Four Months Gone

Where did Summer go?    Sorry I haven't been on in forever, but life has been hectic and I've been OL for school and bill pay only for the most part.  Dad is doing better, he's finished w/chemo and radiation, his last treatment was 2 weeks ago.  His neck, mouth and throat are burned to a crisp and it's painful for him to talk and eat, so he's lost over 50 #s, but the docs are optimistic that they've got it all and now he just has to get his strength back.  He's really weak right now, but he is able to eat and hopefully his feeding tube will be able to be removed soon.  Thank you all for your prayers, I am faithful that he has beaten this thing.

In "me" news, I got an "A" in Advanced Pharmacology!  YEAH!  No small task, that class was killer!  So I kept my 4.0 gpa intact.  I was doing good on the diet and exercise track until this past month when my class was over.  I picked up tons of OT to make up for money that I won't be making once the quarter started back up and pay off my IRS debt and basically didn't work out or eat right all month.  SO, the quarter is starting back up tomorrow and today I went back to my trainer and I've kept on track eating-wise today, I'm getting ready to ship out to the grocery store to stock up on things in a few minutes.  I'm one of the rare homes in Central Ohio that didn't lose electricity when Ike decided to go north.

The marriage thing is in limbo.  IDK what to do, well, I do, but I just haven't.  We are living together, but it's not a marriage.  When we DO see each other, we fight.  I'm still really hurt by that stunt he pulled in April and I can't get over it and he's really doing nothing to help me get over it, no apology, nothing.  He hasn't been to see my dad or call him once since my dad's been going through all of this.  Then when I try to talk to him about it, he goes crazy and starts blaming me for all of the ills in his life and spewing venom like you wouldn't believe at me.  He's just turned into this angry, hateful person that I don't know who he is anymore and he's turned it all onto me, and believe me, he's dealt some low blows to me lately.  I know I'm not a perfect person, but I don't think I deserve half of what I've gotten and I wouldn't have dreamed of saying or doing some of the things he's said and done lately.  I really wish that he'd just go if he hates me that much.  I should have just let him stay gone the first time and I'd already be on with my life.  He's going back to Egypt in Oct.  I'm relieved for the break.  He's really succeeded in making me simply not care how our marriage turns out.  I am resigned to the fact that no matter what I do, I can't fix this by myself and if he has no initiative to help fix the problem, why should I care.

At any rate, I'm not dwelling on that subject for too long, because it will just frustrate me.  I'm back to school tomorrow, and I'm going back to day shift as of next week and a normal schedule, so I'm hopeful that I'll be able to focus a little time on me somewhere in between since I'll be sleeping on a "normal" sleep schedule and maybe have a little more energy.  I've been wiped out lately.  No good sleep, bad food, no exercise, stress.  I have little control over the stress lately, but the sleep, food, exercise thing are in my hands. 

I'll try to keep updates posted as much as possible, but I'm taking 2 classes this quarter, so my time is going to be pressed, unfortunately. 

Hope everyone had a great summer!  Here's to fall!

-Bethany

Dad -Thursday

Dad had a stress test and all is clear for surgery.  His surgery will be today at 4pm and then he will be admitted to the ICU afterwards for close observance since he had complications after the last 2 surgeries.  Please keep him in your prayers.

-Bethany

Dad's surgery....updates...

Well, dad's surgery has been post-poned pending cardiac clearance.  It's my fault, I raised concern that he has been through so much lately that I thought it would be safest if he had his heart checked out.  Well...after much pondering, the docs made an 11th hour decision to cancel the surgery for today and admit dad to the hospital and do a stress test tomorrow and make sure his heart is strong enough for surgery.  Dad isn't the happiest camper in the world that I interfered, but I have to look out for his best interest and my view is what's the use in taking out the cancer if your heart stops working or you have a bad stroke and can't function anyway?  At least now I'll feel better knowing that they checked him head-to-toe and made sure he was good to go before surgery.  SO, he's probably not going to have surgery until Thursday if the stress test is negative.

