Mommy Moments

So I developed a bulls eye rash from a tick bite today, living in Loudoun County you know thats never a good thing. But Before everybody starts sending me Lyme’s Disease literature let me say I have already made an appt with my Dr. to get on the antibiotic regimen and let me assure you I am fortunate that she is actually one of the leading Dr.’s in the Country on this topic. If it develops into anything I’ll let you all know but for now its 3 weeks of antibiotics for me (or whatever the latest protocol is).

But the reason for my writing today isn’t to tell you my health concerns but talk about my total break down this morning after I found the Bullseye. You see this is one of those Mommy Moments, one of those moments where I would text mom and tell her what I found. She’d make a joke, then ask me to send a picture, then say yea that doesn’t look good…LOL! Then she’d tell me to make an appt. with Dr. Walsh and ask me if I wanted her to go with me, which I’d say no I’d be fine. Then she’d text Shawn to check on my state of mind and probably show up anyway. Then she’d go back to sending me a bunch of silly GIF’s about ticks and tell me it was all gonna be fine. And then I’d feel fine because she told me it would be okay.

So with all that you can probably understand my break down. I have none of that today! I actually considered just texting her anyway (until this moment I never understood when people said they did stuff like that when a loved one passed), but then I remembered I shut her phone off and I’d probably get some message back saying it didn’t go through and that wouldn’t be good either.

Damn I miss my Mommy!

Another First….Valentines Day!

OK for some this one might not seem like a big deal in the firsts department and really on the grand sceme of things I was kinda surprised how hard today hit me too. Maybe it hit me hard because I’m getting closer to wrapping things up…. Yesterday I went to the Courthouse and was named Administrator of her Estate (which means I can now take care of those stupid car people), my To Do List for her is getting shorter, and the house is coming along in terms of getting it packed up (except for The Ear…oh wait till I get to The Ear story). Things are starting to feel much more final and I’d be lying if I didn’t confess without a Mom To Do List I worry I might forget about her for a day. And the thought of that starts the waterworks again.

But as I reflected about why today was so hard and I shared my thoughts with my Inner Circle about missing her today somebody pointed out that from their perspective my Mom was big on holidays with me and that they thought she used them as an opportunity to show me how much she loved and appreciated me. Well, that hit me like a ton of bricks and as I thought about it, that statement seems pretty spot on. Especially when you factor in that my Love Language is Giving Gifts (If you aren’t familiar with Love Languages I recommend you Google it after you are done reading this, trust me its eye opening).

She really was the original Best Gift Giver and I’m pretty sure Gift Giving is my Love Language cause of her. Like me, whenever she was anywhere and she saw something that reminded her of somebody she always bought it so she’d have it for that special time when she needed it for them. Maybe that was for a Birthday or Holiday, but more often then not it was just because she wanted them to know she was thinking of them and she knew it would brighten a day. I remember in October of this past year her declaring she was done with her Christmas Shopping because she had been shopping throughout the year. BTW, I know that was a lie cause I didn’t even make my Birthday/Christmas List (yes, I still make a list and hang it on the fridge) till Thanksgiving and there was stuff on my list she got me. So Ha Mom, bet you thought I didn’t put two and two together LOL!

I think the other reason today was hard was because her and I were so much alike, we had so many similar views and we were always talking and texting every day about stuff. On a day like today we would have discussed how ridiculous it is that flowers cost so much on Valentines Day and how everybody should buy flowers at Costco, we would have talked about the cards we almost bought each other, we would have sent each other pictures of what cool trends were happening for Valentines, and we would have laughed at the over the top gestures of love we saw on Facebook . We also would have both said we shouldn’t have eaten the chocolate Shawn gave us but we’d get back on our diets tomorrow, LOL. You see she wasn’t just my mom and we didn’t just talk once a day to check in, she was my Best Friend and we talked all day every day about everything and thats why today and everyday seems just so hard. Because I no longer have that one person in my life I can talk to about EVERYTHING!

So here I am on my First Valentines Day without her thinking what is the lesson I take away from today what would she want me to remember or share with the world as I write this. And I think it all just leads back to what Valentine’s Day was for her, a day to make sure the ones you love know you love them.

I Gotta Try!

