Friday, February 24, 2012

Quick Note

Just a quick note - heard from my neurologist today - I'd had an EEG Monday - evidently I'm still having seizure activity, which is not good news. I'll meet with her next week and we'll discuss the next step...

Friday, February 17, 2012

Not happy

So last night I went through the box of things belonging to my grandmother that was given to me at her funeral. I'd been through it once before, briefly. There are a lot of pictures in it - mostly of me. There's also her Bible - which I'm thrilled to have!

But there's also stuff I'm not so thrilled about. My aunt let me know that my mother (from whom I've been estranged for 20 years) picked out the items and packed the box. Really, now. So I went back through it with a more cynical eye. Yes, the pictures are okay, I guess. As I said, the bible is a treasure. The cards she picked out but never got to send to us are nice.

And then are are the OTHER things. Like the pin she obviously never wore - the cheap costume zebra pin (editorial comment, mother?) still in the plastic bag. (Like it came from a cereal box!) Or the card from someone I don't even know. Or the teddy bear pilgrims that I never saw displayed. Or the ten commandments decorative plate. Really? But my favorite is the picture of a truly adorable child that ended up in my box, but I have no idea who it is. I can only assume the picture came to me because the child is African-American. Come on.

It's like my mother looked at some random, leftover stuff and threw it in the box - hey, give it to Chris - she'll never know the difference!

My grandmother was afraid something like this would happen, I think. She did give me some things before she passed, and I am so glad she did, because otherwise I'd have nothing that SHE wanted me to have.

I have to wonder what the other grandkids received in their boxes. I'm not trying to be greedy, by any means - I'm not looking for treasure, or money, or jewelry. I just want something to remember her by. Something sentimental or meaningful, or significant. Something I can pass down to my boys. Certainly not plastic teddy bear pilgrims! Is that too much to ask or expect from someone who was such a huge factor in my life?

Monday, February 06, 2012

Paring down *edited*

And another one gone...

I've been cutting back on activities lately, in an effort to reduce my stress levels so as to keep my seizure level lowered. Evidently, a higher stress amount leads to a higher number of seizures. Which is bad. So. In addition to the numerous activities (or should I say inactivities - LOL!) that have been imposed upon me by the medical community, I've taken a hiatus from singing on the praise team, and I've asked the boss to lessen some of my responsibilities - if not remove them completely - at the ol' jobarooni. And yesterday, I let go of another one.

If you've read my blog in the past, and I highly doubt that there's many folks still out there who have, but if there are, you know that I've been involved in working with the women's ministry for a number of years. And that our big annual event - our retreat - happens in late winter/early spring. And as you may have deduced, I'm out. With a very heavy heart, I stepped down from leadership of the women's ministry. With less than two months before the retreat. Hated to do it, but there was really nowhere else to cut back.

I'm still going to help out and act as consultant, but we actually have a planning committee in place this year for the first time, and I've begged them to own this event and to run with it. As for the rest of the ministry, I know the other women in the body will step up. I KNOW they will! Hopefully, sometime, I'll be able to add more things back to my schedule, when I feel I can handle them, and my health will allow.

I met with the sister who volunteered by default as leader of the planning group and kind of brought her up to speed with what was left to do, and what I did in the past. I offered to do some stuff, you know, keep track of this or that, do that, organize that, print those, whatever...and she, very helpfully, just kept saying, "no, thank you." This must be what empty-nest syndrome is like...*sigh*