My "whine moment today." What's yours?

Great points Veronica. Yes, he has ALWAYS been that way. I remember one time I was joking around with my sister when we were kids and then I had the nerve to want to use the bathroom while he was in there. He made a whole big fuss about it. This is why I get EXTRA upset when he does it to my children.He screams that I dont want him saying anything to "THOSE GIRLS" meaning my children just like he referred to me as "that child" while I was growing up.

My whine is that I have run out of things to talk about whenever I call my parents at my set time each night on those days I don't pop in to see them during the day delivering groceries or their mail from the PO box, or driving them to a doctor appointment.

Conversation with Mom is usually the weather because she has difficulty hearing on the telephone even with her new hearing aid but according to Dad, Mom takes out her hearing aid when answering the telephone.... [sigh]. She can understand when I say *cold* or *windy*. Then there is dead silence. I don't know what else to say because Mom will say "I can't hear you".

Dad's conversations start out with the weather.... then it goes to something back in his childhood or college days that I have heard 200 times already throughout the years. I am always glad when my male cats get into the conversation as that gets Dad laughing hearing Charlie in the background chatting up a storm [it's a whole variety of different sounds].

It's sad when you lose a certain amount of communication with one's parent(s).

FF could you get one of those devices that prints out what you are saying? Can't remember what they are called. I think you said previously Mom is almost blind but maybe dad would respond better. He obviously likes the sound of his own voice so while he tells his stories do other stuff in the house, like cooking or emptying the dishwasher or do the ironing. You will only have to throw in a few "ah has" when appropriate.

Would your parents be able to use Skype?

Fregflyer,

I can relate! Your story fits my situation perfectly although we have no Charlie. Dad comes outside to greet me when I arrive each morning. We're both standing in the rain and he asks me how the weather is:) After all the small talk each day we will go inside to the office and I turn up the volume on the TV news channel. Dad likes to watch the FOX news channel all day with the sound turned off. He reads the subtitles. I have to constantly remind him the Mom, who is sitting in the wears hearing room, is legally blind and and wears two hearing aids would also like to keep up on current events!! Even through the frustration and resetting the TV zapper every morning I thank the Lord that they are still with me.

Al...

Veronica, good memory, my Mom has macular degeneration so she is almost blind. If only my parents would have moved to a retirement community, then they would have something new every day to talk about :)

Texarkana, Skype is a good idea but it wouldn't work with my parents. Dad refuses to spend one dime for high speed internet yet he will grumble that he rarely can get onto the Internet using his dial up :P

My Mom also has macular degeneration so I take her to the Dr. every 6 weeks to get an injection of some medicine in her "good" eye. I shiver down my spine each time I see her get the shot:) Looks like torture to me but Mom says she is used to it and hardly blinks.

Al...

ullysses, anytime the weatherman calls for rain my Dad will worry about floods... heavens, our area never has had a flood in over 100 years. About 10 years ago I was out of state and Dad heard about the bad weather where I was and called me a midnight at the hotel to make sure I didn't get caught in a flood.... duh, yeah Dad, I plan to drive through rivers :P

That flood phobia use to drive me crazy... now I use it to an advantage, now I can say "sorry, Dad, can't drive you to Lowes with all the flash flooding going on" :)

freq,
my dad died at only 72 but i think he might have had a touch of vascular dementia his last few years . firstly he had a routine and a haircut you could set your watch to so every word that he uttered was predictable enough to make ya want to start killing people . one sip of coffe would get him off into the story of how strong " bob fergussons " coffee was then hed start telling some pointless tale that he would yell at " ma " a dozen times to remind him what " that guys " name was .
thats probably what caused me to give everyone i know a default nickname when im recounting a story . the nicknames are gender specific . the male one uses your screen initials and the female one aint too hard to figure out from there ..
moms favorite story was how a church audit years ago divulged a 10 cent error in the churchs favor and it was ten cents that shed clearly warned everyone about months in advance .
and they wander why we drink . : /

captain, my Dad will even ask if I heard such and such story and even if I say *yes*, I get an instant replay. What is comical, decades ago my Dad use to complain about his Dad repeating stories over and over again. History repeating itself :)

Good morning folks 0210am. My whine moment for today. My mom has been show timing (acting normal) because we had people over. Right now i am awake due to s low blood sugar situation and an astma situation. I just wanna sleep so I gave her a sleeping pill when the asthma and bloodsugar were handled and i popped one myself. I need the sleep. I hope they kick in soon. ~ sleepless in Scandinavia

Oh and the repetitive questions. ...we call them million question day over here.

Yes and they wonder why we drink. I have a husband and a mother that have dementia. Bring on the whiskey. Make a double.

maybe were all a little predictable . i dont drive very fast . i figure you lay stone then you die -- whats the hurry ? one day a few years ago my son ( ff ) and i were driving a country road to get to work . a car was traveling in front of us at about 25 mph . normally i just pace in behind a slow driver but this one just seemed exceptionally slow and erratic . i finally asked ff wth was going on up here ? he said i had finally ran into a driver who drives slower than me .

