On the bright side

This will be an attempt to write more positive thoughts than I have lately. Think more positive thoughts.
I admit, I spend far too much time being negative in the last few years. It might be understandable, my situation in the world hasn't been great. I've had to face that most of my life is behind me and often feel like I failed at who I meant to be and the things I had hoped to accomplish in my lifetime.
When I want to think positively, my first thought is always of my grandchildren. I think they are all amazing creatures. The beauty I see in them leaves me just breathless sometimes.  My heart leaps and melts when I hear their voices. One Christmas a few years ago I was deathly ill with the flu and confined to bed. The family still gathered at my house for dinner and throughout the day I would wake for brief periods and hear their voices and laughter filling our home and I would feel my heart lift each time, just exploding with joy that they were mine and all together.
I have a very limited social circle. My family is my world. The last close friend I had outside of family was Jenny. I loved her, love her still, but made myself step out of her life because it so negatively impacted mine. I miss her but after i broke away from her i had to admit that i lived in a lot less stress from day to day. Then we moved a couple of times and I never even got to know neighbors again. Not like when we lived near Jen and Natalie.
My family is my world. Far from perfect but each just beautiful in their own ways.
Jeremy is the closest to me. I spend more time one on one with him than anyone. Yes, we argue a lot, agree on almost nothing and he doesnt get along with my daughters. But he has always been There for me. Devoted and faithful no matter what. We haven't lived as a couple for years and the grandchildren are a huge part of why we are still together at all, but it is also because there is something just amazing to me about who he is.  I cant imagine any other man who would have stayed through the things he has with me. He will work and trust me to take care of all of us with his earnings and my disability, meaning he has financially supported this family no matter how he has been treated by us. I will be the first to say that he hasn't been treated well at all for most of the 15 years we have been together. 

COVID 19, What I really think

I and others share tips on FB about COVID and the things we need to do to protect ourselves. My latest brainstorm was about our shoes, how most of us have very likely been tracking the virus into our homes on the bottom of our shoes after sanitizing everything we buy, implementing social distancing (an idea that only works if EVERYONE believes it is important) and limiting all contact etc. Then came feet. People coughing and sneezing on store floors and us walking around and tracking it home. My brother and I both posted a warning about this today on FB but I believe we are weeks too late. I think that I dont have little ones who play on the floor but we do have 2 pets that walk on the floors and jump on our couches and beds. Our floors should have been listed in the first official messages about how to keep our homes safe! Even without the coughing and sneezing image, if you look you see people throwing cigarette butts on the ground and other forms of germ carrying litter that we walk through. My ex, Jim, called this morning and said he was sitting in his car in a parking lot eating fried chicken and throwing the bones out the window and was angry that he thought people passing by were glaring at him. They likely weren't, he's just paranoid like that, but I sure would glare at someone doing that!!
So, this is about what I think. I will continue to do everything in my power to protect my family, but I honestly believe it is a battle already lost. I believe we will ALL end up infected and it will be a roll of crooked dice who survives. It will weed out the sick, the old, and the poor and thin out the rest of the population as it sweeps the world.
After what we assume is worldwide investigation none of the important questions about COVID have been positively answered. Where it came from, how it spreads, what will kill it, can you get it more than once, how can we protect ourselves, none of these questions have a definitive solid answer. Answers to those questions change from day to day, minute to minute even.
With the science we have today we could have halted or at least greatly minimized all of the historic plagues of the world. But we have no clue how to deal with COVID!? Yes, viruses and bacteria evolve, become smarter and more deadly all on their own sometimes. But now we have to also consider the studies done to weaponize these things, experiments, playing God.
I cant wrap my mind around what it will be like when this starts hitting closer to home.  IN my home. I cannot picture dealing with the death of any of my loved ones and that gives me a little selfish desire to die first that I immediately take back because I need to be here to take care of us as we fall ill.
We are told that it is no worse than a cold for some and death for others. That some people never have any symptoms. At first it was supposed to only be deadly to compromised people, the elderly and people with ling lung issues like Jazzy and me. But then we read about healthy, even wealthy, people dying every day. The roll of the crooked dice.
I am terrified.

I'm an old woman

I started feeling old within the last 2 years. Before that I knew I was old, I knew I was disabled and lived with pain, but I didn't  truly feel old. I do now. I even expect to not live much longer at this point. When Kira tells me about plans for her 16th birthday party I'm terrified, terrified I won't be alive by then.
Maybe I started feeling old because I started looking old. When I look in the mirror I don't even recognize myself anymore. I see a tired, ugly, old woman.
If I ever pictured surviving to old age I thought it would be like the elderly relatives I visited when I was a little girl. They shuffled around their houses, has prepared simple meals, and knitted, wrote poetry, didn't seem to really do a whole lot strenuous things. My old age seems to be going much differently. 
The granddaughters living with me are 10 years old now and they are starting to learn to help with things around the house but for the last 10 years I have been the main one who took care of all the housework except when Jeremy wasn't working and he would do it when it got so bad it had to be done. Many days I spend three hours standing in the kitchen washing dishes just blocking out the pain making myself keep going until it's done. I mow the lawn using a weed eater cuz I don't have a lawn mower. I make sure I do the front yard and then do as much as I can if the back before it gets too painful to go on. If I am unable to do these things they usually just don't get done. If I am laid up sick for a few days it often feels like recovering is more of a curse than a blessing. I awaken to piles of dishes, piles of laundry, and filth everywhere.
Jasmine and Kira are the only grandchildren living with me full time right now, they're 10 years old, and they are what keeps me going. I love them more than anything in the world and they do bring me great joy and great pride, but I don't feel Joy for life like I used to. I remember it, I just don't feel it. I remember years ago on the farm walking outside in the morning listening to the birds, looking at the sky, smelling things growing all around me and just loving feeling alive, feeling overjoyed that there was a new day ahead of me. I never feel that anymore.
Where did the rest of this entry go?

From 2019, after Homeless Entry

Its hardly a daily journal is it? But when I look at the entries here I'm not surprised I stoppd writing...

I'm assuming that Homeless entry was when we lost the house on Grand Ave. Meezy saved us then, offered us a house he was buying to flip. We lived there over two years. It was a continuance of disaster but I finally got a grip and we've been doing muchmuch better although some things haven't changed. 

Jeanette got it together. She got her own house for a year and then met her man, David, lives with him now and is a very happy woman. She manages a float spa, is trying to get pregnant and lives in a very nice home in west Omaha.

I rented a nice four bedroom house in north O. Yes, its the ghetto but a decent street with good neighbors even if there have been five shootings within  block of our house in the two years we've been here. 
We did "get back on our feet" 
Jeremy has  been working at Ford Storage for over a year. Jami was living with us and going g to the Methadone clinic for about a year a half. Until last December when she was arrested on drug charges. I  believed it was all a big mess up from her trying to help her friend, Brandy, and it may have been to some degree.  I was hysterical when it happened, let Kirk move in to help raise the $4,000 to bond her out. Got her in about a week but then a week later she was arrested for shoplifting. Christmas shopping with plenty of money. Insanity. I'll tell all that later. 
Jess also lives here. Has a room upstairs  next to the girls room. She is the same for 10 years except she's more involved in taking care of the girls. She usually hates me, but that too is another story.
Jazz and Kira are thriving in spite of everything else. They are very active do very well in school. They are terribly spoiled but not beyond repair. They still have  very sweet hearts and the desire to be and do well.
Jessalynn doesn't live with us, she lives with Patrick, but I pick her up after school most days so she is here a lot.  We have a pretty amazing relationship. She is amazing, a 17 year old unicorn. 
Jeremy and I have been working out a new relationship. In not sure what you call it. We are partners, we take care of each other. We raise the girls together. We still in some way love each other. There is No romance, we don't even share a room. But there is Something  between us that is good, just don't have words for it.
Jeanette was living in Elkhorn but just moved much closer so hopefully I will see more of them than I have the last year.
Teresa died last month and Mikey  brought the girls down for the service. They are just awesome! I had pretty much given up on ever knowing them but maybe not. There is definitely a bond there and I probably have Mikey to thank for that.
Typing this on a phone is exhausting. Figuring out how to get a laptop or a keyboard for a tablet. 