So I declared it this morning… I’m gonna start knitting or at least try to learn. I know I know, I have enough on my plate but something is saying I need to do this. And a few of you know I may have tried learning to knit on a bus trip to NYC a few years ago and I wasn’t super successful at it. In fact the scarf/blanket/whatever it was suppossed to be that I had started, I showed my mom and told her when I was done I was going to give it to her. She smiled in her “oh dear that is so sweet” kinda way (you know the I’m being polite but how do I tell you this…) and said oh no you should keep it, its your first one. LOL, my feelings weren’t even hurt that she thought it was a big disaster cause I totally knew it was one too. Plus she probably also knew I’d decide knitting wasn’t my thing (I didn’t have the patience for it), which of course I did pretty shortly after starting that whatever you want to call it. To this day that project is still sitting in a Jeffrey Gale basket in my family room along with the last knitting piece she was working on when she died and some bits of random balls of yarn from her past pieces and a ball of yarn that was at her house that just spoke to me. Hmmm maybe it spoke to me cause it wants me to knit it into something beautiful some day.

But as usual I’m getting a little off track. The point is I feel like I need to knit, to continue her legacy some how. I don’t know what it is I just want to make beautiful things like she did and put little inspirational tags on them that make people happy and inspire them. Its crazy her knitting had such an impact on so many. Her pieces were amazing and unique but it was those darn tags that really did it. Somehow she knew just the perfect little inspirational tag to attach to each of her pieces and somehow those pieces and those tags got to just the right person at just the right time they needed it. I don’t want the world to lose that, I want everybody to have a knitted piece with just the right tag.

She started knitting later in life….well at least I think she did. I don’t remember her knitting when I was younger or maybe if she did it wasn’t like the way she knits now (or did, ugh my tenses will never be right talking about her so don’t critic the grammer of all this, please). The point is, if she could start later in life then I don’t see why I can’t start later too. Besides, I have the desire now, a reason so to speak…Plus I have the amazing “Sock Sisters” ( I’ll tell you more about these woman later, but they were moms knitting posse and they are just the best) who are willing to help me so I’m going to have not necesaarily the Yoda I really want teaching me but some pretty good Jedi Knitting Masters nonetheless to help me. So that’s it, I’ve declared it…its out in the universe, so now I gotta do it or at least try. She’d want me to at least try!

yoda

Super Bowl Sunday 2013

I love Super Bowl Sunday! Even if I don’t have a team in the fight, I still love it! I love Super Bowl Food, I love the commercials, I love the Half Time Show, I love buying squares (of course only in states where its legal LOL) and I just love watching the excitement of the game no matter who is in it!

But Super Bowl Sunday also has some dark memories for me that this year are particularily tough.

NOTE TO READER: stop reading this and revisit it tomorrow if you want to hear nothing but happy tales today.

So most of you know by now or have figured it out through my previous writings that my mom was an Addict. Actually both my mom and my dad were Addicts and I dealt with being the child of an Addict my whole life, but that is alot of back story to tell and will have to wait for another day. At some point around 2010 my mom had fallen off the wagon after being clean for about 12 years (again another story for another day). It started off because she had broken her shoulder while walking a dog and had to have surgery and go on pain meds. Even though Alcohol had always been her drug of choice she got addicted to the pain meds and then ultimately moved back to alcohol to get off the pain meds. For those of us that have never battled addiction this thought process of moving from one drug to another to get off the first doesn’t make a ton of sense, but for an Addict it absolutely does.

Fast forward to 2013… In the back of my mind I think I knew she had fallen off the wagon, but like the good child of an addict I convinced myself that she wouldn’t do this to me AGAIN and there was no way she was drinking again. There were signs of course: mistakes at work she’d normally never make, isolating herself in her apartment even from me, my liquor disappearing from my house. I resorted to leaving little notes under the decanters saying “Don’t drink me I’m expensive” and “Please don’t fill me with water”. It was like having a teenager around. But I never could fully confront her, because I just didn’t want to believe it was true and in a weird way I felt like it was my fault (which later in a drunken mess she would tell me she did blame me and then recant again after she went into Recovery…man is there a lot to tell you). Again, classic feeling for a kid of an Alcoholic. Then Super Bowl 2013 happened…. she had obviously started early that day or maybe she never stopped from the night before but she ended up fainting (lets be real passing out) in the bathroom and hitting her head on the sink. I had to call an ambulance to come get her and take her to the hospital. After hours she was cleared with no major injuries thank goodness, but I was given instructions on what to do just to make sure she didn’t have a concussion. Brought her home got her in bed and comfortable and listened to her give me the whole “I’m sorry routine”, but still we didn’t discuss the elephant in the room. At this point I figured we were good so Pat (my husband at the time….oh yea he is another story too) and I went down to the neighbors to watch The Big Game!

