This Body is Bullshit

Thursday morning I went over to my dad and Kathy’s. Kathy was leaving for her Florida fun trip. Matt came with me because he was installing her new dishwasher and working on the bathroom renovation, and I was there to sit with my dad, get him cleaned up and ready for the day before he went back to the respite facility.

I knew this was going to bother me. I hate sending him there even though I know all the reasons it makes sense. Kathy needs a break. I can’t take care of him by myself. He was fine there last time. It’s safe. I know all of this. I still hate it.

The two guys who came in the transport ambulance were these cute young guys, incredibly kind. My dad was actually pretty alert that morning, so I wanted to try to let him know what was happening. I told him he was going to the doctor, that an ambulance was coming to pick him up, that he’d be staying a few nights, and that I’d see him soon. He just nodded and said okay. I’m taking that as a win because if he actually understood what was happening, he would have said absolutely not, you’re out of your fucking mind, and fought all of us.

I hated watching them load him in. I hated watching the door close. I hate those transport ambulances in general. I’ve had to ride in them two or three times myself. Weird that I can’t remember exactly how many, but I absolutely remember the one where I puked all over myself. Some memories earn permanent storage space.

I didn’t cry when they drove away, though. I turned around to go back inside and realized Matt was standing right behind me. He was crying. That got me.

We went inside and he held me and told me how bad he felt about everything I was going through and that he loved me, and then apologized for being a jerk lately, which was incredibly sweet and also made me want to ask: if you KNOW you were being a jerk, why were you being a jerk?

If I notice Matt seems crabby or off and I bring it up, his immediate response is that absolutely nothing is wrong, followed by being annoyed that I suggested something was wrong, which I feel sort of proves my original point. But standing there that morning, none of that really mattered. He was sad for me. He saw what was happening. He was hurting because I was hurting. And sometimes I forget how much all of this affects him too. My dad isn’t his dad, but he loves him. He loves me. He loves Kathy.

I’ve been thinking a lot about people showing up lately. Maybe my dad actually likes the respite facility. That thought occurred to me after I got over my own feelings about it. Maybe there are people around. Maybe someone talks to him. Maybe he gets a little social fix, because one of the really sad parts of all this is that hardly anyone comes to see him. This man used to take George into the woods for two hours because he would stop and talk to every single person who crossed his path. He drove Kathy crazy going out to dinner or drinks because he talked to everybody in the restaurant. The people at Home Depot probably think he died because he used to go there three times a day. He was relentlessly, joyfully social.

Now his world is basically his bedroom. Two of the guys he used to work with, Leo and Jose, have come to see him. Watching them with him was incredibly sweet. They sat next to him, talked to him, held his hand and prayed for him. Patrick asks about him all the time and says his heart is broken, but when he comes by he doesn’t really go into the room and interact with him. I understand. It’s hard. People don’t know what to say or how to act around someone who used to be one person and now seems like someone completely different. And if you loved who they used to be, seeing what a disease has done to them can be brutal.

But sometimes you have to do the hard thing anyway.

It reminds me of Drew after his accident. God-awful. Tragic. There were people who didn’t visit or call because they couldn’t handle seeing him that way. I understood it even then, but I also saw how much it hurt him. He lost friends during the hardest time of his life. Once Drew got to RIC, I took Grace to see him even though she was really young. I wanted to normalize it for her. This was Uncle Drew Drew. He was still Uncle Drew Drew. He just happened to be in a wheelchair. And all these years later, he remains in that chair. He’s been hospitalized so many times for so many reasons, and I’ve made it my mission to be there. I may not see him as much as I’d like in regular life, but put Drew in the hospital and I will be by his side. Seeing what happened to him after his accident taught me something about showing up when things are uncomfortable.

I may have also been slightly dramatic with Kathy’s birthday post on Facebook and on the Instagram page I run for my dad. I really leaned into what she’s carrying as his caregiver and what this disease is doing to both of them. I wanted people to know. Kathy has been surprised that more people haven’t reached out to her, but maybe they didn’t know how bad things had gotten. Maybe they didn’t understand what her day-to-day life actually looks like.

Well. Now they do. Kathy deserves to be seen too. And guess what? People reached out.

I believe that everyone’s pain is their own. Something doesn’t have to be the worst thing that has ever happened to be a big deal to the person living it. You can’t compare pain. I believe that genuinely. And then sometimes someone tells me what they’re devastated about and a small voice in my head says, Are you fucking kidding me right now?

One of the quotes I’ve saved lately is:

“Don’t let your empathy rob people of experiencing the consequences of their actions.”

Because I can understand why someone did something and still be hurt by it. Understanding someone doesn’t mean excusing them. Empathy doesn’t mean carrying everybody else’s stuff. I probably need to work on that one.

Anyway. Back to Matt.

While he was hugging me Thursday, he said he wanted to take me out later. I appreciated the thought and also knew there was a solid chance this wasn’t actually going to happen. I ended up taking the rest of Thursday off, got some things done, picked up George, my dad and Kathy’s counter-surfing dog, who was staying with us while Kathy was gone. When I got home, Matt had clearly worked his ass off all day, so we weren’t going anywhere. Fine. We don’t really go out on school nights. But he said tomorrow night.

Friday was a genuinely good day at work. I love my work family. Drew—the work husband, not to be confused with Drew, my brother from another mother—and I went to lunch. I left the office a little early and announced to the guys that Matt was taking me out that night. Got home. Matt looked exhausted.

He had gone back to my dad and Kathy’s, finished the work there, mowed our lawn and vacuumed the house because he is Matt. He probably did laundry too. I asked if we were going out. He was not really up for it. I was disappointed. Genuinely. But I was also tired, so I let it go. I went upstairs, doomscrolled and put senseless TV on in the background. About twenty minutes later, he came upstairs. “Let’s go out.” I said no because I knew he didn’t want to.

But he said he hadn’t been thinking about Blume and Ferris that I briefly snuck in prior to my disappointment, this great little brewery and Irish pub we’d found the week prior in the next town, and suddenly he did want to go. So we went.

We ordered food, had a couple of half-and-halfs because apparently we don’t call them Black and Tans anymore—noted—and listened to a band playing Mumford & Sons and Fleetwood Mac with an Irish accent. And of course, Galway Girl. They were really good.

Sitting at that brewery, we got into one of my favorite recurring conversations: Matt’s invisible rule book. Why can’t we move to Ireland? No, seriously. Why can’t we sell the house and do van life for a while, and if we hate it, we stop? Why can’t we just go somewhere and try something completely different? Who made these rules?

Matt seems to believe there is a handbook somewhere explaining how adults are supposed to live—house, jobs, plan, follow the plan. Meanwhile, I’m sitting there thinking, but WHY? If it were entirely up to me, Frank and I probably would have gotten in my silly little car a long time ago and taken off like Suleika Jaouad did with her dog. I don’t even know where we’d go. That’s sort of the point.

Maybe I think about this more now because life has made it painfully obvious that none of us knows how much time we have. Dad certainly didn’t plan to spend this part of his life in a bedroom with frontotemporal dementia. So why are we all so committed to following rules nobody actually wrote? We did not solve this at the brewery. We were home before dark, obviously. But we stopped at Dairy Queen on the way.