Homeless

Our situation is my fault if you look at Who Knew How To Prevevt It. I know not to run up bills you can't pay or go shopping until all your bills are caught up. We wouldn't be homeless if I had taken control. But no matter what I know, it is hard to take control of adult children. Moving in with my kids to try to save their butts should have given me some leverage. Being the main one paying the bills should have given me a Lot of me leverage. But it did not. Should I have been more forceful, insistent, demanding? Could I have? Does that I didn't make this All My Fault?
Maybe.
I see that my attempts were weak, ("AC when it is in the sixties still? Really?") But even if I had been firm, stated the truth that poor people don't turn on AC at all! Stop smoking if you can't buy your own! (Instead I have bought my daughter's cartons of name brand cigarettes while I smoked the cheapest myself) COULD I HAVE TAKEN A STAND AT ALL TO PREVENT THIS?
Yes. I just can't stand when my daughters hate me. I am weak. Both have either ignored my suggestions or even gotten angry at me for nagging. So I just sat here and watched us all go down. I did start to make survival plans for myself after a while, and I would be fine if it was just me, Jeremy, and Kira. But I can't not try to take care of all of them even now.
I paid the $625 in rent every month, bought hundreds of cigarettes for everyone, bought toilet paper, soaps, etc., paid on the sky high utilities when I could, all with my $9,00 a month income. Several times when the power got shut off Jess got Jazzy' s father to pay yo turn them back on. We all get food stamps, but if I try to say to them anything about how food stamps are just to supplement our food bill, not so we can buy name brand products and junk good, I'd get shut down fast. When the food stamps run out, it's cash that should go to utilities. Then in May with the lights about to be shut off again I asked Jeanette if I should pay the electric or the rent, I couldn't pay both, and she chose electric. We're being evicted by the sheriff Wednesday.
Jeremy hasn't been working. He wants to, but I haven't been able to see how I could manage if he did. There are six children here, three only 5 years old, and he has been their main and often only caregiver. He is usually the only one who even washes a dish here, he usually does all the cooking, too, and even with him doing more than his share and mine, I've never lived so filthy. Jeremy, Kira, Jazzy, Jessalynn and I went away for 5 days once. He  cleaned the day before we left but Robby had friends over that night so the house wasn't very clean anymore before we left,  but Not A Thing was done while we were gone. Not even a dish washed. How could I send him out to work?? Instead, he goes and sells plasma twice a week for $65 a week that all goes to gas, cigarettes, (he doesn't smoke) and household things. He does ALL of this for me and because of the grandchildren here. I don't think anyone except me has even thanked him once for all that he does. Instead they yell at him for being slow, for getting frustrated with the kids, even for forgetting to take out the trash.
And he is going to be homeless with us as soon as he gets through packing and storing everything he can by himself.
I have allowed all of this and the sad thing is that I'm sure that  my daughter's won't learn a thing from it all even though I have no idea who or what they will blame for it.
 But will I? Will I become homeless with them again first, trying to save them, and second, letting them walk all over me to our destruction again?
No. 

Think Again

We've all seen it on TV if not in real life: The prostitute whose pimp controls her through her drug habit. We shudder and say, "That could never be me, I'm not a prostitute and I don't have a drug habit."
I'm a 57 year old great grandma and I can no longer honestly say that.
There are thousands of people in the world dealing with debilitating, chronic pain. I am one of them. I wake in the morning and my first involuntary thought is Pain. I give thanks for the day, take a morphine, and wait to be able to get out of bed, usually with a full bladder!
I have a Pain Management Doctor, the only one I know of left in Omaha who doesn't try to just put a bandaid on it, and, for all intents and purposes, I am his prostitute. When he says frog I jump because he controls the quality of my life. Without him I wouldn't get out of bed, play with my grandchildren, or have a life and he is one of the things I give thanks for morning and night. Hundreds of doctors have told me to quit smoking. This one only had to say it once because the order came with the threat of reduced pain medication if not its cessation altogether. A good thing, right?
Recently I had the misfortune to make him unhappy, and as I sat and listened to him berate me and even call me stupid, for the first time, I realized that I am now his Ho.
And I hate it. What can I do about it?? I'm researching it, suddenly willing to try anything with any risk that has any promise of ending my need for narcotics and Him.
I may have found an out, if it works I will definitely document it. But what happened to me is still just as wrong, and I started to wonder about all the other Legal Ho' s out there and about all the addicts on the streets who are self medicating and often dealing to support it. And research does back up my claim that they are out there. Right now, I would consider joining them if I weren't so scared of the legal repercussions, which is silly because I would probably be shot first, suspected of being some Granny Narc....
What happened to me was a misunderstanding from a miscommunication, or, at least, a lack of explanation from the doctor, on top of him totally forgetting what my treatment plan has been, compiled by a possible mistake he made that resulted in him calling Me stupid and reducing my pain medication dosage. The pimp  can do that when you displease him. I didn't get slapped around  though that might have been preferred over trying to adjust to living in more pain while in the middle of moving and trying to give the children in my care a Fun summer. I was silent before my accuser, afraid that speaking in my own defense would worsen the punishment.
My husband doesn't even have that kind of power over me!
If you, like me, say you would never prostitute yourself for drugs, pray you never need them! and Think Again.

2014 Repost Life With Jeanette

I was a little surprised to find this entry. I have talked about KNOWING something was wrong with Jeanette long before she started blowing up this year but didnt realize I had journaled about it in 2014. This was written after Exotica was raided and Jeanette and all the employees were arrested. Jeanettes children had been loving with me for over a year before the raid on Wxotica and we had hardly seen her. She was in love with and literally Slave to Master Jon. I was being evicted from my 2 bedroom apartment (again, I lost my last one for the same reason) and Jeanette was jobless and a total wreck from the raid and imprisonment of Jon. We had to move and she had no income to pay her rent so I offered to move Jeremy, Jess, Jessalynn, Jazz and Kira into her basement until she could get back on her feet. It took a week to clean the moldy, filthy basement. Jeremy and I did it alone.  Even though the kids hadn't lived there, the house was filthy too with dirty, molding dishes stacked in the kitchen and big piles of fast food trash piled in the corner. When I heard that Jeanette was telling people how she was taking care of me and that we were "living off her" i wrote the following in this journal. 
After we lost that house we all moved into a house Meezy was buying. Jeanette was furious because I took the master bedroom, mostly because of my age and disability, it was ground floor with a bathroom, but Jeanette was even angrier that I let Jess take the nicest room on the main floor. It was thru Jess that Meezy was helping us,  he would have been very upset if Jess got less than the best. Jeanette had to take one of the basement rooms at this house. I listened to her rant about it waiting for her to realize that SIX of us had to cramp into the basement at Her house. At least Meezys house had a bathroom down there!! It was huge, was a luxury home fallen into disrepair,  much better than the basement situation the 6 of us had been in.
This is what I wrote in 2014 about life at the house on 42nd street with Jeanette:

It's been one year since we moved into Nett's house to help her after she was indicted. Not an easy year!! You could say we have gotten along amazingly well for four adults and six children living in a two bedroom house. That would be accurate. But a lot of the peace we live in is attributed to people biting their tongues and not saying what they think/feel to maintain that precarious Peace. Not sure how long it will continue... It is a struggle to be sure!! I pay the $625 rent out of my $720 disability, Jeremy sells plasma to keep everyone in cigarettes (even though he doesn't smoke!!) and so we have money for gasoline and household things, Jess usually comes up with money to keep the electric on, and Nett tries to pay the phone bill most months. Jeanette and her kids have rooms upstairs and the rest of us live in the basement, something Jeremy and Jess have a hard time swallowing. They have a harder time than I do with the whole situation. Jeanette doesn't seem to see how little she can contribute or anything the rest of us have sacrificed to do this for her. I think maybe I understand, and thus excuse, that better than the others, but I admit it confuses/bothers me a bit, too.Somewhere in her mind She is doing Us the favor. I think part of it is that we prevented her from bumping her butt too hard when she fell. I recently called her sister in law out for talking about how we are all here living off Jeanette and it somehow made Jeanette angry even though I said nothing that wasn't true and nothing bad about Nett. A bit strange, makes you go hmm. I'm proud of Nett for going back to school and do whatever I can to make it easier for her but it is often at the cost of any harmony with Jeremy!! He has the worst time here. He does ALL of the housework that gets done and cooks and does 90% of all the child care and Nett treats him like shit. He takes it for me and because he loves the kids but it is a bitter pill. I have no clue how to talk to Jeanette about anything here. Pretty much gave that up other than I did insist that she stop telling people that she takes care of me. She gets some child support and has had ADC part of the last year. We all have to watch her go shopping and out to eat etc. whenever she gets any money and we all walk by her room now cooled by a window unit AC while Jeremy sweats cleaning the house because I tell him we can't afford to turn on the house AC. A lot of bitter pills but I keep making everyone take them because I really think Jeanette is clueless that her actions are wrong. She scares me more with her social blindness than her physical blindness and I just keep hoping she will somehow wake up and See how she looks to others. Not long ago Jeremy got in trouble for pushing a neighborhood boy out of his way to get to Jazz and Kira who were crying. It was wrong, all hell broke loose and I chastised him along with everyone else, butt Jeanette was his biggest hater in this telling him over and over how terrible it was that he touched someone else's child. I kept waiting for her to remember/realize that she did far worse last summer running in the street and knocking a little bit off his bike for picking on Robby. I still don't think it ever crossed her mind. That is only here for example of how her mind does or doesn't work. Jeremy and Jess both want to move out and let her figure out what everyone else is really contributing here, and that may happen soon, but I'm afraid for her if it does. I doubt it would make her See anything. I think it will end up at Look what they did after all I've done for them. Her heart isn't bad. I think she has a good heart. I believe she really believes she is the one helping everyone else, I think she really believes she is better and smarter than the rest of us. I just don't quite see How she sees things the way she does. I wish I could fix all of this but I'm afraid I am running out of time. If I can't really explain it how can I keep convincing everyone that she Knows not what she does?? And now Jon may be getting out of jail and Nett is back in love with him. That will force a conclusion here, no one else loves or wants to be part of his life. We will definitely leave them to each other and pray for her children. 

