He's leaving me.............

This is for Antony, AKA, Ahmed, A-town, Cotton, Pizza, and the rest of my boys that I have gotten to know in the last 3 years.

On Thursday, May 12 2011, I watched as my 15 year old 1st born son, became a 2nd class petty officer and his unit won the most distinguished unit award since 2007.

Watching the ceremonies, and awards being given, the slide show of the past year, and seeing all the kids, I have driven around to parking duties, volunteer clubs, food drives, and other ROTC events, it struck me so hard that my son is a young man, and will be leaving me in 2 years, My heart broke. Sitting there with tears streaming down my face, I thought.. wow. He's a young man, and going on with his life, and what the F*K am I going to do with out him???

Antony.. What to tell you about this kid. I fought for him my whole life, his whole life, and when things got rough for us this past year, he stepped up and became my rock. He's an amazing young man. (I know, I call him a boy) but he's not, he's so much more.

He's smart, intuitive, sensitive, strong, and loyal. He's a smartass, like me, he knows how to roll with the punches, and he's tough. I taught him how to love life, no matter what comes our way, and he does.

I never thought I would miss my kids. I love them all in different ways. Krystal is my 1st born daughter, and I am proud as hell of her. Antony is my 1st born son, and again, I am proud as hell of him. Jacob, is my 1st born son by Paul, and so he holds a special place too. Gabriel is the baby of the family, and of course, also holds a that special place. Alexis, is my 1st born grand child, another special place.

I am not your typical soccer mom, not June Cleaver, nor Betty Crocker, HA! Nope.. so I never thought I would miss my kids in the typical way a mother does. Honestly, I can't stand my kids 1/2 the time. They drive me bat shit as my Favorite Aunt would say.

My parents raised me with strong ethics and morals, Church and family, that was #1, and roots. I hated it. I swore to god I was NOT going to be like my parents. I was not going to raise my kids the way they did. I would NOT have empty nest syndrome! Well I F*Ked that one up. God just laughed at me again. Oh, I didn't raise them EXACTLY like mom and dad, who by the way have been married 58 years this year, and still kicking, but somewhere in there, I think I got it right, which just messed up my plans of wanting my own life.

I will miss the HELL out of Antony, and I suppose, the other kids when it is their time to fly the coop.

Slow my Roll... ... it's complicated!

This will be a short one, but had a discussion last night with someone I care about a lot. Maybe to much right now, but rolling with it. Am I real? Yeah, as real as you can get. Loyal, blunt and have a wild streak a mile wide.

BUT, here's the deal, The people in my life are here for a reason, long term or short term, and I am good with that. This goes back to my blog on goals. Anyway, << hate that word, but have stuff to do, so again, this is a quick one.

I am who I am. You'll not find another like me. Maybe, but doubtful. Independent, strong willed, opinionated, but open to anything anyone wants to throw at me. Good, bad, or indifferent. I can deal. Mature enough to know what I want out of life, and smart enough to get it, and I will. Eventually.

Kids raised, schooling, Paris, license, and a man. Yea... a man, but not full time. Maybe eventually, but yeah.. we'll see.

So to this I add, I love the ones I had, I love the the one I'm with, and I will love the one in the future.


Rock and Roll Drummer man~Live to the music! Loving life~

Goals

Today is the day..... back to the Doctor. I have to say, this is a scary one for me, and something I rarely admit. My side is killing me, and I went cold turkey off all meds last July. I don't want meds again. I want my license and Paris, and ... yeah, Rick... eventually when we can mesh things together.

What I don't want is chemo. I swore to god they had better come up with something more effective, and as far as my research goes, they have not. I know this is back, I can feel it. I hate it, and I don't want it. It scares the shit out of me. I will NOT go back on chemo, so if any of my friends have links or advice or anything else that will get me through this holistically, then put them on here. I cannot take care of my kids and business, schooling and Paris if I am on chemo, won't work, and I refuse to give into this illness.

They call doctors practitioners for a reason, so, guess what? I can practice to, and google gives me a bevy of information on what I have and what I can possibly do to get me through this.

What I have? Retro peritoneal fibrosis. You can look it up, but basically it absorbs my internal organs. It is inflammation of internal organs and my spleen is gone, and now it is on my kidney and liver. WOW... did I say that out loud? Ya... I did. Sigh. Have to say, this sucks, but I will beat it. I did once before, and I will again.