Saturday Matt went golfing, and I had a few hours alone with the dogs. I listened to my audiobook, laid in the sun and found a monarch caterpillar on my milkweed. A monarch caterpillar! So exciting!

Then I met Jill and Amy at the La Grange sidewalk sale, where we bought matching $10 dresses that Jill hates. Which obviously means we absolutely have to wear them together and document it photographically. Which was the plan the whole time. Then we went to the new truck stop for dinner, ordered a bunch of things, ate picnic-style and laughed the whole time. Find yourself friends you can go to a truck stop with.

After that, I ran to La Grange Park because Ryan was performing at a benefit concert for a friend who died by suicide. I walked up right as he finished. Missed the whole thing. Felt terrible. But he was just happy I came, and that made me feel a little better. I got to talk to Heather’s mom for a while—that woman has more energy than people half her age—hugged Heather and Rusty, and headed home.

Sunday I went down to Grace’s. We walked the 606, got three miles in, went to brunch, went to Margie’s Candies for the first time, and I rode a Chicago city bus for the first time. I don’t know how I have made it to fifty years old without doing that.

A whole weekend of ordinary things. And it was really nice.

Somewhere in there, I realized how much those ordinary things matter. A beer with my husband. Dairy Queen. A monarch caterpillar. Matching dresses and dinner at a truck stop for photo ops with friends. Walking through Chicago with my daughter. Maybe those are the things keeping me from falling apart. Or maybe I don’t need to be falling apart in the first place. I still haven’t figured that one out.

Which brings me to another quote I saved:

“Life is a constant cycle of losing your spark and finding it again.”

Maybe you don’t permanently find your spark and live happily ever after sparkling like some asshole. Maybe you lose it. Find it. Lose it again. Find a little piece of it somewhere completely unexpected.

I’ve also gotten completely sucked into the audiobook The Fourth Monkey. It’s set in Chicago and it is absolutely insane. I was telling Grace about it Sunday, and she looked it up and found out it’s the first in a series. IT’S THE FIRST BOOK IN A SERIES. I am hooked. When I’m not listening to psychopaths, I’m currently watching Furious, Lucky, and Lioness.

My camera roll remains a combination of people I love, dogs, meaningful quotes and completely inappropriate things.

For example:

“A mastectomy is not a free boob job.”

Correct.

And then there was possibly one of the finest educational songs I have ever encountered:

C is for cunt.
U is for ur a cunt.
N is for not sure if u know this but ur a cunt.
T is for turn around and fuck off mate coz ur a cunt.

I don’t know what to tell you. Sometimes just art finds you.

I still don’t know if my ability to keep going is resilience or medication or a trauma response or denial or emotional intelligence or sheer stubbornness or some combination of all of them. And yet I had a good weekend. I laughed. I went out. I sat in the sun. I found a caterpillar. I spent time with my husband and my friends and my daughter. Maybe the good stuff doesn’t wait politely for the bad stuff to finish. The bad stuff may never completely finish. So I don’t want to wait.

.

I am so fucking tired. Not regular tired. Not “I stayed up too late” tired. My body feels slow and sluggish and heavy. Everything hurts. Everything aches. There are mornings when getting my ass out of bed feels like the first major accomplishment of the day, and the day hasn’t even fucking started yet. I’ve talked before about sitting on the floor of the shower until the water runs cold. I still do that. Not because I’m crying or having some dramatic breakdown. I just sit there because getting up feels like too much effort. I think about staying in bed. A lot.

Lately the fatigue has gotten bad enough that I’ve caught myself almost falling asleep driving. That’s scary. I know that’s beyond just being tired. I don’t know how to get rid of it. I don’t know if it’s my medications, lack of sleep, hormones, stress, my body being put through absolute hell for the last several years, or some fantastic combination of all of the above.

But here’s the weird part. Once I get my ass up and going, I’m up and going. I shower. Get dressed. Go to work. Go to my dad’s. Take care of the dogs. Worry about my friends. Try to do some sort of workout. Make plans. Laugh. Have fun. Handle whatever needs handling. Once I’m moving, I don’t really have time to be sad or mad or dwell on the fact that my body hurts and I’m fucking exhausted. It just becomes background noise. It’s every day.

And maybe that’s what has me thinking about something else lately. How come I always seem to be fine? Sometimes I think I have too much emotional intelligence. My empathy is off the fucking charts. I can usually understand everyone’s side. I can see why people behave the way they do even when they’re behaving like complete assholes. I worry about people. I think about things they’ve told me days later. I want to help. I want to support them. I want to fix things for the people I love.

I love everybody. I just really want to love everybody from my house sometimes. Because I’m also an introvert. A serious one. I can desperately want to be there for someone while simultaneously not wanting to put on pants and leave my house. Apparently wanting to be there for someone and wanting to physically go there are two very different things.

But lately I’ve started wondering where all this empathy and emotional intelligence actually came from. Is some of it a trauma response? Is it a survival mechanism? Did I learn a long time ago how to read a room because I needed to? Did understanding everybody else’s moods and reactions make things easier? Did I get really good at anticipating what people needed and adjusting myself accordingly? Or am I just empathetic? Probably some combination of all of it. Who the fuck knows. But then there’s another part of me that is significantly less enlightened. I am the first person to say that everyone’s problems are their own. If something feels huge in your life, then it’s huge to you. Your head and your heart don’t operate on some universal suffering scale. Someone else having cancer or losing a parent doesn’t mean you’re not allowed to be devastated because your marriage is falling apart or your kid is struggling or you lost your job or whatever is breaking your heart. I genuinely believe that. And then sometimes someone tells me what they’re completely losing their shit over and inside my head I’m thinking: Are you fucking kidding me? You have no idea.

I know. That’s shitty. Apparently I can be empathetic and judgmental at exactly the same time. Another fun little personality feature. There are just days when I’m so tired and my body hurts and I’m worried about my dad and Kathy and my friends and work and family and everything else, and somebody is devastated about something that, from where I’m standing at that particular moment, seems incredibly fucking fixable. My emotionally intelligent self knows pain is pain. My exhausted self thinks, Oh honey. Trade me. Both of those people live inside me.

And maybe that’s why I’ve started wondering if I’ve done myself an injustice by always being okay. Because I watch other people cry. Rage. Completely fall apart. And sometimes I wonder why I didn’t. I’ve been through things that should have knocked me flat. Some of them did for a minute. But then I got back up and did whatever came next. So where is all of it? Did I actually process it? Did I shove it somewhere? Am I just wired differently? Did I learn a long time ago that falling apart wasn’t particularly useful, so I stopped doing it? Is it the Venlafaxine? Is that turning down the volume on everything? Am I emotionally healthy, incredibly resilient, or slightly numb? Am I really good at processing things, or am I just really fucking good at functioning through them? I honestly don’t know.