Woman loses arm to flesh-eating bacteria from bath salts

Woman loses arm to flesh-eating bacteria from bath salts

Lawmakers Push For Ban On Bath Salts

Lawmakers Push For Ban On Bath Salts

Pre-Christmas

This isn't my first Christmas to be broke for the holidays, but it is the first for a while. I wouldn't care except for the kids. That hurts. We don't even have a tree But Philly called last night and said he has one for us. And Thanks to Jenny we have some gifts for Kira and Jessalynn, the two I worry about the most. But it still feels pretty bleak. I have always hated Christmas. Even when I can afford to buy for all I care about I hate thinking about those who can't. I hate that children are told that Santa gives them gifts according to how good they are during the year. I never taught my girls that and I wish no one did. We talk a lot about children who have low self esteem and feed it early with crap like this. I hear people talking about how they dislike all the commercialization a lot but I am the only one I ever hear talking about this. Why?

December 2011

I didn't tell my children that there was a Santa. Not just because we were in a cult that didn't recognize it but because I hated so many things about it. Number 1: Kids are taught that they get what they ask for if they are good. Yea, I hate the whole commercialization thing, too, but that is what burns me up the most. How many children who are poor think they weren't good enough??? And we are poor this year. I'm sure Nett's kids will get gifts from their father's family, Jazz will be taken care of by Meez, but what about Jessalynn and our Kira??? I worry about Jessalynn the most. Kira is too little to really care much. I think Jessalynn doubts the whole Santa thing but she is trying to believe this year again and I just feel like telling her the truth. It will still burn that she gets so little but I think it would sting less. She tells me that there are kids in her class saying there is no Santa and adds that those kids will be on the naughty list and not get presents. I have a gift for her stashed but no hope for getting her or anyone else anything else. Jeremy's unemployment never started, not sure why because he is a doush who hasn't bothered to call and check. Jenny checked with Toys for Tots but they say they are out of gifts. Patrick has never contributed to the Santa thing and always says he has a limit like $20 that he can spend on her. 

My phone is off this month and I lost my auto insurance. I am not sure how we will even just survive. Jaz and Kira are finally in diapers during the day which saves a lot of money. Jeanette is taking care of herself and her children more which helps, too. but we are living on my SSI and the little we get for Kira and there are no extras at all. Jeremy is always looking for work but there is little to find that he can do and there is always the stress of how he will get back and forth without getting in a wreck. With the accidents we didn't profit on iota when he was working last time. We still have to pay a $350. fine for his last ticket for reckless driving in the next two months.

Santa must die.

Trick or Treat

Jeremy, Nett, Jenny and I took the seven kids trick or treating last night. We got a late start (again!), readying all the kids is tricky! and people seemed to run out of candy pretty early but it was fun. We sped over to Cherry Hills and there were as few places that went all out which the kids really liked. Jessalynn was a vampire, Jenise a witch, Robby Luigi, Riley Spiderman, Jaz a Tiger, Kira was Batgirl, and Kegan was Woody, all too too cute!!!!! We went to Walmart and bought them a bunch more candy before going home so everyone has plenty!!!!

Moving On

We've moved. Jeremy lost his job yesterday and a few hours later the tranny blew on my van.
Ah, these are the days of our lives.....
Not sure if Jeremy losing his job is terrible, I pretty much have been expecting it daily. He has been working in Valley for about two months. I didn't tell him about the job for a long time after I found out about it because of the long drive and his driving record. He wrecked his car several times in the short time he has bee working there. He still has to go to court on one of them and his car looks like crapola. Also, his check has been docked several times for breaking things until he got fired for breaking something yesterday and the cost of it will be coming out of his last check still.
The good thing is that we moved this month to a cheaper place. It isn't at all what I was looking for but it is a place we could afford on just my disability if we had to and it is very close to the kids school.
there isn't a dishwasher in this place and I don't have a washer so I iron the clothes dry, and with all the six kids laundry that is a lot of ironing!!!!
The thought that my life hasn't turned out anything like I expected often crosses my mind even though I really have no idea what I expected by 54, don't think I ever really thought it through. I don't hate this life. I love everyone in my life. I suppose I didn't expect to still be raising kids but I planned to be enjoying them so it isn't that different. OK. That might be a lie. But I sure wouldn't want anyone else to have them when their parents can't take care of them... There are wonderful moments, days, years. 
     Kira: GRANDMA! GRANDMA! Jaz is going to bite me!!!!!
     Jaz: I'm not going to bite her I am going to HIT her!!!
Priceless. 
But all six of them as much as they are with me is a LOT of work. 
I feel old. All 2011 I have been aware of how old I am. I feel like I have aged more in the last year than in the last ten. I look at my body and face and see an old woman in the mirror. I live at a pain level that horrifies me and Dr. Gold keeps me under medicated, sadistic or something, I haven't figured that out. Not sure why it is called Pain management because the pain isn't managed at all by him. But that is another story....

What I've Done to Us

Ah, it isn't pretty. We are so broke we will only make it through these times if absolutely nothing else goes wrong for a loooong time. Jeremy has his CNA but is having a very hard time finding anyone who will hire anyone without experience. I should have researched that a little better!!! We whould be alright for the rest of the year if I hadn't spent all of our money on my girls in the last few months. I did what I thought I had to do, but much of it could end up to be a waste after it all. My youngest could very likely lose the home I put her into and everything I bought for it. Jeanette started working last week, there is light at the end of that tunnel, although she was going to be OK most likely soon anyhow with ADC and getting her unemployment benefits extended. But I broke the cardinal rule, take care of yourself so you can help others, not help others until you can't help yourself. Not the first time I have done this but I should know better by now!!!! I even spent money put back for important things, like getting my teeth fixed. Now after next week I will have no teeth on the left side. Ah, my own fault, what is worse is making Jeremy live with this. We could have lived at least a year on what I have spent in the last six months, two years on what I spent the two months before that, and now we are struggling to keep the house in toilet paper and keep the lights on! Fortunately, Jeremy is largely unaware of how much money we had to begin with. Not that he would hate me or anything, but I would definitely hear the things I already know about how careless I have been with our money and lives and I'd rather not.
Aside from that, we are having a good summer with all of the kids so far. We have all six almost all of the time and are often stressed with it all but manage to take them places and do things that they like and are fun for all of us. This summer we discovered the Sprayground park. It is free so there is only the cost of gas to get there, not far, and a little for snacks and stuff and we've bought little toys for the parks like sand shovels and buckets. I sooo wish I had bought a zoo pass before the money was gone! but the Sprayground is fun good for all of them. Jaz doesn't care much for the sprinklers yet but she loves the dry playground.
We are having some trouble with the smoke in the air from wildfires in Arizona that is blowing into our state. Jaz has had asthma problems and Jeremy and I have had terrible sinus problems, but this too shall pass.
All for now. The day is calling.
See ya!

Robby Party

We had a party at Westwood sprayground yesterday. Jeremy brought a grill and made hot dogs, had a Batman birthday cake, and the kids played and played all day. Jenny and Keegan came and Michelle and Keen were there with Cherry so it was a good size group even though several people invited couldn't make it. The park is only about five miles from here so we hope to take the kids there a lot this summer. good free fun for hot days.