My whine for today is that hubby has used up all the ggigga whatevers from dish and we have to wait another 24 hour till they reset.so I'll be off by 8am when the free time stops. He downloads piles and piles of scientific stuff all gets neatly stapled together then left in a pile on the table or spread around his chair. Can't move anything and if i ask him to move it to vaccume he does then still blames me when something is missing.

That's why I don't touch any of dad's stuff. The last thing he will remember is me touching it. He doesn't remember telling me to put it here or there. Then he will blame me when he can't find it. I always have to make exaggerated movements like showing my empty hands before reaching for 'lost' item from above his bed, or behind his pillow or on the floor. Most of the times, I insist he moves the item. This way his last memory of it is Not of me touching it.

That doesn't always work, though. Sometimes, the Last Thing he remembers is My mentioning it. Then being a "very good detective", he says that I took it - because I had mentioned it previously.

Oh, yes...all the untidy stacks of papers of this & that. I can relate. I try to keep bills & important papers in a certain place and in order. Next thing I know, uncle has gone through them & created a d**n mess.

One little lonely whine today, and I probably brought it on myself. Made the mistake of falling back asleep this morning after I woke up early, which meant I entered that stage of sleep where very realistic, lucid dreaming occurs. I know better than to do this, because it happens every time I go back to sleep like that. I have really intense, sometimes frightening dreams. Those dreams that seem SO real after you wake up that you can't forget them. In this dream, however, I became involved with a man who was so loving, tender, gentle and kind - he would do anything for me and was totally devoted to me. I felt so warm and wonderful being cared for by someone else, someone who valued me as a person, loved me for who I am and seemed to feel the world revolved around me. He was happy just to *be* with me, regardless of what we were doing. I can't really explain how good that felt.
I woke up alone to another day of taking care of mom, working for my clients, cleaning house, doing laundry and trying to keep up a cheerful attitude. It felt like someone had set a ton of bricks on my chest. I haven't been able to get that dream out of my head all day.

I've been alone for well over 12 years now - partially because of emotional damage from a failed marriage and partially because I was first a single parent and didn't have time for a relationship, and now because I'm a live-in caregiver to my mom and *still* don't have time for a relationship.

I know the fear and trust issues I have regarding relationships are my own and I've tried dating, but I'm always the one that breaks it off, because I'm so afraid of going through the tremendous pain of a serious relationship breaking up again. I have a hard time getting that close to anyone. I know I should probably get some help for those issues, but if I'm not going to be dating in the forseeable future, what's the point? It just really hit me hard this morning when I had that dream. I felt so lonely and completely alone after I woke up.
(sigh.) So that's my whine for the day. Just need to kick myself in the backside and bust out of this funk. Nothing is going to change on the relationship front anytime soon, so I just need to focus on something else.

To balance out the sucky morning I had, here are some *good* things that are happening:

-Signed up for NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month) and started writing last night. I signed up for this last year and wasn't able to make it happen. I got 440 words down last night in about an hour, and plan to write every night this month. Goal is 50,000 words, so I need to keep at it and try to hit 2,000 words a day to exceed my goal. Learned one important lesson last night - typing on the on-screen keyboard on a tablet sucks. Going to use my real keyboard instead.

-I picked up several pie pumpkins last week, so I'm going to process those today and get the puree bagged up and in the freezer. Also going to see if I can throw myself into some food prep today and tomorrow in order to have good things to eat for the next week or so. Having just come off a 2-week trip with Mom, we've been eating junk for the past week since we came back, because the house was in total disarray from the floor refinishing. Still working on putting that back together too.

-I've been picking up a few small work projects here and there to help bring money in for the holidays and catch up on the shortfall being caused by all the renovations to Mom's house. One more big project on the house this year (cutting the opening in the tub for Mom to get in and out easily) and then I can focus more on saving up for the projects to be done next summer - new roof on house and garage plus starting work on the basement and landscaping in the yard.

I guess I just need to focus on the good things I have in life and not be worried about how much time is passing me by while I'm taking care of Mom. I know I will not regret taking care of her, regardless of how difficult it can be at times - when she is gone, I'll look back and know I did the right thing. I have relatives who will not be able to say that about themselves, so I am trying to treasure the time I have with her, even though it's not always easy to "treasure" days like today.

SusanA43, just had another ah ha moment here when you mentioned dreams that seem so very real.... I was wondering why I was having such dreams some nights and not others... I will need to keep a mental note when such dreams occur if I had awoken during the night.

Ever get dreams where you hear your front door bell ring or someone knocking at the front door and you are wondering if anyone is actually at the door.... I will check my bed and if there is a cat there soundly asleep I will know it was a dream. Or awake in a start because I thought I heard my name being called... that is so weird. Had a terrifying dream the other night, I thought I was having a seizure, I was 100% sure it was actually happening... I couldn't go back to sleep, it freaked me out the whole rest of the day.