It is an inflammation between the lining and the back wall of the peritoneum. On top of this, I have Raynauds and all this, together puts me at risk for a host of other cancers like non Hodgkins lymphoma, rare blood cancers, oh, and my recent fun with skin cancers. Basil cell is non invasive and easily taken care of, but not mine. Apparently I am an anomaly. Mine is invasive, just as invasive as melanoma. Hence my not being able to be out in the sun much, which annoys the crap out of me, because I LOVE the sun.

So, here's my thought... screw it! I will do what I can on my end, but I will NOT go on Chemo, and I will NOT give up my sun. I will however do everything else suggested.

Cats out of the bag. Have fun with this one, I know I will..... It's part of life.

Here is a link, and yes, mine is idiopathic, never been to the middle east and never did cocaine.http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmedhealth/PMH0001497/

Back to reality........ I'm putting friends on notice

I'm going to start this with a little caveat here. This in no way will change the core of who I am.

With that being said, I had quite an epiphany yesterday.

As most of you know, since the split with my husband, I have done some re-defining of my priority's and goals. However, those are being slowly de-railed due to me putting my self last. Of course we know my kids are 1st, but with 4 of them, in different schools, activities, and going in different directions, no help and dealing with a house that has been slowly falling apart, dealing with things left behind, clean up, and purging, plus trying to get in me time, things are getting out of hand.

My health is now becoming a major issue in the derailment of what I want, so I need to stop. Just stop, and focus again. This has not been by any means on purpose or easy to do what with all that I still have left to deal with here on the home front, but after realizing that I am now in a size 24" jeans, Its time for me, or I won't make it, and I have to make it for my kids, because there is no one else.

A lot of my close friends are aware of my illness, and I have always been pretty private about it, but here's the thing, when it has come to the point where it is affecting what I want, who I want, and where I want to be in life, it's time for help, and asking for help, and TRUST ME, I HATE asking for anything. I have always done things on my own. Even in my past relationships, I was the one who made things happen, got things done, or just moved on because it was not where I needed to be.

So beginning on Monday, I am making calls to my doctor whom I have not seen since November. I will be calling in favors for help with the schedule and kids. (which is another hard thing for me to do) but nuff said. There you go..... me time.

New begginings ... cont. ....god has a plan

So interesting story here; Since Paul had moved out, just about everything that could go wrong at the house, did. Oh lets see, electrical shorts, stove breaking, home invasion, (which entailed a new back door) all "his" stuff piled in back yard, and runs to dump to get rid of junk that was left behind.. ect.. been on the constant move here in the last 6 months.

I have doctor appointments and referrals put on hold, classes and schooling, just to keep up with the kids schedules. During all this time, I have also on the weekends that he had the children, gone out with my girlfriends and had fun. I had no intentions of meeting anyone or dating for that matter. To much to do, and with the way things were handled, I figured the kids needed at least one solid force in their life. Me.

So about a month ago, my daughter was up, and we did go out when the kids were home. Mostly cause Papa and other family was always around and I hadn't seen her in about 2 years. Since she left, I had decided to file for divorce. I know I lost Paul along time ago, and was at a turning point in re-defining what I wanted.

Let me back track a sec.. I have a group of people that I do hang with, and we all have a good time, and sorta look out for each other. Another good friend was talking to me about the electrical in my home, and we were trying to schedule when that could happen. In the meantime, I had hooked in with some old friends from the 80s on facebook, and have a bunch of musician friends I have re-connected with. Well one of them, I had added, and he messaged me about a week ago about my Harley shots. Asked if I ride. I do, but the bike is no-longer here, it was Paul's dream, and although we bought it together, I gave it to him when he left.

Now to the un expected. The electrical. The man who emailed me about the Harley, I happened to mention my electrical. He knows how to fix it, so he said he'd come up and take a look. As soon as he got here, my heart stopped. Wow, was all I could think, This is NOT what I need, but oh.. I am such a liar.. it was. It took about a week of back and forth and both of us denying that we had anything, and finally, I called him after a particularly rough evening with the lawyers, and he met me up in Everett. Since then we finally acknowledged how we felt, Ha.. a week, wow, but this is one amazing guy, and so yeah... there ya go, God did have a plan in all this.

Now to make it all fall into place with my goals, and his.

Yeah... he's a drummer, go figure.