I got a bad case of food poisoning from some potato salad, spent a miserable 8 hours but it is passing, just weak and miserable now.
Worried worried worried about money. Been supporting Nett and Jess for months and Jeremy is having a hellova time finding a CNA job. Everyone seems to want a year experience but where is he supposed to get that??? He slunk back to Popeyes today to ask for that job back, I felt terrible for him, but we aren't giving up on finding him a CNA job.
Jami's and Kirk's visits with Kira have been cut down to one two hour visit on Wednesdays in preparation for them ending soon when she goes up for adoption. I still know nothing about if i will get to adopt her, it is absolutely terrifying waiting to know. I am talking to the LDS church about helping us if we need it and I think they will. That is all a little strange. Our new missionaries are almost claiming a completely different LDS doctrine than any of the others have that eliminates most of my long held objections. I know the church didn't change that much, but they have definitely changed their approach! I will be meeting with them again Monday evening.
I just hope they can help me keep our Kira.
OK. Feeling pretty rough.
More some other time.

8 Days of School Left!!!!

Whew. Almost survived another year of driving kids to school!!! Jeremy has been helping drive them a lot lately since I was diagnosed with Labyrnthitis. Vertigo is not the best driving companion or any kind of companion.
The kids are passing around some kind of virus, mostly high fever, but it seems to pass fairly quickly.
Did I write about Nett's eyes???? Her retinas detached a couple of months ago and she is blind in the right eye and doesn't see too well out of the left. She has had two surgeries done by Dr. Priluck and he still thinks she will regain some sight but we won't know for sure for a while. We have had the kids pretty much since this started, she was in terrible pain after the surgeries and then can't lift over five pounds and just needs to adjust to what her life is now. It scares her when the kids run at her because they get close before she can see them, but she is planning to start having them soon. Mostly right now we don't want to risk her getting whateverf this virus the kids are passing right now. I took her to the doctor today and Dr. Rosman is testing her for C Diff, which I hope she doesn't have!! but she has been a pretty sick little girl for a whle now. She is very, very, skinny from the Graves Disease, and has just had too much go wrong lately.
jeremy graduated from Clarkson and has his CNA but is still looking for someone to hire him. This first job will be the hardest to get so he is having to pound the pavement looking but I have no doubt he will do well when someone decides to give him a chance. He graduated at the top of his class amazing everyone with his aptitude for this. I knew he would do well but he even managed to amaze me.
I am worried about our financial situation. We have been supporting Jess and Jeanette for a while now and the money we had saved to get us through while Jeremy went to school and found work has gone too fast but I always have faith that we will find a way to manage, although I have no clue what that will be right now. Rob paid Nett child support for a couple of months but then his mother told him to stop after Jeanette could no longer work, lovely people they are, and we awhve beensupporting her and her kids since then. She has applied for ADC but that will be less than 400 a month when it does start and that isn't nearly enough. Jess hopes to be able to start working in June but she currently owes 340 in rent that I will have a hard time getting together for her. I have it but I also have everyone's other bills to pay and Jeremy still not working but we are first and foremost survivors.

Depression

I seldom fall victim to depression like this. Thank God. It feels very much like when someone close dies but no has died lately. I am sure it is triggered by the death of what I have felt was a close relationship with Jessalynn's father, Patrick, but that is not all of it, only the last straw perhaps. Patrick blindsided us Thursday with court papers demanding imediate temporary custody of Jessalynn and we go to court April 4th. I would repsect it if I had any belief that he did this in Jessalyn's best interest. He stated in his own deposition that he has always had free access to Jessalynn yet he has never in my memory kept her more than overnight on a weekend occasionally, never even for a whole weekend, unless he was taking her out of town for a family reunion or something. No. This is the culmination of four years of him bitching about paying child support and never understanding that the money he has to pay is for the overall support of Jessalynn. Not that he has at all regularly paid. He has only made payment when threatened with being held in contempt of court or of having his driving license suspended. Add to that he was very angry that Jess stopped letting him claim Jessalynn on his taxes the year he didn't give her her share of it. He swore after tax time this year he would have revenge and now he is trying for it. He says he borrowed the money from his mother to do this. He called me and said that he hoped we would have the same relationship as before. I thought I told him that ship had sailed but then Jess called and told me that Patrick was telling her that I was fine with all if this. I called him and apologized if I hadn't made myself clear but that I would never have any respect or even liking for him again in any way. I told him that he was aware that Jess would need my support in this as he had to have help paying for his lawyer from his mother and that I don't have friends who cost me a thousand dollars out of the blue for ridiculous claims because they don't understand child support. It seems that I am worried about everything these days. I have no clue how Jeanette is going to manage with her vision still mostly limited to one eye and Jess is totally dependant on child support that seldom comes and State aid that is never enough for a little longer and Jami and Kirk still can't take care of themselves let alone the addiction taht seems to have claimed them again and I watch my savings disappearing with all of their needs until I know that I will soon have trouble taking care of myself. Jeremy is doing well in school and working terribly hard but he studies constantly to keep his grades up and cna do very little to help me with anything. Indeed, I feel terrible I have helped him so little with his studies after promising so much more when he enrolled in the CNA class. Then there will be the worry of him finding a good nursing job when he does graduate and surviving until that income begins. I had hoped to have enough saved that we could move to a better home when our lease is up here but that is doubtful with having to hire reprsentation for Jess. Jessalynn does not want to live with Patrick so for that reason alone I will seek the best of the best help to stop Patrick's plan to get her and get out of paying child support. I have also been looking for a little car for Jessica but don't know if there will be money for that either after this custody issue is dealt with. There is a bright spot. We were all so worried that Jess getting attacked in her own home twice would make things worse for her. I can't imagine being agorraphobic and then being attacked in the one place I felt safe, I expected a huge setback at least, but it has instead had a totally different effect. She says it made her feel empowered forf the first time, she fought off both attacks herself and survived. God does have the strangest ways of giving blessings!!!! I think her reovery since then has been unbelievable and I do think she could be persuaded to start driving a little again if she had a car. I might still find a way to make that happen for Jess and her girls.

My Beautiful Jessalynn is 9!!

Jessalyn is growing up sooooo fast!!! There was a blizzard the night she was born. Jami came to pick me up to go the hospital the night Jess went into labor. We were climbing through the snow to get to her truck when I slipped through a drift and fell into the sewer drain in front of Patrick's house. Jami had no clue what happened and the wind was so fierce I could barely hear her calling for me, asking where i went. I was in the drain up to my chest which was compressed so I couldn't yell loud but she finally backtracked and saw me and pulled me out of the drain and rushed me to the ER at the hospital where Jessalynn was being born. I insisted o a wheelchair to check on them before I went into ex ray and saw Jess. She was looking pretty bad and had a fever rising so they were planing a C-section ASAP. I went back to the ER and got through the tests while she was in surgery and got back upstairs right after Jessalynn was taken to the nursery. She was so beautiful I just sat there and cried.

And now we often have a snow storm on her birthdays, today no exception. School was canceled but she is here with us. We are going to delay her party, maybe Friday, but I am going to give her one of her gifts shortly. She has been asking for her birthstone so I bought her a 10 ct. gold pair of earrings with marque shaped garnet stones. I'd like to get her a matching ring and necklace but am worried they might get broken or lost which would make her too sad, hopefully the earrings will stay in place better than those might. They will be the first dangly earrings I have let her have although the dangle is very short. I am so very proud of this little girl. She is just amazing and I love the way she loves and trusts me. I lived with her parents her first six months before i went to Texas for two years and when I came back we bonded all over again and the bond is very tight. When I first came back to Nebraska Jeremy and I stayed with them for about 9 months and Jessalynn spent almost all of her time up in the room we were staying in. If I would lay in bed and read she would get a book and lay cheek to cheek with me for hours pretending to read, too, turning pages when I did, never bored. Then Jeremy and I moved out into our own house and not long after Jess and Jessalynn moved in with us. Jess took the downstairs but Jessalynn again spent all her waking hours upstairs with us. I had been injured and spent all my time in a wheel chair or bed but she hung out with me no matter what. We lived there a year or two, then Jess moved into West Omaha and we moved a couple of months later to here, less than two miles apart from them but again, Jessalynn spends at least half or more of her time here with us.

Jessalynn is my second oldest grandchild but she is the oldest on who lives here and she rules the cousins who were born after her here. She is an excellent role model and a loving cousin to the younger ones. When all the three now two year olds were born she became indispensable in helping keep order here when all of the kids are here. At home she is a huge help to Jess with Jaz and all of the babies adore her.