I'll post any new updates that I have as soon as I know.  As far as I am going...I haven't slept in 2 days and I fell into a bowl of mac and cheese and chocolate.  I need it.  I won't beat myself up for it.  I'll be better tomorrow.  But I need the comfort foods and chocolate today. 

Thanks for all of your support and prayers, please keep them coming.  I hope that the stress test is negative so that we can get that cancer out and get dad on his way to healing ASAP.

-Bethany

Dad's Surgery

The Doctor called this am, Dad's scheduled for OR tomorrow (5/20) at 1pm.  Please keep him in your prayers and thank you for all of your support, encouragement and prayers so far.

-Bethany

The Doctor Called...

My dad's PET scan results are back.  The cancer has spread into the lymph nodes in his neck., the good news in this being that this is as far as the cancer has spread so far.  He's going to have surgery this week, but we don't know a date or time yet.  After the surgery, he's going to have to have radiation therapy 5 days a week for 5 weeks.  My biggest concern is that he just had a stroke right before Easter and he's going to have to go off of his blood thinners pre-op, putting him at risk for another possible stroke.  I'm really upset because I noticed that lump on his neck months ago when I went to hug him and my hand brushed against his neck and it was big enough that I could feel it then.  I started getting onto his doctor then about it and he brushed it off and did nothing.  Now look where we are!  Would it have been so hard for his family Dr. to have listened to me then and maybe things wouldn't have gone so far?  I wish my dad would find a new family doc anyway, I've never been impressed with this one, but dad likes him.  I think he's negligent.  At least he's going to a good ENT that I know and know his reputation.  I can't tell you how many times I've caught stuff on my dad that he's over-looked.  It sounds like we're in for a long-haul, but Dr. Lowery says he has high hopes that he's going to be able to remove it all, so provided the surgery goes smoothly, it's going to be a long month with radiation, but he'll be okay. 

Please keep him and my mother in your prayers.  I'll post updates as I know anything.

Thank you all for your words of love and encouragement,

Bethany

I made the Sinner List!

Well, if I'm looking for good news, I cheated multiple times this week, didn't work out, and I lost 3.4 pounds at WI!  YEAH!  I don't know HOW I did it, but I'll take good news any way I can right now. :-)  I've have a "blah" week. 

It's been cold and rainy and dreary weather-wise, I didn't work out b/c TOM wiped out my energy (and stress) and I didn't get out w/friends & family as usual, so it was a great week for self-pity and giving in to temptations. 

Sunday was Mother's Day.  I went to my parent's church to be w/my mom and I opened up the church bulletin and under the prayer requests, there's a request to pray for ME because I was going through a lot of problems and needed saved!  OMG!  I could have crawled under the pew!  Here I am in a church where people barely know me b/c I don't go to my parents' church and I see my name on the sinner list!  ARRRGH!  My parents told me that they had actually said that I was going through a lot of struggles and needed God's help, not saving, and that the lady who does the prayer requests got it wrong, but none the less, it's a small church and it made for a very uncomfortable Sunday morning with everyone thinking that I was the prodigal daughter of the Rev. Crabtree, church elder, and his saintly wife, the piano player.   Then we had dinner at the Buxton Inn in Granville.  A beautiful historic Inn with great food and atmosphere.  Except that it happens to be where DH and I were married and we were seated at the table where we dined alone on our wedding night.  It took a lot for me to put that in the back of my mind and not ruin mother's day any more than I had after being indignant over making the sinner list.  But it did set my mood for the rest of the week, I think. 

On the marriage front, I don't know what's going on there.  He's distant and cold.  We hardly talk.  I'm losing my ability to care.  It's not good right now.  At least the small amount of time that we have interacted this week has been civil and no knock-down-drag-out fights like last week.  I haven't been to counseling in a couple of weeks...I go this Wed again.  I think I need to go, my head is getting all messed up and I need the objectivity.  My friends and family are invested in my best interest and they just want me to be done with my husband so that I can move on and be happy.  I want to be happy, but I want to be married and I'm not certain that DH and I can put happy and married in the same sentence when talking about the 2 of us.  He's said so many hurtful things lately that I'm not certain that I can get over all of that and pretend they were never said and that he never ran out on me when I needed him most.