Maybe that’s why I notice it so much when somebody else completely falls apart. Part of me envies it. Not the pain, obviously. The ability to just fucking lose it. To cry and scream and say I can’t do this and let somebody else figure shit out for a minute. I don’t really do that. I figure shit out. And I don’t say that like it’s some admirable quality. I’m starting to wonder if maybe I’ve made being “fine” such a part of who I am that I don’t always know when I’m not.

Because I’m functioning. I’m laughing. I’m working. I’m going places. I’m making plans. I’m taking care of people. I can have a great day. I can be genuinely happy. I can still find absolutely ridiculous things funny. So I’m fine. But I’m also sitting on the shower floor because standing feels like too much. I’m fine, but my body fucking hurts. I’m fine, but sometimes I desperately want everyone to leave me alone. I’m fine, but I’m so tired that I don’t know what rested even feels like anymore.

Maybe both things can be true. Maybe I’m not secretly falling apart. Maybe there isn’t some giant emotional collapse waiting for me if I finally stop moving. Maybe this really is just how I process life. Or maybe my body is doing some of the screaming for me. I don’t know yet. I just know I’m tired. So fucking tired. And tomorrow I’ll probably get up and do it all again.

Kathy had a birthday. We were able to steal her away for a few hours while Michael stayed with my dad. She still carries everything. Working, updating the house, managing my dad, hospice, caregivers, medications and everything else. I tell her to sit down. Rest. Relax. Do absolutely nothing for a little while. She literally cannot sit still.

Donna is the same way, and sometimes I’m afraid it’s killing her.

Tomorrow Kathy leaves for Florida to spend some time with Melissa and have actual fun. My dad is going back to the respite facility while she’s gone, and I hate it. I know why he’s going. I know it’s the safest option. I know Kathy needs to be able to leave without worrying every second. I know I can’t do it by myself. I know he was fine there last time. I know all of that, and I still hate it. Something about him being there feels like abandonment even though I know it isn’t. Will he think we left him? Will he be scared? He doesn’t understand why he’s there. And maybe part of what bothers me is that every change in his care feels like another acknowledgment that this is progressing whether I like it or not. Lately he’s seemed pretty status quo, whatever the hell status quo means with dementia. I like status quo. I’ll take status quo for as long as I can get it. George, their dog, is coming to stay with us while Kathy is gone. He’s sweet and gentle and big and hairy and takes food off the counter.

Meanwhile, Megan is struggling. Donna is struggling. Completely different circumstances and completely different lives, but I worry about both of them. I wish I could fix things for the people I love. The 50s are turning out to be wonderful and awful. Everyone seems to be dealing with something — health, parents, kids, marriages, money, grief, work, just fucking life. But who ever said life wasn’t hard? It’s awful a lot. And yet somehow I always seem to be fine. How come I always seem to be fine?

Anyway, I’ve gotten back into audiobooks. Dark ones, obviously. Murder, psychopaths, serial killers, horrible people doing horrible things. I get so sucked in while driving that sometimes I reach my destination and don’t want to get out of the car. Currently I’m listening to The Fourth Monkey. I picked it because it’s set in Chicago. I think it’s going to be fucked up. Yes!

But something in the book recently sent my brain in a completely different direction. How did we decide worms were good fishing bait? Seriously. Who was the first person who dug up a worm, looked at it and thought, Fish are going to fucking love this. Let’s put a hook through it. Do fish naturally encounter earthworms in lakes? Do worms fall in? Are there aquatic worms? How was this discovered? I don’t know why this bothered me enough that I needed answers, but it did. These are the important questions occupying my brain between dementia, HR, friends, family and serial killers.

I’ve also become completely obsessed with my zinnias. They’re blooming and I check them constantly. The monarchs are showing up too, and there is something about seeing a monarch land on a flower I grew that makes me ridiculously happy.

I’ve also been saving quotes lately. Some profound, some inspiring, some slightly hostile. Naturally, the slightly hostile ones tend to speak to me.

“Fear doesn’t stop death, it stops life.”

“It’s a luxury to have zero health problems.”

“Life can be a dick. Sometimes it gets hard for no reason.”

Accurate.

And then there’s everyone’s favorite: “It could have been worse.”

No shit. It could have been a lot better too. I don’t know why we’re always supposed to make ourselves feel better by imagining a worse version of our lives. Sometimes something just sucks. We’re allowed to say it sucks without immediately acknowledging that somewhere, someone has it harder.

Speaking of things sucking, I was really bummed when the Florida trip with Donna and Terry fell through. I wanted that escape. I always want Florida. But apparently I’m incapable of going very long without finding something else to look forward to. Next month we’re going camping with Heather and Rusty. They rented a big-ass RV and I already know it’s going to be hilarious. I just love hanging out with them. We’re very compatible travelers. Then Crissy and the kids are taking a trip in November and bringing Kathy, and I’ve been invited to join them. I’m really excited to spend time with them. And then, as I keep saying, February. Mexico. Sunshine, ocean, Natalie, adventure. I cannot fucking wait. It’s not lost on me how lucky I am. I have some pretty fantastic people in my life who plan fun shit and then say, you should come. And somehow I keep getting invited along. I am incredibly grateful for their generosity and that they want me there. I know how fortunate I am.

Maybe that’s really what all of this is. My life doesn’t stay in one emotional lane for more than about seventeen minutes. I’m sad about my dad and excited about a butterfly. I’m worried about my friends and wondering about worms. Hospice has somehow become part of our normal life while I’m making vacation plans. I’m listening to people get murdered in my earbuds while admiring my flowers. I’m worried, grateful, tired, excited, pissed off and happy, sometimes all before lunch.

Maybe that’s just life at this age. There isn’t a clean chapter where all the hard stuff ends and then we get to enjoy everything again. I think for a long time I assumed there would be. Get through this thing, then things will calm down. Get through that thing, then I’ll relax. Get Dad settled. Get through work. Get the house organized. Get everybody I love okay. Except everybody is never going to be okay at the same time. Something is always going to be happening. Someone will need something. Something will hurt. Something will scare me. A plan will fall apart and another one will show up.

Taking care of my dad has me thinking about my mom. Not in a nostalgic way. In a guilty way. In a what-did-I-do-and-what-didn’t-I-do way.

Watching how present I am with my dad, I find myself thinking about her end of life and how different I was then. How much less present. And it sits with me in a way that’s uncomfortable. But to be honest, at the time I thought I was showing tough love. I thought I was trying not to enable her. I certainly wasn’t trying to hurt her. I justify some of it, and the justification is real: her decline was long. More than twenty years of watching her light slowly dim.

She went from this outspoken, funny, big personality, the kind of person who filled a room, to someone who was practically a recluse. Antisocial. Withdrawn. Hard to reach. And I was mad about that for a long time. I resented her for it. I didn’t understand it. As a mother myself, I still don’t understand how you don’t fight through anything to be there for your child or grandchild.

I know that mental illness was a huge part of it, and the more I understand mental illness, the more I understand that it wasn’t her choice. It wasn’t her fault. She was sick in a way nobody really named or treated properly or wanted to acknowledge, and that sickness stole her from us slowly and quietly over a very long time. By the time she was physically dying, I had already been grieving her for years. That’s a particular kind of grief and exhaustion that’s hard to explain to someone who hasn’t lived it.