But I don't think anyone could adore her more than I do.

A Friday Evening

We're waiting on Jeanette to get here to stay with the kids while we go shopping. Friday nights we keep her kids overnight because she works at seven on Saturday mornings but tonight she is coming here to hang out with them adn feed them supper so we can go and she can have a little mroe time with them. We also have Jaz tonight, Jeremy went and picked her up last night. He was so happy to have her back here he watched Dora with her for two hours at bedtime. It's a good thing Jess doesn't mind sharing Jaz with him because the bond between those two is incredible. Jess knows that and appreciates it for what it is. Jaz will always have Jeremy, this is a life bond.
Nett just texted that she is on her way.
There was a Family Meeting here today with KVC and the guardian ad lidem. I wonder if that is how you spell that... I think the meeting went well. I just hope they find a way to help Jami. It seems like they brainstorm all the things they can do for her and then no much happens. I am not sure whose fault it is that so little gets done but it is frustrating. Now they say they have to have a court order to get Jami mental health help but I thought that was already done. I mean, they have long ago established that she needs help, haven't they?? Wasn't that part of what got her into the Family Works program?? It's not like she could have possibly recovered and not need help any more. It doesn't help that Jami doesn't cooperate more but I tried to tell them I can understand some of her feeling of hopelessness at trying.
I think, hope, Jess has recovered somewhat from her most recent trauma. There is just not much that could be done to help her or for her to help herself. I am still very interested to find out if security guard Dale is really an Omaha police officer and I do plan to find that out. But I council Jess not to dwell on it although that is hard with the threat of being attacked any time she walks out her front door.
Nett is here.

After The Ozz

We went to see Ozzy and Slash last night. It ws fun jsut preparing to go, both of us got new clothes for the concert and we wanted to get there early to get Jeremy shirts but got there a little late so we missed the begining of Slash while standing in line. We had pretty good seats, the 17th row off to the right of the stage. Jeremy was pretty upset I told him not to bring the camera because everyone else seemed to have brought one. I thought they would be enforcing the no camera rule, silly me. Slash was good, I texted Jami through their show feeling bad she wasn't there with us for it since she has always had a thing for slash. Jeremy was stunned that almost everyone stayed in their seats during Slash but when Ozzy came on it was a different story. He kept almost everyone standing for his whole show and he put on an amazing show considering he is a fossil. I joked a lot about how the handicap parking was full by the time we got there, we were an hour late for Kid Rock and there was plenty of handicap parking! but Ozz was getting around a lot better than I expected. I was up for his whole show, too, new boots and all. Jeremy was Jeremy in concert mode, jumping, yelling, and as usual as much fun to watch as the concert. I gave our number to a guy in front of us taking pictures and video offering to pay him for copies but haven't heard from him yet. I sure hope he calls, it would make Jeremy very happy. Jeremy was upset enough about it to want me to go bck out to the car and get the camera but I couldn't leave and get back in. It ended around 11 and we went to Village Inn and picked up Kira adn came home.

Snowy Snowy Day

We are in a snow storm. Supposed to be getting six to eight inches by tomorrow morning and it looks like we have gotten most of it. I had to get out in it to plate the van but hope to not go out again. School was canceled today and I hope it is tomorrow, too.
Kirk went into treatment this morning. I was planning to take him but with the snow we asked David to drive him there in his jeep. Now the real worry about Jami begins. I asked her a couple of hour ago if she had arranged anything for herself and she said she hadn't been feeling well this morning.
Nett's kids are here but she is coming to get them since she jsut found out she isn't working tonight.
We are working on taking the binky away from Kira, heartbreaking, and I have never had to take one before since none of the others liked them. She is playing with all of the kids right now but lately I think she likes hewr time alone with us here. She is such a little sweetie!!!!

Kira Birthday

We don't have any big plans for today, Kira gets a little ripped off with a birthday so soon after Christmas although not as bad as her mom. Jessalynn and Trace have the flu and we are all still beat from the holidays so it will be a simple turning of two for Kira. Jeremy is baking her a cake and we have a few party things and the grandkids are all here. Well, the Omaha ones are.

I finally bought a new laptop after getting a piece of crap trying to buy one at the pawn shop. I am pretty happy with this one.

The money I got is going very fast. I am trying to hang onto what little I have left for us to survive until Jeremy finishes school and finds work. It is hard with the kids needing and wanting so much but I have done about all I can for them without losing everything myself.

Jeanette is having a hard time on her own although Rob is helping. He is also telling her he has a couple of brain tumors that sound like they could be fatal if he is telling the truth. I am not sure what I believe. I can easily see him telling her he is dying for sympathy but I can also see something being wrong with his brain!!!!

Kirk is going into a 30 day drug treatment program Monday and I am very worried about what is going to happen with Jami. She should have set something up for herself, she has to go through a drug treatment program, too, but she didn't and she is in trouble with KVC for not going for her random drug tests since she got out of FW. She gets upset with me when I ask about what she is going to do. Today I asked if she was planing to stay at the trailer without Kirk and she said that she would have to until she could arrange something else and said that her phone getting cut off Friday stopped her from making arrangements. I said nothing, she knows I know she should have done something long before her phone got cut off Friday.

We are excited about the Ozzy concert coming up in a couple of weeks. Jeanette gave KVC her information and hopefully will be approved to babysit for us.

2011

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!! We had all of our Omaha grandkids and Trace last night to bring in the hew year. Jami and Kirk spent the evening with Jess and Nett was with her friend, Helen. We didn't have a lot planned but we played Candyland with the bigger kids.
I only have one resolution, to cut down on pop consumption to save the rest of my teeth. Everything else would be ongoing efforts to make everything better. Maybe I should vow to stop trying to fix so many things around instead of more....
Jeremy starts CNA school February 28th and I hope to have our lives a little simpler by then. I need Nett to get a day job, and she needs it too, for the kids, so she can get them to bed earlier and be less stressed herself. Jeremy will be in school in the evenings and I don't know I can handle all of the kids every night without him here although of course I will do whatever I have to. I keep saying I am going toget more organized but, not only are my organization skills not getting any sharper with age, but I am not sure anyone could organize the life I try to lead.
I am happy with my life but I also regret there is so little time for Jeremy and me to just do things together, go out once in a while. It is fine for me but I think about how young he is and what I thought life should be like at his age. He is a wonderful grandfather to all these kids but I would love to see him able to have a good time like a 34 year old guy should. I gave him tickets to Ozzy for Christmas but am still worried if we will have a sitter for Kira. I hope he doesn't end up having to go alone!!! I too often feel like he gets ripped off choosing me but he refuses to consider a life otherwise for which I am grateful but feel guilty even though I did warn him what his life would be with me before we came here. Jess was mad at me the other day over BS like she does and she said "You just want to take everyone's kids!!" I could have laughed or cried. I have a man 20 years younger than me who is wildly fun and outgoing and we spend all of our time taking care of kids and we go out maybe once a year,less thanwhen I was married to a boring, old, deadbeat.
OK. Jeremy is in here.
Later.

John C.Hunziker

That is the name of Jess's therapist for most of the last year. I've never thought much of him, but I maybe should have thought more about him. Definitely should have tried harder to get Jess to switch doctors. First, her depression and anxiety problems got worse and worse in his care. And she never seemed to feel better after an appointment with him. And he just gave me a bad feeling whenever I spoke to him. He was rude and talks at you instead of to you.
Jess has had a lot of problems with keeping the many appointments he demands she make. She and I tried to explain to him many times that it was difficult to meet these demands because she ash two young children and we have three families sharing one vehicle which often makes scheduling things a matter of priority. Hunziker would hear no excuse when we would try to reschedule always pushing and threatening Jess if she tried to reschedule for any reason. Yes. Constant threats to have her committed if she didn't see him and make him money. Little wonder her anxiety problems only became worse under his care. He admits she got worse but of course he doesn't believe it has anything to do with his own qualifications or lack thereof.
Then yesterday he let her know he means business about missing appointments. She has been very sick with a nasty virus and. missed an appointment without calling so he trotted his happy butt downtown and filed a petition to have her committed although she is not a threat to herself or any one else. Jess was in the shower when six police officers entered her home and pounded on the bathroom door demanding she come out even if all she had to put on was a towel. She was taken directly to the County Psych Hospital and placed in intensive care. Se called me as soon as she was able to have me visit her.
We spoke together to the doctor on duty and were able to ask him questions about what Hunziker had done. He admitted that missing appointments was not a reason to commit anyone and that Hunziker was going to have to present a real reason for them to be able to keep Jess locked up. Jess told him that she had seen her psychiatrist very recently who had said he thought she was doing well so he called her shrink who verified what she'd said but the doctor said that he would have to speak to the committing doctor before he could release Jess. After an hour he said that I would have to leave, they hadn't been able to contact Hunziker so Jess was going to have to spend the night there but he promised that he would have her moved out of Intensive Care to a more comfortable part of the hospital.
Jess did find out that Hunziker had tried to give reasons besides her missing appointments for committing her. He brought up three things Jess had gone through, all of which occurred at least over a month ago, and she recovered from them, dealt with them better than many would have. The question there is that if these things had him so concerned for her safety, why did he not recommend she be locked up WHEN these things were going on??? This man is a psychological social worker not even listed with the AMA and Jess was referred to him by a REAL psychiatrist who Hunziker didn't even consult before making this drastic decision for Jess.
It is the morning after. Jess is still locked in County and we are trying to free her from this injustice.
Jess voluntarily went to Hunziker seeking help. She was in no way court ordered or anything like that to see him. She should have been able to quit him at any time but has been held with him through threats even though he himself admitted he was of no help to her. He is boorish and rude and nothing will ever convince me that he was in any way trying to help Jess with the way he has behaved toward her from the very beginning.
I would like nothing more than to see this man lose his license to practice. How many others will never seek help again after experiencing his "care"???