As far as dad goes, he had a PET scan to grade the tumor and check for metastasis, but we still haven't gotten final results or a surgery date yet.  I'm just praying that the lump on his neck isn't metastatic and that it is a benign tumor.  And more importantly, I am praying that he has a smooth, simple surgery sans complications.  He's had such a rough few months and I just want him to be able to catch a break and have some time to feel healthy and better.  I'm trying awfully hard not to let my depression get in the way of my ability to be there for my parents and be strong for them.

I hate that my depression has returned just when I thought I had gotten over it.  Rearing its ugly head and trying to defeat me.  I just want to feel normal, no like this sad, self-pitying little person.  The doctor increased my Wellbutrin to the max dose now.  Of course, I'm hoping that it helps w/my weightloss and depression, too.  lol  I am concerned because I'm going to try to go back to school for summer quarter and I am worried about the juggling act that I'm about to take on by adding this stress.  The worst of it is that i'm worried that I'm going to fall back into my old eating hab

its and stop being active again.  I've been eating right and exercising with the exception of this week and I don't want to give that up.  Lord give me strength!

SO, please keep my father in your prayers.  I'm so worried about him and I just want him to be okay.  And pray that I am able to make the right decision about my marriage.  And pray that I can not give into the demon chocolate who offers to solve my problems but all he does is add pounds and inches! 

I am starting to pull out of my mully-grubs, so i'm hoping that I'll be back to a work-out routine and on plan soon.  I would love to hit my 10% by next WI! 

Well, I'm going to go to bed.  Have a great weekend, all!  I'm hoping that I can soon start having some happier news to start reporting!

Love,

Bethany

Where does the bad news end?

You ever had one of those days where you'd give your right arm if anyone would just tell you some GOOD news?  ARRRRGH!  I'm having one of those days. 

So to re-cap...in the past month...

-My dad had a stroke and wound up in critical care for 4 days

-I found out I owe $7500 in taxes

-DH packed his bags, said "I don't love you anymore" and left, then came back a week later and it's been little more than ice and fights since...with the occassional confusing and awkward moment of hope sprinkled in just to make me suffer, I think.

-I had to drop out of school because I had too much else going on and I didn't feel like spending tons of money on something I couldn't focus on.

So just when you think you've hit bottom...someone throws you a shovel to keep on digging!

My dad has been complaining of a sore throat for over a month now.  I noticed a lump on the outside of his neck that he brushed off and so did the doctor, pretty much.  Then he finally lets me look in his throat to see if he has strep or something and I notice that his right tonsil is WAY bigger than his left tonsil and it's occluding half of his airway.  So mom and I threatened him within an inch of his life and drug him kicking and screaming to the ENT doctor (Ear, Nose, Throat).  His appointment was yesterday.  Mom took him because I had to work.  The doctor did a biopsy because his tonsil looked suspicious.  Today, mom calls me at work in hysterics because the doctor called her on her cell phone WHILE SHE WAS DRIVING HOME FROM WORK (of course, he had no idea of knowing that, but I wish she had pulled over first!) and tells her that the biopsy results just came back.  And then the 2 words that you hope you never hear...it's cancer.  OMG  I thought I was going to get sick right in the middle of the ER.  It's cancer of the tonsil.  The ENT that he's going to is one of the best, I have a lot of confidence in him and I'm praying it is just localized and it will be a "simple" surgery...he'll have radiation therapy afterwards.  He has to go in for more scans to see how involved it is and if it's spread anywhere else...then we'll know more about when the surgery is and what to expect.  The good news is that it is a highly treatable cancer provided that it's caught in the earlier stages and has a >90% survival rate.  I feel so bad because I feel like he just hasn't been able to catch a break.  He's depressed enough after the stroke and now this!  Prayer is all we have right now, so I'm praying that he gets through this okay and keeps his spirits up because he's been easily defeated ever since his 1st stroke in 2005.  

