Personal Updates, New Year's Eve 2014

Things are settling down here (I am going to post personal updates here now so I will never be getting too personal on Facebook again after the events of last week!)

I want/need some time to be alone and relax and I know mom does too.
We go out at least once a day to shop or bank or see a doc or get medications or some other reason but the calls into the house have slowed and the constant stranger visits have all but stopped.

Only close family and two very good neighbors who have been so very helpful are still around, but keeping a distance.
Now it's usually mom who reaches out during her daily call marathons every afternoon (I counted 8 outgoing calls yesterday afternoon!)I sometimes get to watch a show or play a game but one day we'll settle into a routine where I'll put some more time back into my friends.
I do everything I can for her around here (NO COMPLAINTS!) but when all of that is done or I need to wait (early morning and places aren't open yet or late and they're already closed) I go upstairs to either try to rest, organize my little space, or just cry a little.

Mom knows I'm here, a yell up the stairs is all it takes and I am always ready to run downstairs (well, limp) and do whatever needs doing.

The slower pace seems to be letting me gain some strength back, but my achy arms & legs still need a bit of a break.

Sometimes it's easy to forget that I am still sick myself.
Although the kidney stone fragments are nearly all out (I hope - I passed just a little bit this morning) I still rely on the Percocets. I will have to call in for ANOTHER frakking prescription on Friday.
I try to hold out as long as possible every morning to see how bad the pain really is, but I can't hold out for very long :(

At least in the afternoons/evenings (depending how much we do when we go out) I have been able to cut back and it's longer between doses, but to still have to rely on them depresses me.

Everything else seems to be getting better.

The daily crying bouts have stopped and come irregularly now (mostly in the morning, when I wake up from the pain and can barely roll myself out of bed and that first minute of trying to stand up!)

Overall, things are getting better day by day, things are slowing down for both mom & I which is good.

I will get mom back on a somewhat regular pre-death/stroke routine after the new year when her Senior Group meetings and Senior Yoga treatments start back up.

One of my most helpful neighbors, Donna, from down the street called me after I dropped mom off at church last Saturday night to tell me not to come back to pick her up that she was there too and would bring mom home. That was great. I am not religious, but I respect mom's want/need to go to church, and I'm glad she does and I'm only too happy to bring her & pick her up, but as I explained to her (and she understands) that I would feel hypocritical for me to just stand there while the mass was going on - just going through the motions (standing, sitting, kneeling, etc) but not uttering the words seems wrong and I'd start getting lectures from others about why and I don't wish to be rude, in a church, explaining that I don't believe and why.
I went to Christmas Eve Mass with her, I could not let her be alone for that, but with regular masses I just can't do it.
Knowing now that Donna goes to mostly the same mass every week (when she can and her work doesn't change it) I feel better knowing she'll be going with a friend, someone I like and trust.

You can't drive for 6 months after a stroke, and I know that hurts mom in that she feels restricted (I certainly would not take the news of not being able to drive very well!) but I always have and always will take her where ever she needs/wants to go.
Mom's feeling better, I still feel like shit, from kidney stones to general body aches and pains, but we're both alive and taking it day by day - what more could you ask for?
That's all for this week.
Have a great day everybody who reads and have a Happy (and SAFE) New Year's Eve!

Let's all have a better 2015!!!