notrydoyoda Posted January 2012
The Caregiver & Dysfunctional Families: How are you doing?
Follow
Share
Read More Close
34K Comments
Popular Questions
Related Questions
- How do I deal with an emotionally needy mother who wants all of my time and attention?
- I get so angry with my 88-year-old mom sometimes and find myself getting resentful to her and not treating her very good. How can I deal?
- How do I deal with being "cut" from the family?
- My sole mate is sole care taker of both parents. Where do I find help dealing with this?
Start a Discussion
My Charlie-girl, a Chihuahua Maltese mix, is a wee bitty thing at barely 5#, is so attached to me that it makes leaving her a real PITB! I do Love her to bits though, and can't imagine my life without her now. She's nearly 4, and Chihuahuas often live to be 15-18 years old, so this will be my first and only dog ever, as they are a lot of work, especially that first puppy year!
We had an incredible viewing of the Eclipse yesterday, at about 90%, and it was quite eerie, as even the birds were acting funny, and the shadows it made were different, quite lacey.
Speaking of birds, our house buts up against a greenbelt, so we've got loads of trees all around the back yard. I only just noticed this very strange bird hanging about, with a long neck and long beak, and he has a very loud and repetitive squawk that sounds like "What, What, What"! Lol!
So I looked him up on Google, and found out he's a baby blue heron, and now, since I've been paying attention, there's actually 3 of them.
They are super fun to watch, but drive Charlie-girl Crazy! She's small but Mighty, and Loves to chase birds and squirrels! Not sure if I wrote it here, but the other day she chased a squirrel, and in his excitement, the squirrel fell from up above in the tree about 20 feet or so, and landed 2 feet from Charlie. The squirrel landed with a thump, he and Charlie stared at each other for about 2 loooong seconds, and I screamed NO to Charlie, and the squirrel chased off. I was so worried that it might bite her in defense, but nope, he was just as freaked out by the fall as Charlie and me! That was a crazy experience!
Everything is going fine here! I'll leave it at that. BORING!
Oh, last night I snuck out at 8pm to the Casino for a couple of hours, just to get out of the house, and won 250! Tonight hubby is trying his luck! One day we will be able to both go out together again, but for now, we'll make do. 😉 HUGS YA'LL!
Yes 30 years is a long time. His son's and grandsons are promoting marriage. I accuse them of believing they will have a neverending supply of fried chicken and mashed potatoes if there is a wedding. PJ and I talk about it...but that's all it is at this point. May happen, may not.
As for the mice, amazing. I just get the jebee geebees when they are around. Still haven't seen one in a while. The house is old, lots of cracks and openings though floors along walls.One neighbor had an exterminator come and they put some type of gas in a pipe or whole by the cellar and the mice came out 2 buckets worth. That was not a good scene. Part of city living unless its newly built and sealed. Cat? My nephew found a cat and bought her home. Her name is Minnie. The meanest thing you ever met. The poor dog was big but still a pup and she would smack him up and scratch him whenever he passed. Poor Prince. Then next you know they sleep together In front of my mothers door. Minnie will lash out if you look like you going to touch her, except for my nephew. But she has no problem begging for food or running in kitchen when she smells tuna fish or salmon or food! She has never caught a mouse. I told my nephew to take her home with him because she getting paid but not doing her job. lol. Now my neighbor and good friend has a cat that is a natural hunter. She kills birds and squirrels imagine that. My neighbor said she killed a bird one morning and all the birds were around the fence making so much noise she was scared to go out for a while. I would have to get a cat that eats her kill though. I had one cat he would take the heads leave the bodies. Yikes! Got him for my son. Our first cat, loved him to death. Thought he was a girl and named him Princess. Then had to have him fixed because of the spraying he stayed Princess. Im getting ready digress into cat stories. I haven't seen one in a while, New York mice are real smart. I thing they pass on genetic information. Sometimes they maneuver around traps and don't eat the posion, I don't care what you mix in. Then other times you get a breed that falls for everything. Oh brother!!!
sharyn - I think there is some of that going on with the adjuster's supervisor. I am about ready to pull rank on him. I don't do that often, but I was probably teaching at university before he was out of diapers. He will NOT lump me in with the adjuster as us both being confused. I question his reading skills too and am thinking of going over his head. I hope your situation is corrected.
I checked off another item. I found a meditation coach willing to donate 4 hrs a week teaching meditation techniques.
Golden, I have known PJ a long time. Thirty years August 7th. We met at preseason football camp and have been good friends ever since.
Thx trying - hoping for a good year.
