Master Manipulator

It’s been awfully quiet on the parental front. That’s never a good sign. Late last week I received a birthday card with a check from them. The morning of my birthday I had an email waiting from my father, on behalf of both of my parents. (I returned it late in the evening with a Happy Father’s Day.)

Then yesterday rolled around and BAM! I was in the middle of enjoying the first day of the kids being at camp. I had a massage, I was watching Scandal, and in the middle of an episode, my phone rang.  It was blocked. I rarely answer blocked calls, but I did. It was my father. Who was obviously crying. I asked if he was ok.

He proceeded to tell me my mother was having a procedure to biopsy a mass on her lung. That she had been sick for a month and they did an MRI (or cat scan – I don’t remember.) He said it didn’t look good, that she may have to stay in the hospital and that it wasn’t an easy “surgery”. He used the word surgery. I told him to call or text me when she was out.

I sat at my desk feeling like I was kicked in the gut. I didn’t know how to feel. I didn’t know what to feel. My father texted me a bit later:

She will be home tonight.  It is definitely cancer. Please make all contact to ME by phone or text.

In response, I  sent a barrage of questions:

Cancer that they can remove?
Will she need chemo/radiation?

He simply told me that they need more tests before they have a treatment plan. My father is lucky he is connected at the hospital and can typically call in favors to get answers quickly. That was around 5pm.

I felt like shit. I felt lost.  Getting Max healthy and figuring out when to see my mom and how to help, from a distance, became my focus. Hubs and Little One consulted and were very supportive. I cancelled my Birthday Girl’s Night Out and sulked.

At 8:30, I decided to be nice and call my father to see if my mother got home. I was also calling to tell him that I’d be down in the late morning. He told me not to come. That it wasn’t a good idea. That my mother didn’t want me there.

I was enraged. How dare he call me in the middle of a scheduled procedure. One that they’d known about for at least several days, tell me my mother had cancer and shut me down. I had been played. And in all fairness, Little One warned me that my father might be manipulating the situation. She was dead on. No pun intended.

I had the courage to say those things to him. That he opened the door. That he tried to get my goat. I asked him if he and my sister didn’t want me there or if my mother didn’t want me there. He couldn’t answer.

Truthfully, the joke is on them. Having my father and my sister take a medical “crisis” into their own hands is like having a 5 year old child with ADD take care of things. Unmedicated.

Sadly, the reality is I’m the one left alone – now with two sick children – to sit and wonder what the reality is.

 

Inventory

As suggested, I’ve done a personal year in review. Often I’m so consumed with both the depression and the running around that I don’t take the opportunity to sit back and watch the snow fall. And I need to, because as I have fallen down, I’ve also made progress.

In the year of 38, I accomplished the following:

-I stood up to my father, and mother, in a way that I had never done before. I used to cringe when my father called. When he insisted on seeing the kids. But something clicked and I had the courage to put my mental well-being and my family’s safety first. Without Hubs, without CBT, without my support system, I couldn’t have done that. I couldn’t have said no to the Indecent Proposal.

-I was present. I enjoyed time with my family for the first time I can remember. We held hands and danced at parties together, we rode bikes at the park. We laughed and we loved. It seems so simple, so basic. But I was so numb, so down that I couldn’t enjoy the simple things. I can’t lament about the time that has passed, I can only embrace the now.

-I walked 39.3 miles in the fight for breast cancer. My feet were bloodied and blistered (and fractured!) but with my incredible group of girlfriends, we did it. And between 5 of us, raised $17,000.

-I flaked less and engaged more. In the throws of my depression, I couldn’t keep plans. I was anxious, I was exhausted. I spent countless hours in bed with my head under the covers hiding from life. Overall this year, when I made plans, I kept them. I saw the kids through to all (most) of their activities. [note: I still love a good, long nap. Or a day in my beautiful bedroom!] I had numerous friends over for brunches and dinners and hung out in our beautiful home. I opened myself up again. Still guarded, but open.

-I became Board members at two of the organizations I care most about in the world: my kid’s school and my synagogue. The idea of helping to make a difference is something that is so important to me. I also, very much, believe in leading by example for my children. So being active participants in the places we frequent the most often seems fitting.

-I created the bedroom of my dreams. It seems so insignificant, but the bedroom it my sanctuary. And every detail counts. In the last year we gutted and re-did everything and it’s perfect. It’s my safe haven.

