Counting My Blessings

Copyright: Maggie May

This evening (Wednesday) at 6pm, I will be going to our local hospital for a CT scan. At first I thought I was going to be fed through a tiny space which I wouldn't have liked because I get claustrophobic in confined spaces. It might be because I would feel really out of control of what would be happening to me, as I wouldn't be able to escape if I wanted to.

I am pleased to say that I have discovered that it is not the MRI scan but the doughnut, a much wider piece of equipment so I will be fine with that.

I have to drink a pint of water before I go to have it and pour in a little potion that has been sent to me via the hospital. This will show up my digestive tract from start to finish. I will not get the results until the following Wednesday that brings us up to the 2nd of December.

All this waiting has not been easy for me as I am by nature, an impatient person. I like to get results...... I like to start things NOW!

I am having to learn to accept that this cannot be. I have to wait.

I am rather an unusual person because I have a secondary cancerous lump in the groin and no one seems to know where the primary cause is. It is unusual but not unheard of. Just the kind of thing that happens to us as a family though. Not straightforward ....... typical of Maggie May.

If the scan shows up something....... then I will start chemotherapy and radiation treatment straight away. If nothing shows up they will zap the groin tumour with radiation.

I can see that this is going to mess up Christmas either way.

My son is coming to stay for a week with the girls from the time school finishes till the time they fly to Japan for two weeks on Christmas Eve. My daughter will be coming to take over from him when he is away. (Poor thing, as though she hasn't had enough to cope with already.) There will be a bit of an overlap when all the family will all be together.

To try and make it more enjoyable for the children, my son Sam is buying a wii for them all that will be put upstairs in the roof. So that if I am chucking up in a bucket and losing my hair, the children will be having a good time up in the attic space and hopefully that will compensate.

Usually, at this time of the year, I am wishing the Winter away and longing for the Spring. Not anymore. Now I feel very much alive and living for the moment. Being alive seems much more precious. Everything now seems more lovely, more treasured, more beautiful. People seem more important, relationships seem much more meaningful.

I am living for the moment and am grateful for what I have. When you think there is a chance that you might die........ then everything seems to be more vibrant, enticing you to live. I took everything for granted before and hadn't realised the way I often wished my time away.

I have spent a good chunk of my life worrying about my old age. How I would cope if I was left alone. How would I manage financially. When you realise that there might not be an old age then it all seems to have been a complete waste of time. Living for the moment seems a much better option.

Today I can see and hear and move about. I can cuddle my grandchildren and I can blog. I know I am loved by so many people and that gives me courage to face the future.

I have to chose a picture now to go with this post. I'm not sure what it will be yet......... but it will probably be something beautiful.

A Certain Time Of The Year.

Hosted by Cecily and MamaGeek

This photo is very poignant for me and as you know, I don't normally put photos of family faces on my blog, even darkened faces. 

It is the time of the year that makes me think of my Mother. She died almost to the day, in the year 2001 and most of us were able to get to the funeral, even though we were all scattered about the country and in my son's case the other side of the world.

However it was several years later when we all got together on one of Sam's visits from Japan that also coincided with Deb's visit from the east coast, following a family event, that we all decided to go to visit my mother and father's grave.

Sam and Kaiko, with Amber and Millie, Deb and Rick and Dean, my brother and wife and their daughter and son, stood by the gravestone for a while. We explained to the grand daughters and grandsons about my mother and father and some of the things they had done in their lives. We explained how we were all related. Amber and Millie had not been born in time for my mother to see them and my father had not seen any of the four grandchildren.

Some of us decided to link arms, and stand in this circle, and Sam crouched in the middle with the camera. Some said a prayer or two and some just needed to do the huddle without.

I am in the bottom right hand corner and going  anti clockwise is my daughter, husband, niece, sister in law, brother and nephew.

It made us all feel we belonged and seemed to bring the family closer together, for that day, at least!

 

Photostory Friday is hosted by Cicely and MamaGeek.

Life Ain't A Bed Of Roses!

These roses are not mine. They are hanging over a neighbour's wall that I pass most days. I remembered to take my camera today and snapped them. As I walked by, wafts of lovely perfume enveloped me.

However, I am feeling like a rant! 

Life Ain't Like a Bowl of Cherries.........  and it Ain't a Bed of Roses either!

I read other people's blogs and I know that some of you are having a really tough time. However, we are OVERWHELMED! Overwhelmed by bloody cancer mostly! Most of you know that Harry is battling with prostate cancer and Rupe, my son in law has had brain surgery to remove a secondary cancer that stemmed from malignant melanoma from a tiny mole on his shin twelve years previously. Neither of those two can be cured and are being treated with drugs in Harry's case and radiotherapy in Rupe's case. Well that is only two people isn't it? No it is blimmen not! My sister in law, Gloria, had breast cancer twelve years ago and suddenly her arm is three times the size it should be and her shoulder hurts like mad and now it seems that the Big C has caught up with her again. What is going on? She is younger than me and her children are younger as my brother married later in life. She really doesn't deserve this. None of them do!