Thanksgiving Eve

I'm starting the prep-work for TG dinner. Jeanette is making a turkey and most of the side dishes for the dinner at her house. I am making the ham and candied yams for the dinner at her house and also a complete dinner to take to Jessica's. I didn't tell Jeanette we are making diner at Jess's, too, but she doesn't want to know anything about Jess anyhow. I hoped they would patch things up by tomorrow but it isn't going to happen. It may never happen and that breaks my heart to think about. Their last words were so bitter and cruel. I don't take sides with one against the other or talk about them to each other. i just pray they will love each other as they should someday. I see both sides, maybe I understand Jess's feelings better but Jeanette's feelings are just as valid even if a little foreign to me.
I think about when I am no longer here and how I hope my girls will have each other then. I think about how alone I am in the world since Mike poisoned every single relative I have with his lies and paranoia. Uncle Paul has emailed me a few times since then but I know he really believes the things Mike says, too, mostly because he isn't close enough to Mike to see how ridiculous he is. I take comfort in all the things Mom said to me about what Mike had done before she died and the things he planned to do to me after and know she would have stood by me if she had lived and been able to. All of it and other things from that time in my life is why I can understand Jess's feelings of betrayal right now. I always thought and taught my children that family comes first. That you never turn against your own for anything. I felt secure in having lived my life by this theme and all I had always done to stay close to family from when I was very young and started writing letters to close and distant relatives. Mike used to call me and ask me to call Mom or Aunt Bonnie for him so he could find out how they were without having to get involved in their lives which should have been a big clue that he and i had very little in common about love for family. He feels obligation, more like he does and says what he feels he needs to for family to have a little self respect and to be able to tell others how wonderful he is to his family, but he doesn't feel the love. I do. I want my girls to, too, even if it leaves them as hurt as I was after I lost my whole family, but hoping it doesn't end that way for them. Maybe I am just dreaming there. Maybe I have ideas of family that are extinct. But i refuse to be that way myself with my family and I will fight for them to have the same antique feelings that I do. How do we lose the loyalty and closeness that should be gendered by "family" without losing God??? i don't know. Mike claims to be a very pious man but never had any love or respect for either of our parents or our brother. Or me now. He feels very righteous about these things, that we were all people who were unworthy of his love or even the love of whatever god he claims to worship that he thinks smiles on his sickness. He convinces himself that everyone else is just insane and he is the tortured soul that had to cast his family out to save himself and it steadily make him more and more unbalanced. I would hate more than anything for my girls to be any thing like him in these respects. I want them to know that they are blessed with each other and that they are their sister's keepers of heart. Jami comes the closest to understanding this. I just keep loving them more and more hoping to show them how to love each other by how I love them. I teach the grandchildren how they will all be responsible for each others hearts for the rest of their lives.
I pray for a world that remembers these things.

Monday Before thanksgiving

I did go back to the doctor yesterday and he gave me another shot in the butt and a different antibiotic. I'm feeling a little better, coughing up less green stuff. I woke up with terrible tooth pain lat night but didn't get a chance to see anyone today, hopefully I will get into Emergency Dental tomorrow and they can over charge me fir a root canal.
Kira's guardian ad lidem called today to check on us. She asked bout Kira spending so much time here while they were at Family Works and a lot of other questions. They aren't very happy with the progress Kirk and Jami have made in the last year and she said something about how they usually give parents 15 months to get it together and be able to have their kids or "other arrangements" have to be made for Kira. I said that I thought they were sincere in wanting Kira back but couldn't say much in their defense for the things they haven't done especially since I really don't understand it. I think they want the right things but the reality of doing what they have to doesn't really hit them. Or maybe the necessity of it. Jami still rages over what seems unfair and I try to tell her that "fair" isn't in question, it is simply do what they say or lose Kira.
Jenise is very sick. Very stuffy and running a fever. Nett took her to the doctor today and they put her on an antibiotic but didn't way what is wrong other than that it isn't strep. Jaz has needed a couple of breathing treatments since waking up choking last night and her cheeks are red but she doesn't have a temp and is playing like she feel fine most of the time.
It is crazier and crazier with all the kids here so much and our apartment is getting trashed pretty badly. I need to get a couple of gallons of paint and scrub and paint the walls where the babies have drawn on them and other things have decorated them. Robby broke the new blinds in the kids room today and I have no idea when or how we will be able to replace them.
I used Jeremy's bank card at the store the other day for a $3 purchase and they charged his card $83. I caught it by chance, bored and calling the bank to check his balance. I lost the receipt but they still fixed it today. Good thing. That is all the money we have until I don't know when.

Ugh

I feel like crap. Maybe the antibiotics, maybe the antibiotics not working, I'll go back to the doctor tomorrow.
Lindsey has sent me a couple of messages asking me to call her so last night I did and John got on the phone. He shares my brother's title of Pompous Ass, almost steals it from him. It is even worse coming from John. He asked why I was calling Lindsey and then said that I was not allowed to have phone contact with her but if I would like to write to her and establish a credible relationship with her I might be able to speak to her some day.
I just wrote and deleted a lot about this. No need for it to be said again now. It is all in records that can be found. I'm not even that upset about it really, I didn't expect any better from John.
We're having a pretty quiet day here. Just us and Kira this morning, then Robby and Riley came this afternoon and Jaz got dropped off a little while ago. I guess that doesn't sound too quiet, but there haven't been any catastrophes or bank robberies today. Jenise is with her mom on their way here and Jessalynn is at Girl Scouts.
Cheri called today. I miss seeing her but she wouldn't stop by when I told her that Kira and I have been sick. She can't afford to get sick with her job and I can't seem to get everyone well at the same time.

Never A dull Moment

Jami and Kirk have been staying in a nice trailer in the back yard of Kirk's friend who lives near here, David. David has a brother who lives next door, Derrick, who is actually closer to Kirk. The brothers have an electrician company with their father that has been in trouble since the economy went sooo bad but it is obvious from their homes that they were once quite prosperous. Now they are running off generators because they owe OPPD and I don't think they have gas wither. Last night Jami and Kirk went to a Mom's Off Meth meeting together and when they tried to go home the houses were surrounded by police, swat teams, and channel 7 news. They called me here and we found out that Derrick had robbed a bank, saying he had a bomb in the drive through. He got awaya with less than $2000 according to the news and is still At Large. Jami and Kirk were nervous about going back to the trailer but eventually did since they can't be here with Kira. I can't imagine Derrick robbing a bank but I know he has been very depressed and also I heard that his girl broke up with him yesterday. I assume he was drunk, he has been drinking a lot, and likely woke up somewhere today thinking What the hell did I do?????
I went to get Jaz's WIC checks this morning and saw an Urgent Care place behind the office so I stopped in there to see if I could get some antibiotics for a sinus infection. It turned out I am even sicker than I know. I told the doctor there is no way I can be admitted to a hospital with Kira so he gave me a shot of steroids in the butt and gave me an albuterol treatment and a couple of prescriptions and told me to see him again to be evaluated in three days. No wonder I feel so bad lately!!!!! A sinus infection with pneumonia is kicking my butt.

