tidal wave

Oct 31, 2013

I am lying here in bed on this early Thursday morning and my head is swimming with everything that has happened in the past three weeks. I need to process it all so I can move on with a calm, hopeful heart.

I also want to record it so my children can read this when they are adults and know that when they have a string of weeks like this, they are not the first, nor the last, to be hit with a big ‘ol pile of junk.

• Three bad nights of passing out, being rescued, and wondering where on earth my healthy body has gone.
• Battery acid exploding all over the Subaru and needing to be replaced.
• Twentieth anniversary trip cancelled.
• Fisher dislocating his shoulder and getting a hairline fracture in his humorus.
• Sitting on the couch reading to my children when a flood of water starts dripping in to the basement
• My wrist dislocated and stretched or pinched the radial nerve causing the same sympathetic nervous response as when my femoral nerve gets stretched too far.
• Going out many mornings and having ANOTHER flat tire.
• Finally replacing all four tires on the subaru for a pretty penny.
• Richard’s car being dead to the world and needing a new battery. Replace the battery on a Tuesday, car seems fine. On Wednesday the whole car won’t work, windows won’t go up…and are stuck down, has to get towed in the middle of his work day, find out the main fuse is blown and many other fuses are damaged. Replace all of the fuses for more pennies than I care to even think about. He went to pick up the car up a few days later and once again it won’t start. Then the alternator needed replaced. And the battery. Again. Many, many, many pretty pennies later, we finally have his car back and are hoping it will keep running.
• Keziah hit the reflex point on my knee several times during scripture study the other night and once again the sympathetic nervous system response kicked in. My nerves are not happy one little bit.
• We got home from iFamily last night and had another big flood from the upstairs toilet. This time we were able to figure out more of what is going on. It didn’t overflow like we thought. There is a crack somewhere that is leaking.
• Sadie has thrown up in the house three times in the past twenty four hours. I’m pretty sure it is because she ate all the crumbs from my very crumbly cookie project the other night. It took me a few batches to get the flour consistency right. One of the children measured the flour and must have not been quite as accurate as was needed to get cookies to come out in one piece instead of a frillion crumb piles.
• Richard has spent HOURS and HOURS on the phone with the IRS and at the local IRS office trying to fight a bill from our failed 2007 business that we didn’t know we owed and don’t have records to prove we don’t owe. He is conceding the fight and paying them piles and piles and piles of pretty pennies today because another fine goes into effect tomorrow. Unfortunately for us, we had a large disagreement about it last night into the wee hours of the morning and harsh words were spoken and we had a very sleepless night. He thinks we should pay it, I think we should keep fighting them. The only good thing to come out of it was a long, squishy hug this morning and some tender “I love yous.” I am grateful that in spite of all my ranting he still believes I love him.
• I need to be given worst mother of the year award for the all the mean things I have said to my 17-year-old lately. I really hope someday we can look back on these years and laugh at them the way my mother and I can, but at this point I just don’t know if that will ever happen. I fear she may grow up, leave home, and never want to see me again.
• My ugly, repulsive bathroom sink is clogged. Again. And no amount of baking soda and vinegar is doing the trick this time.
• My doctor keeps using the word “disease” and while I guess it is, it feels like a knife stabbing into my soul every time I hear that word.
• Unbeknownst to me, one of the members of this family put away the rice cooker several weeks ago full of rice. Which is now moldy and disgusting and stinky. Good thing Keziah found it this morning so we could get that awful stench out of here.
• My Make It For Maggie website has been hacked into and I have to find some time to fix it…now. Quite frankly, it is time I don’t have.
• We have three broken violin bows, Keziah needs a new violin because she has had a huge growth spurt, and Blythe needs a new bow. Desperately. Right now she is borrowing one of Jennifer’s and I was working on coming up with the $$200 – 400 for a new bow, but all these broken bones, x-rays, and car problems have killed that dream for a few more months.
• Someone we dearly love has just been diagnosed with breast cancer for the second time and is preparing for a double mastectomy, but she doesn’t want to talk about it and I don’t know how to support her or the other people who are involved when we can’t talk about it.
• I have been out of my boot for a little more than a week which is FANTABULOUSO! Unfortunately the shoes I have to wear for the next many months cost us piles of pennies.
• As a sign of how much pressure we are under, Richard actually yelled yesterday after the two hour IRS visit. Yelled. This man does not yell. And yet he did. Then, when he discovered the flooded bathroom last night, he swore. This man does not swear. And yet he did. I think the months of taking care of me, of holding this family together with his steadiness, calmness, and good humor, and the long, long hours he works have finally wore him down.

 
I know that all this will pass. I know that these things are just part of life. In fact, my heart is full of gratitude that Richard is working and earning money and he got a decent paycheck this month that allowed us to go grocery shopping and buy shoes. He had to cash out his measly little retirement account he had from working with the school district to pay the taxes, which still makes me madder than all get out, but I am grateful to have had a way to pay them. But I am tired. Tired AND grateful, but tired nonetheless. I don’t think I can handle another thing going wrong or breaking or flooding for awhile.

There are also many wonderful things that have happened in the past three weeks. I have been able to be in the temple twice. Many other people have been working in the temple for me as well. At least one hundred endowments have been done in the past few weeks. I have been kept safe when my tires were flat. Fisher’s arm is doing well and he is out of his sling at three weeks. We had enough towels to clean up the mess last night and thanks to the amazing Kat we have a new toilet to put in when we find the time to do it. We think we need to pull out the flooring and replace the subfloor that has been ruined by these floods. In the meantime, we have two other toilets to use – big gratitude there, right?

Is it possible to see the good and the bad and the hard and the wonderful all at the same time? Because that is where I am at. I am full to the brim with gratitude. I can see the blessings of God. I know he is watching over us. I know He is guiding us. At the same time, I want to have a breather. Maybe I need to reread my quote from the other day and realize maybe the breather is not what I actually need?

And tonight my Richard will get a massage. He needs to have all this stress rubbed right out of him.