Strange how in both cases the cancer returned after twelve years.

Rupe & Debs (my daughter) were going through hell before the cancer struck and it looked as though their marriage was well and truly over. She was biding her time, waiting for the children to get older. Now she would be "The Big Bad Wolf" if she left him. However, he continues to treat her in a controlling way, wanting her to give up her job and monitor everything she does and he criticizes her continually so that her personality is in shreds. Well I am really upset about it. No one wants to see their daughter like that.

Oldest grandson is finding things difficult, and school wants to have tests done to see if he is autistic. I have wondered from time to time myself if he had autistic tendencies, though if he has, then it is not a severe case. Now he has broken his elbow, when he fell off his bike! Well that can be mended at least!

We had a good holiday, you may well think. Yes we did until Wednesday, which was half way through it and we decided to go to the theatre.  I was really enjoying a little family of entertainers involving children. I glanced at Harry and he looked really ill and I managed to get him into the foyer where he collapsed on me and became unconscious. He came round and was violently sick, everywhere! An ambulance was called and off we both went to Scarborough Hospital which is half way to Whitby and further than I could imagine. After waiting there for several hours in A & E, in very smelly clothes, it was announced that he had food poisoning, which I couldn't understand as no one else had it. We were discharged in the middle of the night, clothes stinking to high Heaven & I managed to persuade a taxi driver to take us back to the hotel and explained husband had not been drinking but had been ill. The hotel promised to get  the clothes laundered as Harry only had the one jacket & it was a good pair of trousers, too.

The day of departure the clothes were returned to me in sacks in the same condition as they were when I handed them in! That was a wonderful job waiting for me when I got home!

I wouldn't be surprised if you had all gone away by this stage! It would be understandable if you had. No one likes a Moaning Minnie! Well, that's how it goes sometimes!

I am going to call this place MOODY MANSION because there are so many moody people here at the moment. Well OK so Sam's house is not selling and he & Kaiko are still here and not living in the lovely little place of their own. But it is not my fault and there seems to be little sense in making ME the scapegoat!

I also would like to get a shower when I want and not have water flooding everywhere in kitchen and bathroom and to be able to give the washing machine a rest before it is flogged to death. Fortunately Amber and Millie don't mind being here and snuggle up to Granddad and me and show great affection.

I am thinking of having a plaque printed. It will be put on the porch door and will read:-

Welcome to Moody Mansion!

You don't have to be moody to visit here, 

But a sense of humour would sure help!

Quite honestly, if I didn't laugh I would cry at the situations I am finding myself in.

Our Japanese Invasion - and how we survived it

"Grannie, get out of this house, Grandad, get out of that chair, it's my house, my chair!"

Three year old Millie is going through a possessive phase at the moment and thinks everything belongs to her! Only six months ago Harry and I were living in our fairly large town house by ourselves. Pensioners, apart from my two part time jobs, living a quiet life, only pleasing ourselves, with nothing to hurry for, or worry about, in our lives (quite boring really!) - apart from the RAT, that is, but that's another story!

In August we suffered an invasion from the Orient! My son Sam and his Japanese wife Kaiko, five year old Amber and of course Millie, came to live with us. Coming from a bilingual family Amber and Millie could understand English well enough but as they had never lived here before they only spoke Japanese which made talking to them extremely frustrating as they could understand me but not I them! They soon learned not to speak to me in Japanese!

Deciding to 'up sticks' and build a life over here, they came almost like refugees with most of their possessions crammed into just two suitcases.

Amber settled into school very well and both children started speaking English at an incredible rate.

I would like to be able to write "and we all lived happily ever after" but this is no fairy tale. We are a real family with real people, each with individual needs and habits. At first, we all thought it was like a wonderful holiday but after a month or so, Harry and I felt shellshocked and felt a little bit like it wasn't our home anymore. We all felt claustrophobic, except for Amber and Millie who loved all the extra space they had in a large English house after living in fairly cramped conditions in Japan where space is a premium. Harry and I are really pleased to have the family with us and adore the children. Following some initial heated differences of opinion we have settled into a pretty good style of communal living and maybe after six months we are now much more tolerant of each other. We have grown used to waiting for the bathroom, finding a slot to do the cooking in our kitchen and sharing the car. Occasional nights when the children are wakeful means we are all wakeful, and crotchety the next day. Did we really mange to survive sleepless nights when our children were young? Suddenly we felt our age.

When I think about it, I feel we have really achieved something and I am very pleased with the last six months. There is no way Harry or I could have survived that long with our in-laws, not even for a fraction of that time, without a murder or two taking place!

We might need to get along well for another six months, but hopefully Sam will get the job he wants, buy the house around the corner and that will be the ideal condition for all of us. Until then we are quite enjoying our situation.