in doing nothing or only doing things you enjoy. If you ever have a crisis you will need that free time and miss being able to do nothing.

7. Specialization is for insects. Knowing how to do things for yourself can often save precious resources and prevent worry. Knowing how to pay the bills is important even if that's your spouses job. Knowing how to fix plumbing leaks is useful when you're limited on time and money. Being able to read the trouble codes on your truck can save you half an hour or more and a tremendous amount of hassle. Time spent learning how to do common household maintenance can save tons of time and money when you put the learning to use.

8. Don't tolerate toxic people, not even when you can handle it. The time to cut them out of your life is before you absolutely have to. When a crisis hits and all of your resources are taken up you don't want to waste a single resource on people who actively hurt you. Not even the amount of energy it takes to kick them out of your life.

9. Cultivate your enjoyment of the small things in life. Yes you may hate the girl in the office that gets excited about every.little.thing. Or look down on someone who squees over tiny little inconsequential things like getting a free mint from the restaurant. That is, until you're in the middle of a crisis and realize that being able to glean happiness from small things is an indispensable life skill. It may be that one day you'll be in the makeup aisle and realize that $2 worth of lip gloss lifted your spirits when everything else was going wrong, or that the best part of your day was homemade coffee with whipped cream. If you can teach yourself to be happy over small things you'll be much better off when life brings really bad news. When you have little in the way of resources left being able to bring yourself happiness using little is an awesome, awesome skill.

Mel

What's Been Going On

Those who’ve known me for a few years have probably noticed a change. I’m not acting like myself, and I’m even more scatterbrained and irritable than usual. Extreme mood changes are prevalent and I’m more contrary and combative. Also, I’m WAY behind on projects. There’s no excuse for not having the cookbook done, but there are reasons.

First off, the cookbook is behind in part because of a massive technological failure. The proofs, layouts, and software all resided on Chris's laptop. Chris's laptop's hard drive decided to fry.

Thank god we still have the pictures, and I'm a big fan of working out my recipes longhand.

The cookbook is also behind in part because mid-process (and a much more intensive process it turned out to be) the camel's back broke.

We're moving. We're not announcing where on this blog (many of you know already anyway) but we're leaving this goddamn hellhole.

Oh, we were planning on moving, in about 2 years. Then the bank merger happened and Chris started working 12 hour days so we decided we needed a bit more family recreation. Floating in the middle of a lake started sounding pretty damn good (what's that? my cell phone has bad reception here. sorry!) so we started looking into boats.

The weekend after we got Zoe we went looking at boats and eventually ended up at Lake Pleasant looking at sailboats. The kids and I started really getting into the whole idea at that point, and we spent some time crawling over a couple of MacGregor 26 sailboats.

In 110 degree weather.

Sometime around the finishing of the second gallon of water on the way home, Chris made an announcement. He was tired of living somewhere he couldn't leave the house 5 months out of the year, where he couldn't do what he wanted to do.

We were moving. ASAP. Actually, as soon as our lease ends on February 28th.

Only one problem. We're moving out of state. We can't found the company yet.

So no ISBN number for the cookbook.

The last reason for the cookbook being behind is extremely personal.

I'm emotionally ill.

The facade of having it together? Completely fake. Emotional stability? Hah.

Healthy behavioral patterns? Now you're just being funny.

I literally had a block in my head that said, "you can't do this. You're a failure, you'll always be a failure. What are you thinking? You can't do anything good. Everything you touch goes to shit."

HAD a block in my head.

I’m dealing with decades of emotional illness, persistently bad coping behaviors, aftereffects of abuse and neglect, and general insanity all at once.

Note I wrote “dealing”. Not hiding. Not pretending. Not suppressing. Not just trying to keep myself together. Dealing.

I blame Tahoe. I blame the lull in court action. I blame not spending every day worrying whether or not my children will have food or clothing, and I blame Chris for making that possible.

I also blame the bank merger, the stress of which drove Chris to consider getting a boat, then had us at Lake Pleasant in 110 degree weather looking at boats. This led Chris to declaring that goddamnit, we’re finally leaving this goddamn hell of a state. This led to me having a direction.

In short, I blame everything that has lifted my emotional and mental load to the point that I have the “luxury” of leaving survival mode.

I don’t think I’ve spent this much time outright bawling since my mother died. Memories are resurfacing; insights into just how badly I’ve bungled things and WHY are a daily occurrence.