I don’t know how much time passed but it wasn’t that long (I mean the game wasn’t even over) before my phone rang and it was her. I answered my phone to hear her sobbing and teling me to come quick she had fallen. I of course raced up the road to find her slumped at the bottom of the stairs that she had fallen down holding her arm…it clearly was jacked up. So I put her back in the car and raced to the hospital for the second time that day. Now this is where is becomes PRICELESS…. got her to the hospital and got her checked in and the doctor and what I thought was a nurse asked to speak to me privately. I literally thought to myself this is it, the circus act is over, time to discuss the elephant. But nope the doctor and what turns out to be a social worker start questioning me about Elder Abuse. Are you fricking kidding me I yelled at them, you think I did this to her or somebody in the family? Ummmm hello she is a ragging alcoholic I screamed at them. I had lost it enough was enough. I told them to patch her up and keep her overnight cause nobody was going to deal with her for the rest of the evening and I left the hospital mad as hell.

I drove back home went into her apartment and started ransacking the place. The amount of empty bottles of wine and liquor I found hidden were shocking to me and I literally just sobbed and sobbed while I boxed them up and left them in an empty box in the middle of her living room so when she did come home the next day she would see the Elephant was no longer going to be silent.

At this point I’ll stop going into all the back and forth that happened from that day till I checked her in for Medical Detox in April of that same year. I’m sure we will revisit it again because there are more stories to tell, but this is getting long and you and I both have other things to do today. Like watch The Puppy Bowl, the 1st Annual Snail Bowl (do a search of Snail Bowl and Jimmy Fallon if you don’t know what I’m talking about LOL) and of course The Big Game. But I guess the point of today’s writing is that life is so damn complicated. At one point, I woke up this morning feeling sad because mom wasn’t a football fan but she loved the commercials and the half time show and The Puppy Bowl and she would have been all about The Snail Bowl. We would have texted all day today. She was my best friend thats what best friends do! But on the flip side I can’t help remembering the milestones that happened along the way that got her to the place of finally being Sober and us having the relationship we did the last almost 6 years. The point of my writings aren’t to make you believe we lived in a land of unicorns and rainbows rather they are to give you Hope that tomorrow can be a better day.

xoxo,

Lydia

A Birthday is a Special Thing

So it’s Birthday Week around this house…not my Birthday Week (which you’ll come to learn about someday if you aren’t familiar with it yet), but Bob and Smudge’s Birthday Week. For those of you who don’t know or for those of you that just need a refresher, Bob (or Robert as Shawn calls him) is my mom’s Pitbull other wise known as Blogging Bob (oh man is that a story) and Smudge aka The Baby Smudge (as she likes to be referred to by her full name much like The Queen of England) is my English Bulldog. Bob turned 12 on January 20th and Smudge turned 8 on January 22nd.

I don’t know about your house but around here dog birthdays are just as big a big deal as human birthdays and because these were milestone birthdays: Bob’s first without his mom and Smudge turning 8 (Bulldogs only live 8-10years so anytime a Bulldog hits 8 its a time for extra celebration) we tried to make both feel extra special this year. Lucky for Willow (my Black Lab), whose Birthday isn’t till March, she got to reap in the rewards for just living here. So Bob and Smudge got new toys and treats and extra love and attention and of course their own posts on Facebook LOL. But of course the dogs Birthdays are yet another thing that makes me miss my mom terribly and I’d be lying if I said there were no tears shed in this house as we’ve celebrated. You see, My mom made me look like a rank amateur in the dog birthday department! She always did the best stuff for the dogs on their Birthdays: she’s baked them cakes from scratch, knitted them scarves of their own and always managed to find the perfect toys and treats for them, shoot she even sent them Birthday cards LOL.

Actually, my mom managed to make everybody feel pretty amazing on their Birthday. One of my favorite things she did was if you were Facebook Friends with her she would post a picture of a Birthday Cake that reminded her of you on your Facebook Wall. I always loved seeing what she picked out for people and if you have ever been a recipient of one of those pictures you knew it was always pretty spot on and would definetely make you smile.

Honestly, I don’t know how she did it…how she kept up with all these people. In her death, I’ve come to realize what an incredible impact she had on people’s lives and her relationships with people were so incredibly genuine. She had a group of people she texted every day to tell them she was thinking of them and encourage them in some way (this is probably one of the things I miss most each day), she was always buying little gifts that reminded her of people (and people did the same for her), she had special jokes and days with people (Norma and Hump Day Camels, Shawn and Giraffes), shoot she even had an entire Facebook Group called Gal Pals where she posted inspiring messages to all the woman in her life that she had brought together in one place. And all this, all this was REAL! She did it because she truly cared for people and wanted to see people live their best lives just like she was doing. She was a mother, teacher, mentor and friend to so many. And I know right now people are reading this and nodding their heads YES in agreement.