I also had a different relationship with her than I have with my dad. I’ve always been a daddy’s girl. He was on a pedestal for most of my life. My mom and I were complicated. Frustrating. Sometimes hurtful on both sides. I loved her. I know she loved me. God, she loved Grace and me more than anything, probably to the point where it made her a little crazy with worry. But it was hard. And I think that complicated love made it easier to stay a little more at arm’s length when things got bad.

There’s one thing that says it all, really. When I was diagnosed with breast cancer at the end of 2020, I didn’t tell my mom until two or three days before my mastectomy in March 2021. Because I knew she couldn’t handle it. I knew the news would devastate her in a way that would make everything harder, not easier. So I protected her from it or maybe protected myself from managing her reaction on top of everything else and waited until the last minute. She couldn’t come down to be with me. She couldn’t help me afterward. And that was sad. Not angry-sad. Just genuinely sad. The kind of sad that comes from loving someone and knowing their limitations at the same time. The kind that comes from needing your mom and knowing she wasn’t able to be that for you in that moment. But that’s the illness. I don’t say that to be cruel to her memory. I say it because it’s true and because it was part of what made our relationship what it was. Love and limitation existing in the same space at the same time.

And then at the end, I was there. Visiting on the weekend for the last month or 2. Fully there her last week. Bedside. She went from conscious and saying hilarious things, because even at the end she was funny, that never fully left her, to unconscious and slipping away. I sat with her and whispered that I loved her. That I was there. That it was okay to go. I told her Grace and I were going to be okay because I knew that’s what she needed to hear. I got Grace on the phone and held it to my mom’s ear so she could say whatever last words she wanted to say to her grandmother. My mom left us later that day. I was there.

And then the messages started coming in.

People reminded me of who she was, the person I had forgotten she was, the person I had been grieving for so long that I’d lost the full picture of her. The good old days. The big laughs she brought. The sharp sense of humor. All the things that had dimmed so slowly that I hadn’t realized how much I missed them until old friends and people from her past started describing her back to me.

By the time we gathered for her celebration of life, we’d already been missing her for a long time. But it wasn’t all sadness. Because honestly, have you met us?

Here’s the part that still haunts me about that day. I didn’t prepare a eulogy. I didn’t know how to start one. I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t feel ready. So I went up there and winged it. It was all over the place. I misspoke. I didn’t like how it came out. I walked away feeling like I hadn’t done her justice.

But one of my favorite pictures from that entire day is Grace taking a selfie with my mom’s urn. Grace may or may not have been stoned out of her mind. I cannot confirm or deny. There she is, smiling away, posing with Grandma. And somehow it’s one of the best pictures ever taken. Maybe we’re weird. Maybe we’re slightly deranged. Not maybe. We’re depraved. Whatever. I love it. Because grief in our family was never going to look like everyone dressed in black, sitting solemnly in a room and quietly talking about how sad we all were. We loved my mom. We missed my mom. And we were still us. Laughing at inappropriate things. Taking ridiculous pictures. Telling stories. Probably saying things we shouldn’t say. Pookie would have understood.

When my mom died, I posted a line from Elton John’s “Candle in the Wind”. The part about someone’s candle burning out while their legend lived on. Nothing captured her better. Because her light really did dim long before her life ended. That’s the part I understand differently now. For years I thought about how much she’d changed. How small her world had become. How far away she seemed from the Pookie everyone remembered. But her legend didn’t disappear with that light.

It was sitting right there in that room that day. In Aunt Jean and the Mennas, and all those memories of growing up in Indian Head Park and Acacia. In the Joneses and generations of friendship that basically made us family. In Karin and the Hinsdale Dental years. In the stories about the parties at Mort’s house that, I’m probably better off not knowing all the details about. It was in every person who walked into that luncheon carrying a different version of my mother with them. It was in Grace taking a possibly chemically enhanced selfie with her grandmother’s urn. And it was in me. I wish I’d been able to stand up that day and articulate all of this. Because sometimes you have to lose someone, miss them, be angry with them, forgive them, become a caregiver yourself, get older yourself, and live a little more life before you can really see them. I was seeing her differently and wish I had done a better job. But maybe this is what this is. This is her eulogy. And now I forgive more. I appreciate more. I remember more.

And when I picture her now, I don’t want to picture the woman whose world became so small. I picture Pookie. Young. Beautiful. Funny. Caring. Generous. Probably with a glass of wine in one hand and a cigarette in the other, surrounded by people and making somebody laugh.

Her candle may have gone out, but her legend never will.

Long live Pookie. Long live my mom. Love you. Miss you.

It’s been a while. I’ve made attempts to get back here. I have these profound, important thoughts on the drive to work or on the way to my dad’s, things I wish I wrote down, and then the second I actually sit down, they’re completely gone. Every single one. Vanished. Just me staring at a blank screen wondering what I was so sure I needed to say.

I know and you know it was brilliant, of course. So here’s what I’ve got instead.

I’ve been burning the candle at both ends and then some. Not just work, work and then my dad’s most nights, which means I’ve also been quietly neglecting my friends. And I feel guilty about that because this has been a hard year for a lot of people I love. Physically, emotionally, marriages, health, money, just life. Everyone seems to be carrying something heavy right now. They need me and I’m stretched so thin I don’t always know how to show up the way they want me to.

For a while I was going to my dad’s in the mornings too, getting there before work to help Kathy with his first change of the day. That worked for a little bit. And then gradually, honestly, I faded on that one. Getting up and out the door has never been my strong suit and I’m not going to pretend otherwise.

Sorry, Kathy.

I do try to get there most evenings though. Which is its own thing, because I’m showing up at night right around the time I used to be getting into bed. Remember when I went to bed ridiculously early Those were good times. My whole sleep schedule is a disaster now. I am tired in a way that goes bone deep.

I’ve also been trying to lift weights regularly, which I actually like. I like feeling strong. I just don’t give it enough time or consistency to do much good yet. And my joint pain is not impressed with my effort level.

My dad is different every single day. Some days he’s alert and we have something that almost resembles a conversation. He can’t really finish thoughts or sentences anymore, words disappear somewhere between his brain and his mouth but he’s present. He’s trying. Sometimes he even makes a joke. He always makes faces. Other days he’s angry and defiant. Other days he’s so far away that I look at him and think, oh gosh, and then just brace myself because this could be the end. And then I go back the next day and he lights up when he sees me and wants a hug and tells me he loves me and I think, okay. We’re okay. Today we’re okay.

It’s a mindfuck. I don’t know how else to describe it. I am constantly trying to prepare myself for something I have absolutely no way to prepare for.

The other night he was pretty out of it. Not really talking, not really tracking. Kept trying to take my glasses off my face. Then he started trying to remove my nose. Like, actually remove it. Just casually attempting to unscrew my nose from my face. He was completely serious about it too. He wasn’t hurting me. I thought it was one of the funniest things that has happened and also one of the saddest, and I sat there while he worked very diligently on my nose situation. Apparently the nose had to go.

That’s caregiving. It’s sad and exhausting and scary and sometimes so fucking ridiculous that all you can do is laugh.