Many of these memories are less than happy; when I told people that my first marriage was emotionally and mentally abusive I didn’t even realize how much I was UNDERSTATING the problem. Memories are reaching the surface that I’ve haven’t touched since I left; if I had, I doubt I would have had the presence of mind to fight for the kids. I’d be too busy off in a corner somewhere either bawling or completely detached from the world.

I’m also remembering how I got there in the first place, and how stupid I was to willingly walk into such a situation, and WHY. Understanding where exactly I messed up is ego-bruising, to say the least.

All of this however is a good thing. For example, I now understand why I think everything that goes wrong is my fault; one of the problems in my first marriage was my ex-husband's unwillingness to admit fault. Getting pregnant even though he knew I'd run out of birth control, refused to buy more, and refused to use a condom? So totally my fault. Taking the kids away from him? My fault, to the point that we're still in court to "punish" me.

That's just one example of the degradation and dehumanization shoved down my throat. My ex in-laws wanted to bring me "down to their level". Enough verbal abuse, emotional abuse, shoving into unwinnable situations, and isolation will result in complete dehumanization.

I think I got out just in time, and one of these days I'll write about how I came to the decision to leave, but now right now.

I’ve been trying to tackle one surfacing memory at a time and one breakdown at a time. Every day I feel a bit lighter, a bit more stable. A bit more human. It's been a helluva roller coaster, but I'm finally getting somewhere.

Thankfully my friends seem to understand, and since all but one came after my life started improving they’re a constantly reminder that things have changed permanently for me. The one exception I’ve known for 12 years and has been my best friend since we were 15 and she's been nothing but a help. Plus, when I think that maybe my memories are false, that maybe I'm exaggerating,she's been there to correct me (and very often tell me I'm not, it really was that bad).

Just KNOWING that all of this had a reason, that I'm not imaging what happened, that despite being surrounded by the insane I've got some kind of footing in reality HELPS. Helps so much. I'm starting to trust my thoughts, my conclusions, my judgments again. It's not that I was insane because everyone else was right, but that everyone around me was insane and wrong. This doesn't just apply to my ex in-laws, but to my family and the way I was raised as well. My parents made everything needlessly complicated, and formed a tiny little petri dish of a world that had NOTHING to do with the outside world.

Everything I ever learned means squat. Reality is so much better. Reality is what I knew all along, but nobody around me was willing to admit to.

Now that I don't think of myself as insane (or at fault for everything, or worthless), I see just how difficult I've made this whole process, and how soon I should be able to start shipping out. Cookbooks will be out before Black Friday, hopefully WAY before if I can continue to be this mentally stable.

As a bonus, for those of you who've seen the house, I've made tremendous progress is getting organized. I even found my Book of All Knowledge, the notebook my oldest recipes are written in, so THEY'RE getting added as well.

There is one last stress, however, and it has nothing to do with my mental and emotional state, but rather my father's.

Chris and I never wrote about the full circumstances of my mother’s death. It’s not that “death by infection and metastatic breast and ovarian cancer” isn’t correct; it is. The circumstances are just much more complicated than a simple diagnosis.

In reality, what happened to my mother was a mixture of her own procrastination and ignoring of problems, my father’s outright denial, the first hospital’s apathetic care, the second hospital’s apathetic care (minus one doctor), and the ambulance ride to the third hospital.

My mother was admitted to the hospital with fluid in her abdomen, and 6 weeks later she was dead. I've never quite gotten over the shock.

I watched her as the doctors did tests, waited forever to get results, declared breast cancer and performed a mastectomy. After months of not being able to keep food down (even in the hospital) she developed an infection, went into respiratory arrest, and died in the ICU. That's the short version.

NONE of this was unavoidable. My mother assumed the lump was a spider bite, even though it persisted for a year, and never got a mammogram.My mother spent months without an appetite and gaining weight without food intake. She hid her health problems from my father (and everyone else). Not until her distended stomach turned into a source of acute pain did she go into the hospital. Once at the hospital she refused to be "a bother" and attempted to make everyone ELSE'S lives as easy as possible.

Since my father believed her when she said it wasn't a big deal, my dad took her in, then retreated into his work. He wasn’t there to help her make decisions because he thought she was mentally competent.

She wasn't. She's been hiding her pain for months, if not years, as became obvious once we tried to untangle the business's finances afterwards.

I visited the hospital every day to see if she needed anything. She was almost always fine. I tried to talk to the doctors, but I could never seem to reach one of them. She always said they were waiting for tests anyway.

Until the day they scheduled her for a mastectomy, that is.