Yes, I am looking forward to a break, plus I like that the boys can have good relationships with both sides re grandparents.
The insurance office is in Calgary and R and I will be down there in the next week or two. I will try one more email to the adjuster explaining things again in words of one syllable. I now know what it is she is not getting.
Boy's third b'day. Wow! Time flies!!! They will be in school before you know it. Nice that the other set of grandparents will be around for a while. It gives you a break. Enjoy!!!
A lazy day even though I have much to do. Our dd's in- laws will be arriving on Friday, I will have some time to unpack more while they are staying my dd and son- in- law. The boys 3rd b- day is coming up next week!!
What nerve to tell you that YOU are confused! Glad to hear however that it is just one idiot rather than a team of them!
I wish you luck with Mom, can't say I envy you but gotta do what you gotta do! *Hugs*
Bengals are beautiful, they are smart, they are amusing but they are also a giant pain in the ____! Very high maintenance, this was my husbands idea, not mine. I would have been just fine with a shelter cat but Nooooooo, he had to have exotics! He never showed the slightest bit of interest in cats. When I met him, I had the sweetest little black cat I adored. He was hit by a car and it just about killed me. So, I was in no hurry to rush out and replace him even though everyone tried to give me a cat after that! I had to grieve. Thinking husband was not remotely interested in cats, he barely ever glanced at my cat when he was alive, I figured he just wasn't a cat person. Then, one day a co-worker offered me a Savannah kitten for free. I had never heard of one so I looked it up and joked to husband a friend offered this to us. He got so excited!!!! Tell him yes, we will take it! I was shocked. I said, "I didn't think you liked cats!" He said, "I have always wanted an exotic cat!" Well, thank God the friend changed his mind and kept the Savannah for himself, I would later hear stories that really made me really grateful 😉 like him tearing the screen door off the frame! Anyway, husband being disheartened found the Bengal Breed and told me they are average house cat size. So, I gave in. Let's just say, they are NOT your average housecat and are quite demanding! We had to put interior locks into certain rooms because one would jump up, pull the lever down and get into the rooms we did not want them in unsupervised. They don't get along, one always chasing the other, I will not have anymore creatures in the house after they live out their lives. Too much.
I understand your reluctance to take on more projects. I never want to see another one after the renos we went through here after the fire/flooding. I am sorry about the troubles you are having with your new financial advisor. It is important to have good service from them.
Mother does not know about any upcoming changes yet. She will be told the morning of the assessment. I will be there in the afternoon to discuss the options, and expect her to be upset. Oh well, it has to be done. Hope you get to some gardening.
You unfortunately have to check EVERYONE these days. Gone are the days of hiring professionals and trusting them to "do their job right" with anything. Even grocery baggers can't seem to understand not to stack heavy things on bread or eggs, jeez! Nobody trains people properly, they throw them into the deep end and say "Swim," while the customers end up paying for it. Laziness, lack of training, lack of integrity,lack of common sense, all of the above! It is getting frustrating because you have to go over everyone's work for them even though you are paying them to do a job! A $16,000.00 gaff IS significant!
It never ends. Same thing here, no matter who we hire (unless we know them) we have to watch them like hawks. Check contracts, make sure they are doing and have done what they agreed to do for the price they agreed to do it for. It's maddnening. That is why both husband and I agreed no more projects for the rest of the year until next year when spring rolls around again. It wears you out! Now I am fighting with Mom's financial advisor. We had a great one, he recently retired and the firm he passed everyone's account to is not even close to how good he was. Promises me this and that, so far, nothing. Constantly cancels and reschedules meetings, I am not impressed.
On to happier things, I hope you enjoyed your B-day! Someone should have spoiled you because you deserve it! Today is much nicer so far than yesterday was. Maybe I will work in the garden a bit. How's your Mom handling things?
ali glad you had a good time even if you suffered a bit. Seems to be part of camping
duck - so sorry you are fighting "critters" as well as the family issues.
rainey - you ARE very practical. Good for you! Bengals are beautiful!
glad - that deserves something like a Darwin award!
upset - that is a funny story. Cats seem to know when the moment is particularly ripe. You have known PJ a long time. I have a much more embarrassing story about my first camping trip with R early in our relationship. I do hope the child caregivers back off - seems inane to me.
My cat story: Mother was coming to visit, so on the day she was to arrive I went upstairs to do a last check of her bedroom and make sure everything was OK before I went to work. She was a spotless housekeeper. I came downstairs to the kitchen and found myself ankle deep in downy soft, grey feathers. The cat, a large tabby, was a great hunter and had obviously caught a bird and brought it inside. I swept up the feathers and fruitlessly looked for the carcass, which I never did find. He must have taken it out again. I was so concerned that he had hidden it in her bed, as that was the kind of thing cats do, but fortunately, he didn't.