The Florida trip fell through. Donna, Terry, and I are not going. Which is a huge bummer.

So I immediately texted Natalie to channel all that disappointment into Mexico excitement because right now that’s the only real getaway I have on the horizon. One hundred and ninety-two days. There’s something strange about counting down to something I desperately want while simultaneously wishing I could slow time down.

I want February. I want Mexico and Natalie and sunshine and the ocean and cocktails and to feel like myself for a little while.

But I also want tomorrow with my dad. Even if he doesn’t know what day it is. Even if we can’t have a real conversation. Even if he’s angry or asleep or spends twenty minutes trying to remove a facial feature.

So that’s where I am right now.

Trying to be a good daughter, wife, friend, employee, dog mom, and somewhere in there, myself.

Tired as hell. A little behind on everything. Probably forgetting something important.

And maybe that’s why all those profound thoughts I have in the car disappear by the time I sit down to write them.

My brain is full. My life is full. There isn’t a lot of room left up there.

But my life is full in other ways too.

There are people I love who need me. People I need. There are friends I want to make more time for. Trips to plan. Weights I’m going to keep lifting. Dogs who need something every five minutes. A husband I should probably spend some time with.

And there are evenings with my dad that break my heart and evenings where he makes me laugh. Sometimes those are the same evening. I don’t know how much time I have left with this version of my dad. I don’t know who he’ll be tomorrow.

I do know I can’t be everywhere. I can’t take care of everyone. I can’t fix many of the things that are hurting the people I love. And I definitely can’t slow any of this down. But I can keep showing up where I can. I can keep laughing at completely inappropriate times. And I can keep having something to look forward to.

One hundred and ninety-two days until Mexico. But tomorrow first.

When Kathy left for Paris to meet up with Crissy and fam, I packed a bag and moved in with my dad for six days.

A year ago I probably would have gone into that week bracing for disaster. Instead I got something more complicated than that.

I got time with my dad.

Right before Kathy left, he’d been officially approved for hospice. While she was away we spent a lot of time getting everything set up so things would be ready when she got home. Thankfully it all came together. Hospice has been in place for a few weeks now.

I already knew hospice wasn’t giving up — I learned that years ago with my mom. But this still feels different to say out loud. This isn’t about saying goodbye today. It’s about keeping him comfortable and giving Kathy the support she desperately needs and honestly deserves. They manage his medications now. There is more, and there is morphine. There’s a hospital bed in the house, he is just about no longer mobile. An aide comes twice a week to help bathe him. Michael is there three days a week.

The disease is progressing. There’s no pretending otherwise.

But life keeps happening anyway.

Most evenings that week were filled with confusion — repetitive questions, conversations that started somewhere and ended nowhere, stories that looped back on themselves. I stopped trying to make sense of it. I just went along with wherever he was.

And then every once in a while he’d become completely present. Clear. Sweet. Almost childlike. I’d catch myself thinking he’d become my little boy, which I know is completely backwards. But that’s what it feels like sometimes.

Most of the week was actually good though. We watched TV. Ate meals together. Sat outside. Just existed together. I’ll take every one of those ordinary moments for as long as I can have them.

Then there were the nights.

One night he fell in the bathroom and I couldn’t get him up. He was angry and combative and wanted nothing to do with my help. I eventually called Matt. By the time Matt got there I was basically wrestling my eighty four year old father trying to convince him to go upstairs to bed.

My dad wanted to fight me.

At one point he kept trying to bite me.

And I thought it was hilarious. I could not stop laughing. My tiny dad was absolutely convinced he was going to win this thing.

Matt did not find it funny. For him it brought up painful memories of watching his own father decline and I could see it all over his face. Two completely different experiences happening in the same stairwell at the same time.

Sometimes caregiving is heartbreaking. Sometimes it’s absurd. Sometimes it’s both simultaneously and you just have to pick a lane.

The other memorable night involved what can only be described as a complete and total shit storm. Literally. I’ll spare you the details. Just know there was poop everywhere — and at that exact same moment I was pretty sure I’d caught whatever stomach bug has been going around.

Timing really is everything.

Now that Kathy is home we’ve settled into a routine. I go over Tuesday through Friday evenings to help her get my dad ready for bed.

Last week he hurt his wrist and we were convinced it was broken because he was in so much pain. Seeing him hurt absolutely broke me. He has morphine now so they were able to keep him comfortable and it seems to have improved. But that’s the thing I’ve figured out about myself through all of this — I can handle the exhaustion. I can handle the confusion. I can handle the middle of the night chaos. Apparently I can even handle being bitten.

What I cannot handle is seeing him in pain. That gets me every single time.

In the middle of all of this I got my MRI results.

The MRI itself looked good but the original concern wasn’t actually my breast — it was something in the chest wall. My oncologist took my images to their breast conference so everyone could weigh in together. The consensus was that what they were seeing is most likely a surgical suture.

I don’t entirely know what that means.

I don’t really care.

It’s not cancer. We move on.

My carotid ultrasound also came back completely normal. One more thing off the list.

Matt and I worked through our disagreement. We’re okay.

Frank is doing well and back to being fully and completely Frank, which is all I ever ask of him.

Natalie came to visit and I already miss her. I’d been hoping to fly out to Hermosa Beach to help take care of her after her surgery but her mom is going to be there instead. I’m disappointed — I don’t know when I’ll see her next. Hopefully before February. I cannot wait to get back to Puerto Vallarta and Sayulita together.

Last weekend Matt and I had dinner with his Aunt Jean, Aunt Cory, his mom, and his sister. Good food, easy conversation, people you’ve known long enough that you don’t have to perform anything. Karla and Cory came back to our house after and spent the night. We stayed up talking and laughed a lot and had coffee together in the morning.

I’ve been spending a lot of time talking with Megan lately too. Real conversations. The kind that matter.

And I think about Donna a lot. Because she’s carrying so much and most days it feels like she’s down more than she’s up and I wish I knew how to help her find her way back to herself. How to help her find joy. I just want to see her happy.

At least we have something to look forward to. Donna, Terry, and I are headed to Florida at the end of August — I kind of jumped onto a trip they were already planning and thankfully they didn’t mind. And then February, Puerto Vallarta and Sayulita. I am counting the days.

Matt and I have also been decluttering the house. Mostly the garage. It’s astonishing how much stuff accumulates. It’s equally astonishing how sore you can get just trying to get rid of it.

Life still feels heavy most days. My dad has hospice. My body still hurts. There are always appointments and medications and worries waiting around the next corner.

But I’ve stopped believing joy comes after the hard part is over. I don’t think that’s how it works. Not for me anyway.

Joy shows up beside the hard things now.

It shows up in my dad’s face when I walk through the door. In laughing while he tries to bite me. In long conversations with Megan. In missing Natalie because she matters that much. In an ordinary dinner that turned into a sleepover. In Florida at the end of August. In Mexico in February.

The hard things haven’t gone away. They probably won’t.

But we’re still making plans.

We’re still showing up.

And we’re still laughing.

I received this little graphic about the evolution of the blog:

2021–2023 Molly: “How do I survive this?”
2024 Molly: “Why is this happening?”
2025 Molly: “How much more can one person carry?”
2026 Molly: “How do I build a life inside all of this?”