Are we having fun yet?

Oh, do I ever hear you on that, FreqFlyer! I've had some *really* odd dreams that occurred after waking up and going back to sleep. Sometimes they're those stupid "falling" dreams, where you can absolutely FEEL your body falling - I *hate* those.

I had one once where I felt like I was being smothered - I could actually feel the pillow over my face, and the outline of every single finger on the hand pushing it down against my face, and I COULD. NOT. BREATHE. It was horrible. I woke up gasping for air and flailing my arms at my invisible assailant. That one was enough to make me get up and check the entire house - baseball bat in hand - because I swore there must be someone in the house.

I often hear my Skype chime go off when I'm half asleep, or the phone ringing - I hate when that happens - you feel like you *have* to get up and investigate, and then, you might as well just stay up! LOL

I'd much rather have the dream I had this morning, even though it made me sad when I woke up.

My whine moment of the day is not a whine but an observation. THE HOUSE IS SO QUIET WITHOUT MY FATHER WOO HOO. My sister came by and picked up Dad to take him to her house for a few hours. The house is so quiet. I swear every time I hear him come down the stairs, I cringe. Our weekend HHA is a delight. She is so quiet and unassuming. She really blends right in with the family. Its funny when my father goes to my sister's house he has no health concerns whatsooever. Moving boxes, Helping to arrange things. When he is at home, he sits around expecting to be waited on hand and foot. He even tried to volunteer my children to go over to help arrange my sister's house. He wants us to do things "as a family" when it comes to being my sister's personal slaves. Otherwise he would not want the children around. Im sure he will make up for the drama he was unable to cause for 3 hours as soon as he walks through the door. Im truly at the point where I cannot stand the sight of him. I know it sounds horrible but he is a very mean person.

Usually during my chat with the higher power before bed, I ASK to have one of those wonderful dreams. They don't make me feel sad or lonely, just the opposite in fact. They give me a glimpse of great things yet to come in life. That, and well, it's the only fun entertainment I get!!

Those bad scary terrifying dreams.... oh boy.... as much sleep as I lack, when I have one of those, I force myself to relax, chant "it's not real" over and over and try for that sleep again!!

Awesome on the writing Susan! That's one thing I have seriously wished for, for the longest, the ability to write articulately and understandable!!

i think i was in that sensual dream you had susan . just kidding of course . im NOT kidding about a neighbor friend of mine who has his dad at ednas nh right now . his wife smiles , waves and gives me a long wink every time i see her . out here in the country its really awkward when lifelong neighbors end up swapping spouses . my ex only lives 2 miles away with another lifelong neighbor guy . i dont feel as much resentment as i feel sorry for the poor b*stard . if he can deal with the misery of a bipolar spouse more power to him . " lennys " wife better be careful . us guys are only as loyal as our current options ..

look at junior junior covering his ears . he knows g - pa not only would f a snake but actually HAS . the snake lives in the ceiling now . i have to assume that the sex was consensual . that cowsnake is a seductress so i have to wonder whos s*itting whom here ?
big day tomorrow . goin to chicago to see an alice cooper show with cubehead and salad shooter . salad shooter likes to cop a shine on occasion too so cubicle is the designated driver whether hes realizes it or not .

Cap, you were only in that dream if you looked like Sean Connery in the movie "Medicine Man". LOL

Well, this is 'new'. Today my mother was looking for '4'. I figured it was the TV station, so I turned on 4. But no, she was still looking for '4'. Turns out she was waiting for 4:00 to take her nap. I'd forgotten about it until just now.

I noticed her going into her bedroom and looking at the clock. Then I heard her say something, so I went in to ask her what she said and she said she was looking for '9'. Also, she had turned from Lawrence Welk which is 3 here to channel 9, which is an advertisement channel. She said she's looking for 9. Well, turns out she was looking for 9:00 so she could go to bed.

This is the first time she's done this. Literally, in circles, looking for '9' tonight. I don't believe she knows about the time change but even if she did, that wouldn't be the 'problem', although I did changed it to 9 because I know there's a time change.

na . i might pass for sean connerys reflection in the toilet . bet he cant build you an engine or a new house tho . everything is a tradeoff ..
it looks like nobody is going to PM me for my latest off color jokes so ill try one here that the mods might let slide .
a rich man and poor man were discussing what they planned to get their wives for christmas . the rich guy said hed get his wife a diamond necklace and a maserati . he said if she didnt like the necklace she could use the maserati to return and exchange it . the poor guy said he planned to get his wife a pair of slippers and a sex toy . he figured if she didnt like the slippers she could then go frig herself ..

Crud. My daughter just told me we turn the clocks BACK not forward! Now I have to sneak into her room and turn the clock back two hours, because I turned it up one hour to make it 9:00!

Gees, I'm not doing so well.

Haha... I WISH the hour was going forward!!

Personally, I think it's awful when it gets dark at 5:00 p.m.

That is without a doubt, a major whine in life, for me.