It wasn't a good visit. Mother had insisted in coming up even though I had said it was not a good time for me, and then she refused to leave unless I drove her back. That was the last time she came to my house. I made sure of it.
They are just giving you a gift, in their own weird way!!!! LOL!!! One of my boyfriends cats who loved me used to leave me beheaded rats at the bedroom door 😳 So I would praise him and without him seeing me, dispose of his (gulp) gift. Nothing like opening the doot first thing in the morning and accidentally kicking something you knew was a dead something. My cats are indoor cats because they are bengals. I can't imagine the amount of corpses of dead thing we would have piled up since they are such good hunters. Their is also a lot of wildlife right outside our door that could potentially harm them too so having them inside avoids a lot of potential disasters.
The mouse was one of those little wood mice that come in in the fall when the weather turns cold. A couple of weeks after incident with PJ My son had a girl visiting at the house. She had taken her shoes off at the front door. The cats put a dead mouse in her shoe. She was from Maine and knew they came in at the first sign of cold weather.
On a funny note, one of the news channels here posted to their instagram account to message them with questions about the eclipse. One person asked "why did they pick Wyoming?" Can you imagine?
I have three cats, so no mice that I can tell, but I bought my daughter some electric mouse traps from AMazon ($20. each, but they work) and they are zapping them quite effectively.
Roaches I would have a huge issue with! Call an exterminator.
Yes the wedding was perfect. I was not about to have Mom spend money on one day for me. I have never been one of those gals who had to be "Pretty Princess" for a day and go through months of agonizing for this "show" of (everyone look at me!) I don't like being the center of attention, I get uncomfortable and it is just not who I am. I am a practical gal and even when I was young and pretty, that still was not one of my life long dreams. I am always flabbergasted on the amount of money and trouble people go through just for a day and a ceremony that's over so fast. Maybe it's because I was raised more by brothers, who knows, I was more of a "Tom Boy" anyway. I was never a typical little girl. I was horse crazy though! ❤️🐎🐴
The most popular cake at my wedding was a pumpkin cheesecake. I got married on Halloween, my favorite holiday next to Christmas.
I love Autumn, my favorite season so husband proposed to me on Halloween a year before and said, "A year from today." I was fine with that! I gave away most of the other goodies and left over cakes to the straggler guests and that was that! A good, practical wedding, people came and went as they pleased. One of my neighbors I grew up with who is very Catholic was having trouble processing my "way of doing things." No photographer, No invitations or RSVP's, no family except Mom, me catering my own get together, no wedding cake, no rules, just come if you want, enjoy some goodies, and leave when you want. I think I hate the obligatories so much, I had the anti-obligatory casual get together. Heck, I was outta my dress as soon as I got home because it was time to get food ready to set out! LOL!!! How could I enjoy myself wearing a restrictive dress? I wouldn't change a thing except wish we could have gone on a honeymoon. Couldn't because we could not leave Mom alone and could not trust anyone to care for her, our cats, the property, etc. So, almost 4 years later after getting married, still no honeymoon, because I had to go straight into caregiving. *Sighs* That's what I get for waiting so long to get married.
Mice. Not scared of em, they have never been an issue, I used to keep my seed envelopes in a cookie tin, I used the tin for something else, cookies for someone, without even thinking about it, I just left them loose. Don't ever do this I just learned. So, you keep anything enticing in airtight containers and that will do it. No more food, they go elsewhere. Boy will they be disappointed tonight! If they dare to venture outside of those cabinets, they have two Bengal cats to contend with and good luck with that! 😼
Gratulerer med dagen 🍰☕️🎉🎈
Tusen takk
REalestate in my area is going up and crazy. So people are buying these house for way too much money and renovating them and selling them. The whole neighborhood is changing the face is changing. Anyways I live between two houses where the owners are renovating. On the right he did the second floor last year and the mice came in like crazy. Then when they tear up the street to repave or do work in sewer or electric they come in. Now on the right he is doing top floor. They came and drove me crazy. I am half blind and it terrifies me when I see something run cross room or in corners. So I caught them on traps, bought this 40 dollar spray that did nothing, bought two types of poison. some times it work sometimes not. I just got it down to seeing one mouse every few days scurrying out of my view. Now they starting work on left side. In winter they come into the house. Any tips, solutions, advice would be greatful.