Yeah. That’s it. I didn’t plan any of that — I just kept showing up and that counts as evolving.

Natalie came to town. Her mom Donna took us to a drag brunch. Donna got brought up on stage and danced around the room collecting tips for charity. We laughed and cheered and were completely ridiculous and I enjoyed every single second of it. Happy Pride!

I also did a nursing home tour last week.

I know. The whiplash is very my life.

The tour was depressing. I cannot imagine putting my dad in one. I also don’t have to worry about it because they are so unaffordable it’s almost funny.

Sunday we hosted Father’s Day and Grace’s birthday together. Family from four different branches of the family tree, plus Drew — who IS immediate family — and Michael, the caregiver who helps both Drew and my dad. It was really nice to have Matt, my dad, and Ken all in the same space. Three men who have shown up for Grace and me in completely different ways. All of them matter.

And Grace… She turned 27.

I don’t know why 27 has wrecked me the way it has. I used to laugh at Donna. She cried at every single milestone her kids hit. Birthdays. First day of school. Last day of school. All of it. I thought she was so extra about it. And now here I am completely undone by a birthday, and maybe this is exactly what she felt every time. Maybe it just took me 27 years to get there. Boy, does she have a long way to go!

I don’t know if it’s the weight of looking back at 27 years or the fear of not knowing what’s coming or this quiet terrifying thought of — is this it? Am I done being her mom? I know I’ll always be her mom. But it’s different now. She doesn’t need me the same way. She has built this whole life. Remarkable, independent, kind, out there every day trying to make the world better — and I am so proud I could burst.

And I miss her being small.

Both those things. My baby is 27. I don’t know where the time went.

I called hospice today and scheduled an evaluation for my dad.

I want to say this clearly because I know what that word sounds like: he is not dying. Not soon anyway. I think. But hospice is so much more than end of life now — it’s support, it’s resources, it’s help navigating something that has no manual. We need help. A lot of it.

It was still a hard call to make.

And then there’s Matt. I know, he’s pretty perfect. BUT

I’m disappointed in him right now in a way that feels big. I feel betrayed. I don’t fully know how to process it yet because right now I am so mad and hurt that I feel vengeful and I know myself well enough to know that vengeful Molly making decisions is not going to end well for either of us.

So I’m putting it here. Sitting with it. Trying to get to the other side of the feeling before I do anything with it.

That’s growth I think. Angry, hurt, not-at-all-okay growth. But growth.

2026 Molly: “How do I build a life inside all of this?”

One day at a time. One hard phone call at a time. One birthday, one drag brunch, one nursing home tour, one moment of heartbreak at a time.

Natalie is sleeping over tomorrow and maybe for a few days and we’re doing happy hour on Friday. Then my MRI. Then Kathy leaves for Paris and it’s my dad and me for six days.

Boy. I really rambled on yesterday. I am keeping this short. It’s Friday and I am so ready for the weekend.

Another crazy storm came through last night. Tornado sirens going off at 8:30pm. I had to wake Matt up out of a dead sleep and drag Fiona out from under the bed so we could all get downstairs together. She was pissed. Shaking and clawing the entire way down. We made it unscathed.

Today they were doing new headshots at work and I skipped. It was Western Day anyway, I had my cowgirl hat on, and I had planned to stop for a bang trim and eyebrow threading on the way home from my oncologist but that didn’t work out.

Saw Dr. Undevia yesterday. He is a riot. Great sense of humor, laughs really loud, no bullshit. I really appreciate him. Donna sees him too, which is one of those things in life that really shouldn’t be, your best friend should not also have the same oncologist. Well, I love him. Donna may have a slightly different take. She did tell me to watch for his earlobes shaking when he laughs. I still haven’t noticed.

I like that he’s honest and straightforward and tells me how it is. Yesterday, half joking, he said he really needs to figure out what to do with me once he retires. He’s somewhere around my age. He chuckled while acknowledging there are a number of complicated things about my case. I take that as a compliment somehow. But it left me wondering just how long will I be doing all of this.

I’m down to seeing him every six months officially, but I still go every three no matter what because I need a quarterly injection, really an implant, since I still have one ovary. He’d like me to have surgery to remove it. I’ve considered it, even with my firm stance of never having another surgery ever. But when I had a scan with the surgeon who would supposedly do it, he couldn’t locate the ovary. So no. I am not having exploratory surgery on a maybe. I continue with the implant quarterly at nearly $6,000 a pop. Dr. Undevia says the hospital must love me for that. I also take a daily pill that he expects I’ll be on for at least another five years before we reevaluate, though there are some new options coming out that he’s considering for me.

He gets the fatigue. He gets the joint pain. He gets the brain fog in a way that nobody else really does. I told him that with my dad’s recent FTD diagnosis I’m terrified I have dementia too. He told me to give him examples. He listened. Then he told me no, it’s the drugs and the surgeries and what both do to my body. And while it’s not dementia, it’s also not going to go away.

So that’s awesome.

Then the exam. When he asked about any changes I casually mentioned this bump, I hate calling it that but bump or lump on my chest, that I’d been thinking might actually be bone. Matt thought so too when I showed him. And Undevia was like, yeah probably, you’ve lost some weight, things start looking and feeling different. Let’s check it out.

Then: Yeah, bone. Oh wait. Hmmm. Can I move it? Hmmm. It’s something. I think a cyst. Not cancer. Your case is so complicated. I’m just going to order an MRI.

I’m not freaking out at all. Honestly.

I told him, you know I have heard the word cyst before and look how that turned out. I also told him I don’t care what it is because I have him to take care of me now. Whatever it is, we deal with it. He said it’s not cancer and we’re probably going to do nothing. Let’s just check.

Yeah. Let’s just check.

He also suggested adding tart cherry juice for the joint pain. Okay. Sure. I’ll try anything at this point.

Then off to the infusion center. Where I got a nurse who was, let’s say, enthusiastic with the needle. It’s not technically a shot, it’s a pellet they inject into my lower abdomen with a fairly significant gauge needle that most people ice before and after. I never do the ice. Yes, I am a complete madwoman. But she used what I can only describe as unnecessary force. The needle is going in regardless, you don’t need to stab me. Got my bandage, scheduled my next injection and bone infusion in three months, and was sent on my way.

I left a little distracted, knowing I now have an MRI to schedule, which is why I skipped the bang trim and the eyebrow threading. I just wanted to go home. I also need to get an ultrasound of my carotid artery because my cholesterol has been suddenly high. My PA flagged it last month.

It’s hard to get old.

TGIF. When I head out of here I’m going to check on my dad and Kathy because during last night’s storm they lost power and as of the last report it won’t be back on for two more days. So we may be having a sleepover.

Have a great weekend.

Like I said — ended up being longer than I thought.

Let’s start with the good news.

Frank is doing well. Really well. Thank you, sweet baby Jesus.