-I [hope] I did something nice for Hubs. He is the hardest person to buy things for because aside from a Maserati, there is nothing he wants. Nothing. Ever. He is content at home, with his family. But for his 40th birthday, I threw him a lovely dinner with his true friends. After saying that he didn’t want anything, I think he was touched that 30 people came together for him.

In the next year, I plan to:

-focus on my familial relationships. Namely with Hubs and Tallulah. Those relationships need a lot of coddling right now.

-get healthy. Not just say it. Really do it. “They” say everything gets harder after you are 40. So, I’m in.

I figure with two significant, yet rather vague, resolutions, I’m bound to get something right.

39 & Stable

I overcame my anxiety and braved the school district charity event last weekend. My outfit came together classy, summer chic – despite the fact that I still can’t wear heels and am more round than tall.

As I was facilitating things on the red carpet, my phone was ringing incessantly. It was Hubs. I answered hit breifly and he blurted out,

Mitch had a heart attack.

I was floored. I walked inside to gather myself. Remember Mitch? He’s not my favorite person, but he was, at one point, a very good friend of Hubs, and was in our wedding. We all have history. My stoic husband told me that Mitch would be alright, save for some stents and blockages. He’d be in the hospital for several days. I went back outside.

Hubs showed up at the party shortly after that. I could see on his face he was distraught. Hubs just turned 40. Mitch will be 40 in September (and has three kids under 4). Nothing like this, thankfully, has happened to any of our friends or even acquaintances. It’s been shocking. And perhaps, a wake up call.

Hubs and I kept to ourselves most of the evening, not really having to say anything to one another, because the air was thick with the “what ifs” re: Mitch. I could tell Hubs was anxious to get to the hospital and be with him, so we departed on the earlier side.

Several days later, Mitch is home resting comfortably surrounded by his wife and three daughters. I hope this was a message for all of us.

What’s Your Lucky Number?

Despite the fact that I am undoubtedly the black sheep in the family, my sister was a wild teenager. Having always been the perfect child, it pained my parents to see her strung out, strutting about town, but they let her do her thing. She ran away (to the safety of my mom’s now ex-BFF – it was the demise of their friendship) and eventually moved in to an apartment into the shadiest part of town. She’s lucky she didn’t die.

She was a rebel without a cause for a short while. And everything she did, she did to piss my parents off. Including the time she decided that when she turned 18, she’d get a tattoo. Apparently, she’d always wanted one, and the minute she could, she ran out and marked up her arse.

Sister Dearest decided to announce that she got a tattoo at my engagement dinner. She took me and my now-sister-in-law in the bathroom and dropped her drawers. She was so proud. She turned around and admired her tattoo’d arse in the mirror. It was perfect she said. Sister-in-Law and I burst into tears. We were literally weeping, but not so much because that she had permanently defaced her body. But because she had permanently defaced it incorrectly.

Imagine spelling “stupid” as “stoopid”.  Because essentially that’s what she did. Sister Dearest convinced herself that despite the fact that many Jews abhor tattoos, she would get a meaningful symbol of our religion. And so she took her favorite necklace, a symbol of the number 18, which means life, and handed it to fancy “artist” in the LBC. As in, she’d be marking her body for life. Totally appropriate.

To most, the symbol is called “chai” and looks like this:

Except when she handed talented artist the charm from the necklace, she must have done it backwards. Because the letters were reversed, transposed in the final product. On her ass. Permanently. But she had been looking at it in a mirror, so of course it looked right. And she did not believe us when we told her.

Fast forward 15 years later, and she’s had it removed. Luckily her high school best friend’s mom is a cosmetic dermatologist and took to fixing that when Sister Dearest was ready. Me, I’d never laughed so hard in my life. Nothing like being unruly and having it blow up in your face. Or your butt.

*By sheer coincidence, I post-dated this post to June 11th. Which happens to be my sister’s 34th birthday. Suck it Sister Dearest. ♥

Slighted, With a Side of Anxiety

Last week I was at home resting my foot. I got cabin fever, which is ironic because of all those months I’d chosen to stay home, in bed – sleeping and crying. This week, I likely should not be driving or on my foot as much as I am, but I’m burning a hole in the couch and staying at home is giving me terrible anxiety. I wish I could find a happy medium.