Anyway, I'm just trying to hold it together and continue with counseling and try to be there for my family and figure out where my marriage is going.  The good thing is that during chronic stress, I eat like a pig, but during acute and HUGE stress, I forget to eat.  So maybe I'll at least lose weight.  (I have to hold onto some bright side)

Everyone, just please keep my dad in your prayers during this difficult time and pray that this is nothing hugely serious.

Thanks to all of you who have been sending hugs and prayers my way, they're much needed and appreciated.

Love, 

Bethany 

WI

OK, so I got my rear out of bed this am to go to the Thurs WI instead of the Sat WI eventhough I really wanted to get the true 1 week weight...but considering I'm working 3p-3a on Sat, I'm not convinced that I would be able to get my bum up in time to make the 10am meeting on Sat.  Since my insurance will only reimburse me if I go to 100% of the meetings for 10 weeks, I had to go today.  I stepped on my scale, which is usually right on target w/the WW scales this am and I was at 211.7 (that's 1.9 pounds down from Sat!  YEAH!), but the scales must have been reset over there, because my WI was 213, which is only 0.6 pounds down.  UGH!  SO, I'm posting the 211.7, which means I'm just 5.7 pounds away from my 10% goal of 206!  Sorry, WW, but your scales need calibrated!  lol  I'm still weighing myself on Sat for my weekly weight, today was just so that I could have documentation that I showed up.  Maybe under 210 by Sat?  Hmmmm....

Well, I'm going to bed, I need a nap before I go to work and I want to get u p in time for a short workout before I have to leave at 2pm.

Have a great weekend, all!

-Bethany

One Day At A Time

First of all, I'm re-arranging my blog and my goals.  It's part of my "house cleaning." I've decided to re-evaluate my life and my goals, and here's as good a place to start as any!  lol  I changed my goal weight, too.  I started WW at 228, my 10% goal is 206, so that's my first goal.  Once I reach that short-term goal, I'll change to my next goal.  I suppose that I feel more accomplished if I'm hitting more than one high and lofty goal, so I'm setting small goals in an effort to get to the big one.  And then there's the rest....

I don't even know where to begin.  The state of my marriage is a mystery to me.  As I said, DH moved back in after being MIA for over a week.  Then he moved back in, the house was ice cold.  Then Sunday, I see the first real sign that he actually wants to work to save our marriage.  We talked, well...we did more than talk..and I thought I could finally breathe, things maybe were going to be okay.  Then Monday comes...he's withdrawn again and we go back to not speaking, he's still in the guest room.  ARRRRGH!  I'm SOOOO frustrated.  Of course, everyone is wondering why I haven't filed for divorce already.  I don't know how to explain to people that this IS my marriage and it hasn't been all bad.  We were in love and something went terribly wrong.  We stopped being friends and spending time together.  We worked too much, stressed too much, began fighting.  I'm tired, he's tired, my dad's sick, both of his parents are sick.  The difference is, I live 10 minutes from my parents, he lives 10,000 miles from his.   He's homesick.  It all piled on him, and me, we forgot our marriage.  I'm hurt, but trying not to be extremely hard on him, eventhough he has said some awful things that I'm not certain I will soon forget.  But I DO want to save my marriage if there's anything left to save.  I don't want to spend the rest of my life living like we are now, I can't stand this much longer.  I'm laying low while the dust settles and I while I want to do all in my power to save my marriage, I do love my husband, I have made my peace with whatever happens and I am NOT going to save my marriage at the cost of losing myself and seeing me do 100% and him do nothing.  I'm certain of that.  I've been down that road once, I won't do it again.  I just wish he'd stop sending me such mixed signals.  Are we going to work on this together or not?!?!  I just wish I could get into his head and know what's going on inside of that brain of his.  Frustrating.

Meanwhile, I've continued couseling, although I cancelled today.  It was my only full day off, I wanted to sleep in and didn't feel like talking about my feelings, I just wanted to stay home.  I'll go to my next appointment, but not this week.  Instead, I slept, then I caught up on my shows that I had DVR'd and after that, my friend and I walked 4 miles at the park.  Now I'm back to being lazy.  Tomorrow is back to work. 