Friday Evening

Jeremy is gone with Jeanette to her old house to try to get the last of her things. this is supposed to be the last day to go there, the landlord is wanting the keys, so hopefully they can get everything Jeanette wants. Then Jeremy and Kirk are supposed to start moving her things out storage here into her apartment so she can start getting it set up for them. Nett is so rattled trying to do everything being so sick. Untreated Graves Disease is a real booger to live with until they fix it. She had all her tests to prove it is Graves done yesterday but I'm not sure when they will get around to radiating her thyroid.
Babyproofing is a much studied science here. Three two and almost tow year olds can thwart almost any ideas we come up with. We finally have the bathroom so they can't open the door, used those donut looking knob covers, but that still only works if everyone remembers to close the bathroom door. And it is a pain in the butt for the rest of us to get into the rooms with the covers on the knobs. I put surgical gloves over the knobs under the covers which helps but it is still hard for the big kids to get in the bathroom.
Rob has contacted Nett a few times. He seems to just go back and forth between saying he is sorry for everything and that everything is Nett's fault, a bit of a contradiction!!! He doesn't really believe Nett is serious about divorcing him yet even though he got a copy of the protection order. He sends her very bad poetry that just makes her want to barf and she just keeps telling him it is over. He spent most of their marriage in the basement getting high and drunk and playing with his toys but now he misses them . Seems like if maybe he noticed them when he had them this wouldn't be happening. I must say that, even with all the chaos of staying crammed in this apartment with me Jeremy and me, Jeanette seems a lot happier than I have seen her during her marriage.
Jami s pretty miserable with her situation but I can't sympathize with her since she made her own situation that she is living and , despite her denials, I very much believe she already using again and complaining that the courts are going to make a her begin and complete a drug program since she bailed on FW. Se tells me every day how she misses Kira now but that wasn't her main thought when she walked out on FW where she had Kira living with her. Not only does she have what very much looks lie a needle hope in her neck but she was also seen in Council Bluffs yesterday and I don't think it was to visit her father or anything legitimate. She is always fighting with Kirk lately again miserable but there is nothing I can do for her if I wanted to. If I had the time to!!! Her timing on this was terrible for everyone and the only thing I could do at all was to take Kira in and force Jeanette out so I could have Kira back here. That was a shame for many reasons, Nett isn't ready to be on her own and I have just had too little time with her since she got with Rob when she was only 14. There are so many little things I always wanted to share with Jeanette that I want to teach her now. I still will, she will be very close and I will be helping her be a single mom with three kids. But I hoped she would be able to live with me at least a month even though it is cramped with all of us here. A lot of the damage done to Jeanette's thinking while with Rob needs to be undone and taught correct. The first years she spent with him she assumed he was smarter than her and listened to him about every little thing. She has known that he is full of shit for some time but still needs to learn the real things about life that a mom can teach.
Just had to stop and clean up another mess the babies made and I have to figure out what to feed this troop. That is another thing about Nett, her kids need to learn to eat real food before they are just like their father. someone must have scared Rob in the cradle with a vegetable and I see Robby acting the same. Jenise is a little better but she had a very hard time she she started school trying to eat like other kids.
OK. Gotta get back to this.

Chaos

Jeanette rented an apartment here today. We have to get our apartment emptied and ready for a KVC inspection. I can't believe they didn't show up today but I know they will be here tomorrow. Jami was officially terminated at Family Works this morning and I have no clue what she is planning. She will have to complete a drug program somewhere to get Kira back, likely in patient at this point.
We are passing around a terrible stomach virus. I was very sick for the last few days and the kids have been sick, too. I took Jessalynn home last night and Jess called me a little later saying Jessalynn was feeling sick and wanted me to come get her. Jeremy picked her up and I laid with her until she started throwing up, which made her feel better. Poor Jeremy slept on the couch and I had Jessalynn and Jaz in bed with me.
Now we have to get Nett moved into her place and then put our apartment back together. We put a lot of our things into storage to make room for Nett and her kids. I wanted her to stay with us at least a month to save a little more money before renting a place but the thing with Kira forced her to do it right away and now we're scrambling to get everything done.
Chaos.

Saturday Afternoon

Jeremy and Jeanette have gone with a truck to move her large things into storage. I gave the babies baths and did their hair. The big kids are playing outside, it is actually pretty nice out still. We are all working on organizing our coexistence in this apartment. It is nice having Jeanette with me even with the circumstances, I have missed so much with her. The kids are having a hard time, especially Jenise. She is such a tender little thing like her mother. It would help if Rob were on the right page with this and would work in her best interest. Hopefully he will catch on in time but for now he has forced Jeanette to exclude him from the kids lives. He is a very self centered man, can't even put his kids first, and he's not very bright which doesn't help either. He persists in trying to tell the kids that Mommy is bad and this is all her fault. He can't or doesn't want to see how harmful that is for the children's fragile feelings. I despise him but I would never bad mouth him to his children because they love him and because they know they are a part of him. Last night when Jenise asked why her Daddy broke his promise to see her I told her that sometimes people love you so much that they will promise they will do the things they wish they could and that they don't mean to hurt your feelings if they can't keep that promise for any reason. I think how very young Jim and I were when we split and am proud that neither of us ever tried to hurt Jami in any way to get back at each other. It doesn't seem hard at all to me for parents to figure this out if Jim and I could do it as teenagers.
I took Jeanette to an endocrinologist last week and the testing and then treatment for her Grave's Disease is started. She had the bloodwork to test for Graves and next week she will have the thyroid scan and then hopefully soon she will go through the radiation treatment. The doctor, who I think is good, put her on a heart medication to help her feel better while they go through all the required motions to get her treated. She is very, very, ill. She is skin and bones and always sweating and has a very hard time concentrating with her body going 500 mph right now. she is run down and worn out with the separation but still happier than she was married and living with Rob all these years. She and Jess see each other and talk a lot now and that makes my heart feel good. I do all I can to make things easier for her and help her through this. I don't know how she is holding up except that she is like me and just does whatever has to be done no matter what.
We are so broke it is frightening but I know we will work it all out. Jeremy losing his job right before the blow up is a terrible thing, not just financially, but for Jeremy's feelings, too. He doesn't feel right not working and would like to search more for work but we need him for so much else right now he hasn't had much chance to job hunt. I think this weekend will be our last chance to get Nett's things out of her old home so maybe we can get on a routine of some kind here.
Of course, the van is acting up again and I worry every day that it will be the last day we have it running. My atty called about a week ago and said that I would be getting my settlement on that wreck any time now but I have no idea what it will be. I try not to get my hopes up but I do hope it is enough to get us a vehicle that runs.
We got a letter from the DMV saying Jeremy has to pay $25.,000 for that cop car that hit him and we are frantically looking for the letter we got shortly after that wreck saying no one was considered at fault.
Jess is holding up well through all of this but I do worry when she might break from the stress, too. What Rob did to her is just unimaginable. I can better understand his father attacking Jeremy than Rob attacking Jessica and Jeremy in no way deserved to be attacked by that trailer trash family. Rob lies through his teeth still tyring to convince Nett that Jeremy attacked Bob even though Jeanette kept telling Rob she SAW it happen. But I have never known he or his family to set any stock in honesty or being honorable. I have hated seeing Jeanette act like them while with them for the last 14 years.
OK. Looks like Jeremy is back.