Perhaps I’m struggling with my upcoming 39th birthday. With saying I have no expectations from friends, but secretly having them. How effed up is that? Yup, I said it.  (More because people like BG and Lee, who I shouldn’t give a damn about, will forget. And for some reason, it will pain me.) With not being at a weight where I am comfortable? Where I am watching the fine lines grow deeper, despite the Retin-A I religiously dollop on nightly. Maybe I need to take R&F’s route and reflect on all of the positives the year of “38″ held.

Perhaps I’m having anxiety about the upcoming charity event for our school district that I’ve volunteered some time on. That one of my Bestie‘s is a Board Member on. I’m sitting at a table with friends, in the thick of things – my tickets are not General Admission, so I’m not with the masses. I know many of the 1,000 people going there yet I already feel so out-of-place. For no justifiable reason. I was never insecure like this.

PMDD anyone?

Meet the Parents: Mummy Dearest Style

As a “friend” prepares to have her parents and her intended’s meet, I thought I’d do a little throwback about when my parents officially met Hub‘s parents. It goes down in history as one of the most embarrassing nights of my life, yet Hubs still married (and kept) me.

We’d been together a couple of years already and our parents must have met prior to our engagement. It’s all a blur, and even without this story, I’m sure you know why. We became engaged in December of ’97. All four grandparents were alive and over the moon. They’d have the chance to see at least one of their grandchildren get married. They’d already met Hubs on numerous occasion and we had their blessing.

My parents, on the other hand, I’m sure that after they were blinded by my ring, saw big dollar signs and were not happy campers. It really must have hit them like a ton of bricks. We didn’t seek their approval as we wouldn’t have gotten it anyway. So what was the point? Surprisingly though, they pretended to be pleased. Secretly I think they were glad to have me off of their [responsiblity] list. I had already been off of their financial plan for a year or two.

Days after we were engaged, and a shocking move, my parents called Hubs’ parents and invited them to dinner in their neck of the woods – a good 60 miles away. My parents let me pick the restaurant and all parties agreed on a day that worked.

The Saturday night date quickly approached and Hubs and I piled in the car with his parents and sister for the journey. Had I known what was in store, had I known that Xanax existed, it would have been a different time and place.

We met my parents and then 18 year old sister at the designated venue. The “kids” down at one end, the parents down at the other. There was an undeniable tension when Hubs and I announced our chosen date a year and a half in the future. Dinner lasted forever.

Then the check came. And my whole world changed. My father, who had invited Hubs’ family, reached for the check. So did Hubs’ dad. And my father took his money. I was horrified. My mother was not raised like that. You don’t invite someone to dinner and then have them pay the bill, or split it. Or take money out.

I cried the whole way home. Silently. It was pathetic. It was nearly midnight when we returned to my townhouse. I grabbed the phone and dialed my maternal grandmother in New York – where it was 3 a.m. I told her everything about the evening – except the story of my sister’s new tattoo*.

She sobbed with me. Likely because she was as embarrassed as I was. The next day she called Hubs’ mom and invited them to dinner at her house the next time they were in town.

I suppose I should have known at that moment that I was nothing like my parents.

 

*Stay tuned for The Unlucky Tatto0.

Poor Me

A dab of Nars Orgasm on the lips. A quick feel of the elbows to make sure they are appropriately lubricated. A swig of water to wash down half of the lowest dose of Xanax known to man. It’s been a rough morning, and I’m only gearing up for the Kings game. We’re having company to watch the game, eat lunch and snacks and hang. Which is fine, because it’s absurdly hot and humid outside. I’ve got the a/c cranked down low. Hello, summer. I woke up with a terrible cramp in my left calf at 5 am. I hopped out of bed, forgetting that I had injured my other foot and the pain shot up throughout. I wasn’t off to a good start. Just as I was drifting back to sleep, Max – my SEVEN year old – came in to tell me he needed me to wipe him and that it was a messy one. I mean seriously. No one should have gotten out of bed today. The week itself has been rather hum-drum. Not driving has left me to my own devices, and while I haven’t eaten myself into oblivion, I’ve slept a lot and cuddled with my kids. Sadly Hubs and I have been arguing a lot, but this too shall pass, right? I think I’m having a lot of anxiety about school ending and my upcoming birthday. I just can’t put my finger on why. But I’m bitchy, I’m short. I’m emotional. I’m stressed. Admission is half the problem, right? Thankfully I have an appointment with the head doctor on Monday. I hope it’s a double.