After the initial shock of the sudden break-up of my marriage, I am gradually moving back to 'normalcy,' whatever that is.  In keeping with my vow to lay low while the dust settles, I've taken a lot of my focus off of the state of my marriage...that sounds counter-productive, i know, but for the first time in ages, I'm focusing on me and what I want.  I need to find that out so that I can know where I want to move in the relationship department, too.  I am blessed because I have tons of supportive friends and family and I've been enjoying going out with my friends and having "girls nights out" and meeting my friends to go walking and support each other in our fitness and weightloss goals while we solve the problems of our lives and the world at the same time.  In the end, I can't make anyone happy if I am miserable and I've been miserable, I have been working insane hours and going to school and I forgot to take time out to have fun and be with friends.  We all need girl's nights out.  I've probably taken a few too many of them lately, but I'm making up for lost time!  lol  It showed on the scales last WI, I had only dropped 0.4 pounds, but since I had been exercising again, I must have counter-acted the partying.  lol 

While I'm unhappy about the state of my marriage and I'm back on my wellbutrin, I am generally feeling much better, as odd as that may sound.  I'm eating better, exercising, getting out more, and finding "me" again.  And if my husband would like to find me again, he knows where to look, but I'm not stopping my life while he makes up his mind.  I'm here for him, no matter what happens, I'll always be his friend, I think he knows that, but I also think that he needs to figure himself out and what his goals are, too.  Maybe we can talk then.  I'm trying to be patient, but it's hard, so I distract myself from the matter so that it doesn't eat me alive instead. 

SO, this week, I've stuck closer to my plan with only a couple of detours (thank God for flex points, I've used them all!), and I've been keeping my fitness goals, too.  I've worked out daily except for yesterday.  Which also happened to be my detour day.  I'm weighing in on tomorrow unless my "detour" is making me pay, then I'm waiting until Saturday, my normal weigh day.  But I'm hoping the scale shows a drop tomorrow, because I won't be home from work until 4 am on Sat am, and I am afraid that I won't wake up in time to make WI this week, and since WW charges you even if you don't WI, and my insurance will not reimburse me if I miss a WI, I need to go to one or the other, no matter what the scale says.  Maybe I'll go Thurs no matter what.  I'll see how the morning goes.  My whole life is about one-day-at-a time right now. 

SOOOOO...that's the long version of where I'm at.  The short version is that for once, things are going to be a little bit about me, too.  It's the only way I'm going to win this weight battle and maintain my mental health.  :-)

Hope everyone is having a great week so far!  I miss being active on here!

Lots of love,

-Bethany

Transitions...

Well, I have given up relaxing when I have a lull in my life because there's always something waiting around the corner to come and take it's place, hence the reason I haven't been on in a while and I'm just now getting into the "getting up and dusting myself off" phase of the drama.

The Cliff's notes version is this:  Spring Quarter started and we finally got around to doing our taxes after Dad had started to show that he was improving and becoming more independent...enter next drama.  We owe $7500 in taxes to the IRS and State ($5g to IRS, $2.5 g to State).  SO, I that pretty much means that I had to drop out of school Spring Quarter to work OT in order to pay the IRS what they feel that they are owed.  UGH!  That was April 8th, April 9th was my dad's birthday and per my usual, I was at my dad's helping him out and getting ready for my dad's b-day that evening.  While I was gone, my DH comes home in the middle of the day unannounced while I was gone, packed his bags, and left.  He waits until my dad's birthday party to call me and tell me that he doesn't love me anymore and when I get home, I'll find him gone.  Coward couldn't even tell me to my face and I was pretty much blind-sided.  While we have had our issues, we were, at least I thought, happy in general and I really didn't see him packing his bags in the middle of the day and sneaking out behind my back!  SO...he was gone a full week, we talked on the phone a couple of times, mostly arguments.  I couldn't hold it together at work and got sent home twice and wound up in counseling, back on anti-depressants, and xanax for panic attacks, a phenomenon that I experienced for the first time in my life after he left.   The week sucked, needless to say.  Just when you need your husband the most b/c your dad's sick, you owe the IRS a ton of money and you have to drop out of school because of money issues and what does he do?  Wait until I'm down and kick me in the teeth!