Now I won’t blow smoke up your back end, it wasn’t always like this…she wasn’t always like this (even though I’m pretty sure she always wanted to be). She lost her way many times throughout her life (alcoholism will do that to a person), but don’t most of us! But she worked hard in the last almost 6 years to become the woman she was when she died. To become what the author Sarah Ban Breathnach calls your Authentic Self (if you are a woman and aren’t reading Simple Abundance everyday you should be). And I for one hope one day I can achieve that too.

I’ve said many times over the last few weeks since she passed…Mom died living her best life, being her best self her authentic self, she was Happy and Content with what she had and where she was, she had learned to accept the things of the past. Knowing this gives me some peace and makes me want to strive for the same. And though she is not here any longer, I know she will continue to guide me and she will always be my example.

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What do you mean I’m not her passcode

So one of the worst parts about a loved one passing away suddenly (well besides the obvious) is all the stuff you have to handle that you aren’t prepared for. A few days after my mom passed I made a PSA on my Facebook page about this. I should probably title this entry Get Your Shit In Order People but once I finish I think you’ll understand better why its titled this way instead.

Seriously, if a loved one passes is their house in order? Do they have a Will, Life Insurance (who is the beneficiary), do you know what their final wishes are (oh wait till you hear what mom wanted), has an executor to the estate been named? Ok those seem like fairly easy questions to answer and if somebody is prepared for a family members death then you probably have this all lined up. But if you aren’t prepared then get ready for some serious wammies! What about all the weird crazy things people don’t think about. I feel a checklist coming on here people. Lets start with a doozie… Do you know how to get into your loved ones phone? Did I just hear a pin drop!

In this day and age when people are so wrapped up with privacy and everything is on lockdown what happens if somebody dies? Most of our whole lives happen based around our phones and trust me you’ll want to get into that person’s phone for information. Did you know Apple can’t/won’t unlock a phone, those hacks you find on the internet don’t work btw (I tried them), short of a court order you aren’t getting into the one thing that is going to make your life a little easier and help you emotionally process some things too (my mom’s photo album is priceless right now). We are so concerned about keeping our privacy that we don’t even think about what happens if….

Which baits the question why are we so concerned with our privacy that we have to have a passcode on our phone anyway? Oh I get I was in a 16 year marriage where at the end I didn’t want him to see anything I was up to (even turned Find My Phone off which is never a good idea at the rate I lose my phone) and of course this leads us back to EVERYTHING is on our phone including these days all our CC’s, saved passwords, etc. So yea we need it set to private so if you do lose your phone some jerk doesn’t steal your identity. But, man I miss the simple days when you carried a wallet with your ID, a credit card and you remembered people’s phones numbers or had a small telephone book you wrote them down in. I guess what I’m trying to say here is: do you have somebody in your life you trust, somebody in case of emergency can be “your person”, somebody you can give your passcode too because trust me they’ll need it.

So back to why I started writing this to begin with then I promise I’ll let you go (as a note for future reading I tend to digress a lot so if you are going to follow me get used to it LOL). So the day after my mom passed away I kept trying to get into her phone. Honestly now I’m not exactly sure why that was such a priority but for some reason in the moment it was. So of course I started with my birthday because duh I’m her favorite. Guess my shock when my birthday wasn’t her passcode. I tried a few more codes and again nothing. I searched the internet for ways to get in nothing. Friends searched the internet for me for ways to get in and still nothing. Then my friend Katie came over and brought Shawn and I apple juice and egg sandwhiches (everybody needs a Katie in their life btw) and as we stood in the kitchen and I told her about the phone and I asked her “do you know your moms passcode and she say yea duh its my birthday” and I lost it people like really lost it. I stood in the kitchen and yelled and cried and pouted like a child “why wasn’t I her passcode”, I thought she loved me, I thought I was her favorite…it was crazy people; the wave of emotions I was having, even why I write this I can’t stop the tears from flowing. And then it hit me, like a ton of bricks, it was like she was standing right there….a conversation popped back into my head of a day she and I were sitting on the couch and she was knitting (she was always knitting) and she showed me some goofy Facebook post on her phone and her phone went to lock screen….I showed it to her and said what’s the passcode and she told me and it that moment I heard her words. I immediately snatched the phone back from Katie who was at that point watching some crazy Utube video of how to bipass the lock function and typed in the code and I WAS IN! OMG the relief, I hope you never have to experience it but the relief was incredible. And guess what I was her passcode (just not in the order I thought) and at that moment that one glorious moment I realized she did love me and I was her favorite.

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