We are done with the emergency vets and specialists for now and back to just seeing Dr. Palmer, who is an absolute sweetheart. The diagnosis is in — PLE, Protein-Losing Enteropathy, with inflammatory bowel disease. The name is a mouthful, but we are catching it very early. The plan is a special diet and supplements first, followed by a two month recheck to see if his protein levels respond. If they don’t, we add steroids. Surgery exists as an option but it is not one we are considering. Not just because of the financial reality, but because of Gus. We spent everything we had trying to save him. A major surgery, a brutal recovery, completely drained our savings and we still lost him. My heart cannot do that again.

The complicated part is that the PLE has nothing to do with what happened neurologically. Dr. Palmer believes he had a seizure and the hope is that it won’t happen again. The silver lining is that the seizure led us to find the PLE before Frank got really sick. Before the chronic diarrhea, the severe weight loss, the fluid buildup, the swollen limbs. We caught it before any of that.

I know my little loaf is going to respond to this. He is going to eat his fancy prescription food, take his supplements, and be a smelly, stubborn, ridiculous sixteen year old pug someday. I am manifesting it.

In the middle of all of Frank’s drama, the projectile vomiting, the drunk sailor impression, the stupid fender bender, the emergency vet, the $3,000 and counting… my toenail fell off.

Just fell off. No injury. No explanation. I had my toenails painted yellow at the time. So when it came off it looked exactly like a piece of corn.

Then I went to see Anthony’s school dance. The sweetest boy. Maggie was out of town so of course I was there to support him when Aunt Susie asked. The finale was the three of us with Anthony and all the other kids and families doing the Macarena. I was best at the hip swivel. I am not the most coordinated with the arm movements.

And speaking of Maggie… I received the shocking news that she was laid off. Her whole department, apparently. She is so talented. So compassionate. Another company is going to be very lucky to have her. As for this one with the audacity, I hope they go bankrupt. Fuckers. How dare you. She has enough on her plate.

There was also a high school graduation party for Samuel in there somewhere. This handsome, quiet, incredibly intelligent young man. You would never know he kicked leukemia’s ass as a toddler. My sweet Donna has such a hard time with her children’s milestones, not because she isn’t proud, she is bursting with it, but because she just wants them to stay babies forever. It’s okay. She’ll always be my baby to look after and hug.

This week at work has been Associate Appreciation Week, which is one of my favorite weeks of the year and also one of the most exhausting.

I take it personally. I drive everyone a little nuts about it because I want it to be perfect. There are theme days, food, raffles, photos. But when you work with people who show up every single day, do hard physical work, and still manage to be genuinely wonderful human beings despite all the little heartaches that are happening on the outside, they deserve a week that feels special. They deserve to know someone sees them.

We had themes every day and our people showed up for every single one. I love taking photos with the associates, watching them laugh and be silly. We post everything internally through the company intranet and it’s just fun to see.

Wednesday was the luncheon. First shift ate in ninety degrees and a bazillion percent humidity — we were all basically melting into our sandwiches. Then right after second shift started, the sky opened up. One hell of a storm came through, practically a tornado, and just like that the temperature dropped. So second shift got to eat lunch in actual human conditions instead of dripping sweat onto their plates.

Last week we went out for a couple of beers for Frank’s birthday. Frank my colleague, not Frank my pug. I’m the only woman in my group of guys at my building and we all get along so well. I like being one of the guys. And I like that my husband is cool with it. I guess he knows I couldn’t do better than him.

Over the past couple of weeks I’ve had two tattoos touched up. Meaningful ones I wanted refreshed. The oak tree, in honor of the poem Matt gave me in a card years ago that became one of my daily mantras. And a pelican for my grandparents and Marco Island.

What I do not love is that my daughter has apparently decided to keep pace with me. Actually she’s lapped me, she now has more than I do. Which is how I found myself telling a grown adult woman with a master’s degree that she is not allowed to get any more tattoos until she is fifty. I also recognize the complete absurdity of that coming from me. Which really resonated with me when I listened to the Smartless podcast episode with Jon Bernthal. I was not a fan going in. I was judging him. And what was I even judging? A character he played that I didn’t like? Embarrassing in retrospect. Classic you can’t judge a book by it’s cover. Because this man had me. The way he spoke, the things he said about “parenting through adversity” I don’t even have the right word for what it did to me. Inspired doesn’t quite cover it. Just go listen. It might be too late for me to apply most of it but maybe not for you.

And then there was the Whole Foods incident.

Kathy needed to run to O’Hare to finish up her Global Entry for her upcoming Paris trip — she absolutely deserves that trip — so I met her near one of the Dynamic buildings on the way and took my dad with me. I had what I thought was a brilliant idea. I needed to stop at Whole Foods for a return and figured the shopping cart would give him great support for walking. Get some steps in. Get his blood flowing. Kill two birds with one stone.

We made it in. Did the return. And then he had an accident.

That was the end of the Whole Foods adventure.

I hovered outside the men’s room not knowing what to do with myself, stepping in when I knew the coast was clear, panicking every time someone else went in. I called Matt, who rerouted and was already on his way. About thirty five minutes later my dad reappeared.

Shorts on backwards.

Cancelled Matt. We headed home.

It is so sad. It is also a little bit funny. And that was Tuesday.

I genuinely don’t know how people do it. I am scrambling. Burning the candle at both ends at work, managing things with my dad, trying to support Kathy, trying and kind of failing to show up for the people I love and by the time I get home I have nothing left. I want to sit on my deck and stare at my plants and not talk to anyone. That’s it.

And then I feel like a bad person about it.

A couple of weeks ago my girlfriend’s daughter ended up in the hospital. Infection, surgery, the whole terrifying ordeal. I cannot imagine what it’s like to watch your child go through that. She is a hospice nurse, by the way. She spends her days caring for people at the end of their lives with grace and tenderness and I genuinely don’t know where she finds it. And yet, I happened to mention that Matt wasn’t feeling well and she showed up with soup and bread. While her own family was going through something awful. She always makes you feel seen and important and loved and I want to be more like her even though I am currently running on fumes.

My neighbor stopped by in the driveway the other night while Matt and I were trying to get a few things done in the yard. She is so nice, she would do anything for us and we try to reciprocate when we can. I told her honestly that I was burning the candle at both ends, emotionally drained from work and from everything with my dad, and that when I get home I just want to sit on my deck and exist quietly. She totally understood… and then sweetly invited me over to her backyard, which she has made absolutely beautiful with a water feature. So relaxing, she said. Just sit and listen to the water.

She is not wrong. It sounds genuinely lovely.

I still haven’t gone.

Which brings me back to Megan. She also has a beautiful backyard. Also a water feature. Also constantly inviting me over. And I want to go, I really do, and I also really don’t want to go anywhere or do anything or talk to anyone. Both things are completely true at the same time and I feel terrible about it.

I need to be more intentional about my downtime. Real downtime. Not just collapsing between obligations. Actual chosen stillness where I’m not feeling guilty about what I’m not doing or who I’m not seeing.

And speaking of my deck and my plants. Aunt Susie showed up at my house and planted Zinnias. Just came over and planted them. Started some of the pots on my deck. Without being asked. Without making a big deal of it. Just showed up and did it because she knew I hadn’t had the bandwidth and she knew how much it would mean to me.