Fast-forward to Thurs of last week, the first day I felt like I could function w/out being heavily medicated and he calls me that morning out of the blue and wants to meet to "talk."  So contrary to my gut reaction to say "no." I met him for dinner that night.  We fought, then talked, and agreed that he would move back in, but to the guest room until we got things sorted out.  Well....let me say that when he left, I would have done anything to get him back b/c I loved him so much.  Now that he's back, I'm not so sure that's what i want b/c pretty much any trust that I had in him was completely destroyed in one day when he walked out that door behind my back and then called to say he didn't love me anymore and wanted a divorce.  I'm really just feeling stupid and used now.  Also, add to that we are supposed to be "working things out," but we don't talk to each other, are rarely in the same room together and when we are, it's ice cold and when I suggested marriage counseling, I might as well have asked him to cut out his spleen.  So we are currently tip-toeing around the proverbial big dead elephant and spinning our wheels for over a week now.  Our house is NOT a pleasant place to be.  I've been working and going out with friends in order to avoid it and true to his form, he's just working, which is what he always does anyway.  He works 16 hours, 7 days a week, and the little bit of time he is home, he's on the computer, watching tv, or talking on the phone.  Even when we have gone out to dinner, he talks on his phone or watches the tv in the restaurant and acts as if I'm not even there.  I'm beginning to think that his main purpose for moving back in had nothing to do with working things out, but more so to ease his conscience about leaving the way he did and so he could say "I tried and it failed."  Furthermore, he's been throwing little verbal barbs at me here and there and I'm wondering if he's just trying to throw me over the edge so that it will be me that pronounces the marriage dead instead of him.  It just may be working, too.

So what am I doing?  Well, since I haven't been eating d/t stress, I've lost 15 pounds.  I'm coping, I haven't been panicking, so I'm not taking the Xanax, I'm still on the Wellbutrin and I'm seeing a counselor so that I can at least figure out things for myself.  The good thing is that I have tons of friends and family for support and I've just been keeping myself busy to take my mind off of the things that are driving me crazy.  I'm going to try to go back to school this summer b/c I need my Pharm class of I will be set back an entire year for graduation, at least the class I dropped is not a pre-req for my clinicals.  I'm also teaching clinicals and I'm loving it, I have a great group of students and it makes for a fun work day.  As far as the marriage goes, unless I see significant improvement, or at least some move to make things right again from his side as well as mine, I don't see it lasting, to tell the truth.  He drove a stake through the heart of it when he did what he did and now he's showing no effort to try to resolve the matter, whatever the matter may be, with me.  I am determined that this is not gonig to be 100% me and Zero on his part.  I wasted 6 years of my life on marriage 1 doing that, I won't do it again.  He won't say "I love you" or "I'm sorry for what I did."  He thinks it's all me, all my fault and whatever he did, it's because I'm a bad wife that he did it.  He even went so far to say that it was my fault that my first husband "left me."  Well, I left him, first off, and he was abusive.  That was another blow to my initiative to try to resolve things.  I'm just worn out w/him and the marriage right now.  If he had been a BF, I would have never let him back in, I only did it b/c he's my husband and it's my marriage.   Perhaps doing it was a good thing b/c I can see things for what they are much more clearly now and see things as they are.  It's not what I'd like, the story-book ending w/my handsome prince, but maybe what he did is doing a favor for me.  Better to find out now than when I'm old and washed up, I suppose. 

So, for now I'm concentrating on paying the IRS, losing this weight and getting back into shape, getting back into school, and making it through one-day-at-a-time.  Whatever happens, I just want it to be the best decision and have no regrets.  I don't hate him, I still love him, but I have little trust in him.  He still won't tell me where he was that week, which makes me wonder about that, too.  We'll see.  I'm laying low until the dust settles and taking it from there.  I hope to be able to get back on here more often, too, because this blog is my support group therapy.  :-)  You all are great and thanks for taking the time to listen to me go on about my crazy life!

Have a healthy and happy week, all!  I'll try to catch up as soon as things settle down!

-Bethany