The day of I waited outside the surgical unit with my oldest brother. When the surgeon came out, he said it was worse than they'd feared. He estimated the cancer had been there for a decade.

All of a sudden my mother gave up the pretense.

My dad had no clue what to do, and leaned on my and my brother. Neither of us had authority to do anything. (As a sidenote, both of us now have power of attorneys for both our father and youngest brother, depending on who is more available in the situation).

My mother's recovery did not go well. She still couldn't eat.

The hospital tried to discharge her. She hadn't eaten for 4 weeks and they tried to discharge her.

My father and I fought the discharge won. The first time.

The second time he took her to another hospital.

Another apathetic hospital.

My mother lost the ability to speak. She started hallucinating. She still didn't eat.

One week later, we finally got a break. My mother's oncologist went on vacation and someone filled in for her.

This doctor took one look at my mother, one look at her chart, and transferred her to the best cancer unit in the state.

Thank God for University Medical Center.

Unfortunately, during the 2 hour ambulance drive she went into respiratory arrest. The paramedics managed to keep her alive (they didn't know she had a DNR) and she made it to the ICU.

I never had the opportunity to talk to my mother again.

4 days later my father and I made the decision to take her off life support. My father called my middle brother and told him to come down to see his mother; my brother said he'd be there in a week, they were driving and his wife wanted to visit friends on the way. My father called me, one step from falling to pieces.

Chris called my brother. All of a sudden my brother and his wife and kids were on a plane to Tucson.

2 days later while I was giving my father a break from her bedside, she passed on.

Afterwards I drove my dad to his guest room at a friend’s house. Picked up his things. Picked up my brother’s luggage to take to the house. BABYSAT MY NEPHEW BECAUSE MY SISTER-IN-LAW WAS TOO BUSY BAWLING OVER THE DEATH TO COMFORT HER HUSBAND OR TAKE CARE OF HER CHILDREN. Drove my father, kids, and nephew to my dad’s house. Called the pastor to make arrangements for my grandparents to be informed and for the memorial service to be held. Called all the other family members to inform them. Did the grocery shopping with 3 kids in tow so there would be food in the house. All in the day she died.

I made the cremation arrangements.

If it weren’t for Chris, I would have been a complete wreck. As it was, that month and a half almost killed me.

6 weeks of hell that could have been avoided. If my mother had been proactive in her health, if my father had taken control, if the first hospital had done more, if, if.

Chris “forced” me through the grief process, in that he prodded me until I dealt with and accepted my mother’s death. It was the kindest thing he could have done for me.

I’ve done my best not to dwell on it since, and to get on with my life. I could rail against the unfairness of the situation and seek out someone to blame. But I don’t.

That’s evidently my father’s job.

Since my mother’s death, my father hasn’t been quite all there. He spends quite a bit of time railing against the hospitals, blaming them for her death. When he’s not busy being enraged, he’s busy in self-pity mode.

In July (13 months after her death) my father went on an extended trip to his childhood home for a reunion. My aunt (his sister) and I hoped it would do him some good, and she did her best while he was there to help him through the process.

When he got back he seemed better, happier. I thought that maybe, just maybe, this scapegoat hunt he’d been on would be over.

A few days ago I called him, and he told me he was just about done with his project. He’d been going over everything that happened, and he was ready to take his notes and journals to the media and take on the evil hospital.

…….

I’m pretty convinced at this point that my father has lost it. My hope that he would ever come back to reality and be a father and grandfather? Well that’s pretty much crushed. I can accept that, I knew it was a possibility.

Then he told me he needed me to read everything to make sure it was all accurate.

Yes, my father wants me to re-read my personal hell from day one in order to pursue his own version of vengeance.

I can’t do that. My memories are horrifying enough without reliving everything, much less while I’m dealing with other resurfacing memories.

I don’t know how to tell him that I can’t do it, without doing what I really want to do, which is tell him to look in the mirror and he’d find one of the people responsible there. Then, if he looked on the shelf he’d find another responsible party in the urn.

I don’t know how to tell him just how much worse this is making things for me and the kids. That it’s not bad enough that at 28 I’m motherless, my kids no longer have a grandmother, my unborn children will never have a grandmother, that for all intents and purposes they don’t have a grandfather. No, that’s not enough, I also have my father attempting to destroy me (intentionally or not) by having me relive the worst couple of months of my life.

I am completely heartbroken.

So if I seem a little out of sorts, crazy, or otherwise not like myself, that’s why.

The good news is, despite all of this, life is getting much better.