I had been so stretched that I hadn’t been able to tend to something that genuinely brings me joy. Something as simple as my plants. And she just took care of it. That’s Aunt Susie. She sees what needs doing and she does it quietly and lovingly and without any fanfare.

It made my day. My week. My whole month. Thank you. From the bottom of my heart.

I’m working on the stillness.

Slowly.

From my deck.

Surrounded by Zinnias.

Staring at my plants.

And through all of it, Frank’s diagnosis, the corn toenail, the tornado, the Whole Foods backwards shorts situation, the tattoos, the Smartless revelation, my dad is always there in the background of everything

On the days I can’t get to him, I at least call. Some evenings are the hardest. Evening is when the confusion sets in deep, when the paranoia creeps in, when he gets agitated or scared or convinced of something that isn’t true. On those nights I talk to him anywhere from one to five times. Sometimes more. I just go along with wherever he is. I don’t correct him. I don’t argue. I just try to meet him there and slowly, gently talk him to the other side of it.

It works sometimes. Sometimes it doesn’t. I know those are the hardest nights for Kathy too.

And then you hang up and sit with it for a minute.

And then you go back to staring at your plants. And then it’s tomorrow. And tomorrow is your quarterly appointment with oncology.

I honestly can only remember two things about Mother’s Day weekend.

Saturday I went into the city to hang out with Grace. It was a beautiful warm and sunny day. We had lunch at this place called Little Bad Wolf which was delicious, then walked around, explored, and shopped. It was a really great day. Just the two of us, no agenda, exactly what I love and needed.

Sunday was a late lunch, or maybe it was early dinner, at this little Bohemian hole-in-the-wall restaurant I never knew existed. My dad, Kathy, Anne, Matt, and me. Good food, nice time. So stuffed. On the way there, Kathy, my dad, and I had stopped at Drew’s to meet Michael, the caregiver who has now been helping Kathy out a couple days a week. My dad is not a fan. He’s having a hard time accepting it. Which is a whole thing we’re navigating.

If my memory serves me right, which it usually doesn’t, the following weekend my cousin, Heather, hosted a luncheon for her husband’s 60th birthday and her son’s high school graduation. Matt, Ken, and I went together, which was really nice. Got to see my other cousins and my aunt, ate way too much delicious food, and just enjoyed being together and spending time with Heather’s extended family.

And then — Matt and I went to Florida!

A little getaway for the two of us. Our belated celebration for both our 50th birthdays and our ten year anniversary, even though we’re creeping up on eleven and Matt is already 51. His idea. He knew exactly where to take me, Marco Island. It’s nostalgic in the deepest way because that’s where I grew up going, where my grandparents lived. We had a condo on the other side of the island from where I’m used to, but it didn’t matter. I just feel better in Florida. I breathe differently there. The water was as clear as I have ever seen it. The shelling was not great though, which was weird.

Wednesday we headed to Bonita Springs to meet up with Rusty and Heather, which has become one of my favorite traditions. They are our people in every way — same schedule, same energy, daytime sun, boating and pool, beach walking, happy hour, early dinner, early bed. They’ve always been so generous letting us stay at Heather’s parents’ beautiful home. It was perfect. All of it was perfect.

And then we came home.

Our flight got delayed over three hours. We didn’t walk in the door until nearly midnight. Grace had been with the dogs for the week but left around 2pm, expecting us home by 8:30 at the latest. By the time we got home they were absolutely starving. We got them taken care of, got into bed, and within about two hours Frank started projectile vomiting. I have never seen a dog do that. Got him settled, cleaned up, went back to bed. He was restless. We got up around 5:30 and before I could even get his breakfast together he was at the slider door getting fresh air off the deck and then projectile vomited onto the deck again. He was not himself. He was very unwell.

Off to the emergency vet, Arboretum View. $1,300 and four and a half hours later, we came home with no definitive answer. Some blood levels off, some intestinal inflammation on the x-ray, an anti-nausea injection, and fluids. Within a couple of hours he was back to himself, which felt like a small miracle.

My dad, Kathy, and George came over later. It was Memorial Day. Kathy brought an entire meal. Barbecue ribs, corn casserole, sweet potatoes, veggies, and cookie bars for dessert. My dad was content and happy being here. We started early because we were both running on nothing from the night before, so by 5:30 we were done eating and I felt bad because I know Kathy would have liked to stay longer. They headed home. My dad called me later, a little confused, sitting outside with his dog watching the sunset. Confused but not manic or scared or angry. That’s a good night for me. I just hope it was for Kathy too.

We went to bed.

The plan for today was simple: Matt would take the day off, pick up a rental car — his car is still in the shop, another long story — take Frank to his follow-up with Dr. Palmer, and I would go back to work. Frank had other plans.

When I got out of the shower, Matt was very concerned. Frank could not stand without swinging in circles. His head was bobbing. He looked like a little drunk sailor. I had no idea what was happening.

We piled in the car to drop Matt at the rental car place first. The parking lot was chaotic. I was distressed. I was not paying attention the way I should have been. And I have no idea how I did it, but I took out the corner of a parked rental car and trashed the side of my own.

Instant tears. Full breakdown. How could this be happening? We just got back from the best trip and now I have a very sick dog and I just did something so incredibly stupid.

Matt knew I was distracted. He wasn’t really angry – disappointed, maybe. We have his car already on an insurance claim for hail damage. Our house exterior is being redone because of hail damage. And now this. He stayed to deal with the accident report and the rental car situation and I headed to Dr. Palmer alone.

Dr. Palmer is the best. He came in expecting a routine follow-up from the emergency vet visit and immediately saw that something was very wrong. He looked at Frank and told me that while he could do some things in his office, what Frank really needed was a facility with higher-tech capabilities — specifically an MRI. Because what he suspected, based on what he was seeing, was either a brain tumor or a stroke.

Not something I was prepared to hear sitting alone in a vet’s office.

As I was walking out Matt was walking in. We left the rental car at Dr. Palmer’s and drove to the emergency facility in Aurora. The one that treated Gus for his cancer. I know it well. They’re wonderful. But it’s not somewhere I ever wanted to be again. Matt and I took turns crying on the way.

The doctor there was thorough. She examined him, ran tests, and concluded she believes it was a seizure. But it could be one possibly caused by a small stroke. We’re waiting on some test results to know more. An MRI would have been seven to eight thousand dollars, which was not an option. What I can tell you is that he was in really bad shape when we got there. Clearly something serious had happened neurologically. But after nearly five hours of being there, something shifted. He started snapping out of it. By the time the doctor was giving us the diagnosis, Frank was ready for a nap but only after accepting several pieces of cheese from the doctor, because he is still Frank even in crisis.

He’s made what appears to be a full recovery. For now. A big miracle.

I missed work today and I feel guilty about it. But I was where I needed to be. My kid and my dog will always be a priority. I just hope my little guy is going to be okay. And to justify it a little for myself, I did work on Memorial Day catching up on emails and verifying timecards. Plus, dealt with the ongoing poop issues while in Florida. That was shitty.

We went from “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times” in about forty-eight hours.

That feels about right.