By the way, yes, he has met the kids, and they are happy that mom is not going to grow old and become a crazy cat lady. (My Granddaughter told the school counselor that)

New Beginning's........OMG... the dog.

Alrighty then, this is it folks. Time for a new start and a re-defining of life as I knew it.

As some of you know, my husband and I separated in November of 2010. This separation actually started in Jan of 06, but I was apparently oblivious to what was happening. Oh, I saw some signs of things happening, but what, was not definable. He actually told me on September 29th of 2010, after a camping trip we took. Then continued to stay here. The day after Thanksgiving he said he was moving home to his mothers.

So, I had started a blog awhile back on inspiration, and decided I didn't need it. There were to many in-consistency in what was being said and what actions were taking place for me to think that we may have had a second chance at anything. No regrets here by the way. We had something, and now we don't. Time to move on.

This is where things get a little hinky, but it is what it is. I won't go into the details, because I refuse to degrade what my husbands choices are at this point, but for me, I am done, whether he thought he was or not.

Enough is enough. My priority's have always been the same. Kids 1st, then family, and ect... Now it is Kids, Job, and someday, one day, who knows when, a man that knows how to be honest and real, no games, and will accept me for me. Strong, independent and at times opinionated, but loyal and honest. Take it or leave it. Not marriage, at least that is not on my mind now.... and won't be until the kids are grown and gone, but I will have a man. Period.

So, no more inspiration blog, and going over memory's of my life as it was, it is from today forward. Anyone who knows me, truly knows me, knows I don't go back, I move on. I have always been that way.

So Chin up, boobies out, (as Oshun says) and on with life! We only have one, and my husband is correct in saying that.

This is my family. I love them.
Signing off for now~ Loving life!

Life changing events

I just finished reading a blog about an event that change a friends life, and I am now following it for inspiration.

This is a story of my life changing event.

15 years ago on Nov, 11th 1997, I met the man of my dreams. 14 years ago, on the 8th of January, we made a life commitment to each other. 13 years ago, on the 1st of February, I married him. We had a fairytale romance, and a beautiful little boy by June of 1999.

We were living in a rental home in Everett, and my husband decided that he wanted to go to college in Arizona for his Harley Davidson accredited mechanics degree. So we moved into his parents to save the money. During the time we were living there, my son who was 3 at the time, and in pre-school, mentioned something to the school counselor that changed the course of my husbands dreams. By the time we made it through the courts with my sons father, and a separation forced on us after 8 months, my husband was allowed to move back in with me. Also during this time, our son, Jacob, ended up with a ecol i and we almost lost him. He was 7 months old at the time. We missed each other terribly. It was a difficult time, and we did the best we could to get through it.

From his parents home, we then moved to a trailer with my son and our son. He has a daughter from a previous marriage, and we had her on weekends. We lived in the trailer home for 3 years, and had a second son. A month prior to giving birth to my second son, Gabriel, We took my oldest daughter's daughter in at the age of one. I had Gabriel on Oct. 29th 2001, and then on the 11th of Nov. 2001, I was sick at my husbands birthday and so I was rushed into the doctor. It took them 8 months to figure out what was wrong with me. I had an auto immune disorder that absorbed internal organs. My spleen was missing and I was on oral Chemotherapy. I took care of 4 children now, all under the age of 5. A newborn, a one year old, a 3 year old and a 5 year old, and drove them back and forth to school and activities, while my husband worked a job he hated. He would come home and take over for me so I could rest. I was also on very strong pain medicine back then. One night my husband had gone up to the store for me and his daughter to buy ice cream, when he came home, he was dancing. I loved him so much right then. He came in the door, and had a huge grin on his face. He had bought, not only the ice cream, but a dollar scratch ticket and won 5000.00! One of his other dreams was to build his own Harley,he already had the frame, from taxes from 1999 and with the 5000.00 we got the engine and tranny. No one in his life had ever backed him with his dreams.

I never lost sight of my marriage or my vows to my soul mate. This was forever. Amen.

In May of 2003, I asked if we could move to a house, we were squished in the trailer, and things were hard all the way around. We made a move to a house that was built in 1910 and we loved it. It had room for the kids, and us, a yard, and a creek. It was wonderful. My husband had worked for a different fence company for awhile, and then went back to the original one that he worked at when we lived at the trailer. During all these years, we had family reunions, took trips to North Dakota every year and made beautiful memories.

Life moves on.... to life changing events, cont....