Miscellaneous thoughts on a hard day

Today was a hard day. I woke up to a phone conversation with my mother-in-law's stepson about multiple financial and legal problems regarding her care. My mother-in-law has very advanced MS, and is living near us in a nursing home. It is amazing to me that she is still alive, her body keeps fighting, against all odds. I am hoping for God's grace over this whole situation, it has been a tough one to deal with in many ways for over ten years now, and may be getting tougher.

Then my parents, whom we are going to visit tomorrow for a couple of days before school starts, called to describe how their family room was flooded last night in a freak heavy downpour. Thankfully, though they are stressed, the problems are all just practical issues from the flooding. My dad had a very hard time with his health in the last 12 months, with 4 major hospital visits and some pretty tough times for us all. Hopefully he will be able to rest and recover from this flooding stress without incident. I'm looking forward to visiting them tomorrow, though not looking forward to the six hour drive to get there. I'm also hoping we are all truly free from flu and colds - two years ago we accidentally brought a summer flu with us on an August visit (we didn't see my daughter's nose running until the middle of the car drive down), and my parents were sick for over six weeks.

Last week we visited my father-in-law and his wife. She is currently living in a hospital bed in the living room of their house. My father-in-law brought her home from a nursing home that seemed to be doing it's best to kill her a little over a year ago. Her health has improved amazingly, a huge bedsore that should have killed her is now shrunk until it's almost gone, but still we wonder how much longer it can go on, the work and the stress are incredible and she is still very ill. We are hoping that my father-in-law doesn't loose his health in his fight to keep hers, and also that he will consider coming to live with us when she does eventually pass, though this is something that it's hard to get him to face at all at this point.

And some good news - today my husband had a second interview for a contract job. The prospect of this job is more than just a little overwhelming, so we are really praying that God will only open this door if it is a job that would be a good thing. It could be a wonderful thing, or an awful thing, and it is really hard tell... but it's just about impossible to walk away from anything that's offered in his career field at this point. We won't find out more until probably at least next week. I'm also waiting to hear from the principal at my daughter's elementary school about the possibility of another part-time job there this year. Struggling with a little sadness that this year the kids starting school will then mean that I have to be disciplined and busy too, rather than just have a whole bunch of free time to myself - but knowing that the structure of the part-time job I had last year really helped me move forward in my struggle with depression. It was definitely a net gain for me.

It's been so tempting to give in to depression these last few days. Adding on to my own life stressors are the heavy sadness of stories like Jordan's and other online and IRL friends, and all the drastic health and family issues they are facing. I have been staying up WAY too late on a regular basis, which is a common practice for me when I'm in a place of avoidance and hiding... I also have to fight the temptation to abuse my "drugs of choice" - alcohol, food and caffeine. I'm winning the fight against the temptation of alcohol, mostly winning in the fight with the draw of caffeine, and eating way too much (as well as staying up too late)...

It's also strangely been a day of thankfulness for me. As I've been grappling with the feeling that life can JUST BE HARD SOMETIMES and wondering how I could have lived so many years without REALLY understanding this before - I've come to a realization that it's absolutely worth it. All these parents in my and my friends lives who are struggling with illness and end-of-life issues - what would the alternative be? Not to have lived? And while I could wish that we would all live easy, happy lives and die peacefully and painlessly in our sleep at some convenient elderly time - that's just not the way life works. It's messy. It's not fair. It's hard. And it's oh so good. Not something to be taken for granted. Something for which I am truly grateful.

Sorry if these ramblings are moaning and then pollyannaish. This is how I think about it, how I cope. Acknowledging the hard things, and then looking for the good, the light in the darkness, gets me through. That, and God's grace.