Almost Lost Kira

I was at the courthouse with Jeanette helping her file a restraining order against Rob when Kirk called and said Jami had left him a message saying she had walked out of Family Works. Fortunately, I already had Kira. Jami had called Wednesday night wanting me to go pick up Kira because she was planning on leaving FW. She was very upset, has been upset at FW for a while, but I told her that I couldn't get Kira then and that it would be best if she stayed where she was, safe with Kira, at least for the night. the next day KVC brought Kira here to visit Kirk and Jami asked them to leave Kira with me. FW knew Kira was with me but they still called the police and reported Kira missing when Jami left. Before I got home from the courthouse Kirk called and said that the police were searching the place he lives looking for Kira already. I was rushing home while on the phone with the new KVC case manager, Tad, trying to put out the fire. Tad said he would call DHS and I tried to call Kira's guardian ad lidem who wasn't in but her supervisor was and he started trying to stop the police orders to find Kira and put her in foster care. He couldn't find the papers that I was told they had saying that I would get Kira back if something like this happened. Without that document the police would have to take Kira. I got a call a little later from DHS saying that the police said they and come to my address and that a woman living at this address told them that I didn't live here but somehow also said that I had a bunch of people living with me and that I had gone to the courthouse but that I didn't have Kira. None of that made any sense. the police did NOT come here but I do have Nett and her kids living here and I was at the courthouse, something no one but Jeremy, Kirk, Jeanette and I knew. Now there was another fear of me not getting to keep Kira if someone made a stink about Nett and the kids being here. The woman from DHS seemed to finally believe the things I was saying, it wasn't hard to check that I still live here since KVC had brought Kira to me here the day before. She said that she would talk to the police again and to expect that the police or someone from DHS or someone from KVC would be showing up eventually. No one ever came yet. Jami finally called around dark and said that she was with the mother of a graduate from FW and that she was sitting at the Burger King up the road. She told me that she was planning to go stay with this woman in Bennington but ended up spending the night with Kirk at his friend's house where he stays.
Kirk called this morning nd said that Jami did go to Bennington this morning and that she does plan to return to FW before her time limit, they called me late yesterday and said that she could return within 48 hours, no harm, no foul.
know Jami s mentally ill in many ways, that the drugs weren't the whole problem. I wish she could be in a place that could help her with her mental illness more. I know FW tries in their way but I hear from everyone that FW is only another government funded sham of a place for helping people, that their funding is their biggest concern. Most of their guidelines and rules are kept or broken according to how it will effect their funding. Drug court is a joke. It is all a bad joke in so many ways. But FW is a temporary safe house for women with children, that much I believe. They are housed and watched over enough to keep them safer than they were on the streets doing drugs. The women can use it for the intended purpose if they choose or they can go through the motions of reform and go back to their old lives. No institution has been created that can really do much more than that.

Family Feud

We have had on hell of a week. Have I written in here that Jeanette told Rob she wants a divorce and hs been trying to get him to move out???? Wellllll, Nett was hanging out in the parking lot where she works talking to Pat and goofing off after work Thursday night and Rob's little sister, Sara, was in the parking lot across the street spying. Rob moved Sara in with them last month because her parents threw her out because they found out she is gay. (She's 19, dropped out of college to join Rob in being a alcoholic pot head.) Sara called Jeanette and told her she caught her and was going to go to their house to tell Rob. Jeremy and I got there right before Sara, and Jeremy went and banged on the basement door to try to get Rob up and talk to him first but Rob was passed out in there. Sara arrived and I met her in the kitchen and said I wanted to talk to her and she turned and went through the door to downstairs and slammed it in my face. I yanked it open and called her a little bitch adn told her to never do that again. She called her mother, Rob's step mother, Tracy, who showed up shortly but didn't say a word to me, both of them are scared of me, not sure why, but I'll take that if it helps. I told them to get Sara's things out and they went down and banged on rob's hideyhole door screaming it was an emergency until he answered it and they burst in and told him that Nett was having an affair. Rob started screaming and breaking things and Jeremy went down there and tried to calm him and to tell him that Sara was lying about what she saw, and she was, having assumed and elaborated a LOT. At first Tracy said that they would all leave and take Rob with them "even if we have to call his father", which is supposed to be a BIG threat because his dad, Bob, is supposedly a badass and Rob and they are terrified of him. Jeremy and I decided to stay, couldn't leave Nett there with all the times Rob has said he would kill her over much less, so we decided to stay the night. Tracy and Sara took a lot of Sara's things and left and we stayed upstairs with Nett and the sleeping kids listening to Rob scream, yell, and bang things around in the basement all night. Jeremy kept going down there to make sure Rob was OK and try to calm him, sometimes succeeding for brief periods of time. Friday morning we got the kids up for school and I left to get Jessalynn and while I wasa gone Rob came upstairs and told Jenise and Robby that they would never see him again because Mommy is bad and got them crying and freaking out with Jeremy trying to talk him into shutting the hell up. Nett got the kids calm and to schoool warning their teachers what happened, they did both have a good day at school distracted with Halloween parties nad candy. Sara returned in the morning and went down in the basement with Rob and after seeing her leave and come back with food and drink we figured out Rob wasn't planning to move out figuring Nett had no where to go. He didn't have the rent for their house anyhow having blown it on dope and all the BS he always blows money on and after talking to Nett about their financial situation I told her there was no way she could keep the house either even if it was safe to stay with Rob being able to return if he ever left. I told Jeanette she and the kids could have my apartment and Jeremy and I would move in with Jess or think of something. We started packing Nett and the kids and I had to go get kids from school. I was going to get Kirk to help load but was nervous that things could go bad and didn't want him involved and then Jessica offered to go stay at the house with Jeremy and help guard Jeanette especially since two of those in Rob's camp were female and might attack Nett. I picked up the kids from school and all at once Jess, Nett, and Jeremy were calling me all at once. Rob had gone upstairs to call Nett some choice names and Jess said something smart ass, think it was, Are you out of booze in your cave? and Sara and Tracy called Big Bad Daddy Bob. Bob came skidding up to the house and Jeremy was loading the van and Bob rushed Jeremy knocking him over. Jess ran and shoved Bob off Jeremy, she didn't really need to save Jeremy but, well, she didn't know how well Jeremy can take care of himself, and Jeremy proceeded to pound Big Bad Bob. Rob ran over and jumped Jessica picking her up and throwing her across the yard so far and hard she had grass stains down her back ( she is hurt pretty badly) and then Rob ran and started pulling her hair but she popped back and grabbed his hair and started popping him in the face. Bob told Jeremy he had enough and Jeremy let him up right away and got between Rob and Jess, funny Rob didn't try to fight with Jeremy, and the police were called. I wanted to take the kids to Kirk but Jeremy called again and said things were going bad, the police were about to arrest him and Jess instead of Rob and Bob, so I headed there. When I got there Rob and his family were standing up by the house, Bob was pouring blood, and the police had Jeanette, Jessica, and Jeremy sitting on the kirb in the street. When I pulled up they all started telling me what the police were saying, which was soooo wrong, and one officer interrupted them and said, Mam, you can't know what has gone on here, we know what we are doing. I said I knew more than them, that I had been there for the last 24 hours watching this build and that there was no voilence until Bob showed up. The cop said that Rob's friends and his family swore Jeremy jumped Bob and that Jess deserved what Rob did because she had had words with him before they called Bob. I was stunned. I told him that I knew, and every real man, and I assumed every cop, who I knew, knew that no man has the right to put his hands on a woman especially especially just for something she said and I asked when the assault rules had changed. He said Well, if I arrest Rob and Bob then I will arrest everyone here and he told me to leave. I left and took the kids to Kirk and went back to Nett's. The police and everyone except bleeding Bob were still there but by then the cops had figured out that Rob is nuts and they were being decent to my family even though they weren't changing their stand about the fight. The cops stayed parked out front a long time while we packed and loaded Nett in the vans and Robs mom and sis loaded his stuff. Rob tried to talk to me at one point, stupid man, saying he never wanted me to think badly of him, and I was still very pissed and said I could never even like him again and told him he was a punk to attack a little girl and why didn't he step up to fight a grown woman. He said he only did it because he thought his dad was in danger and I asked why he didn't attack the real threat, Jeremy? Then his Mom said, come on Rob, we can't reason with her, and I used a lot of self control and let that go and walked away. I had to concentrate on Nett who is so sick she can hardly stand and weighs about 100 pounds right now. She maybe should have thought before hanging out in front of where she works with Patrick even though they were just talking, not that there was any way she could know she was being followed and spied on, but she has't had a clear thought since her thyroid got so out of whack so I jsut feel very sorry for her.
I rented a garage to store Jeanette's furniture and stuff and our stuff to make more room in this tiny apartment.
Oh God. there is actually a LOT more drama but I will spare you. I will likely write a story about this in one of my websites, definitely going to slam Omaha's finest over their "help". I am very proud of Jeremy in this. Rob slammed him around a lot when Jeremy was going to the basement to try to calm him all night and Jeremy let him because he knew Rob was distraught and not right in the head, and drunk as a skunk, and I am proud of him for letting Big Bad Biker Bob up right away when he told Jeremy he had enough. bob's face looked like mince meat when I got there so he took a lot before he had the sense to give up. Jeremy didn't even get hit after the first rush. I am proud of Jess for trying to protect Jeremy even though she actually made it worse for him because he was fighting Bob and trying to pull Rob off her.
Now I have to prepare to take the kids trick or treating and make it fun.
I'll be back with the aftermath and unbelievable details.

The Caridiologist

I've been wearing a heart monitor since I was hospitalized Labor Day weekend because I have had problems since running a 104 temp. Today i saw the cardiologist to hear what he had to say about the heart readings I have been transmitting to them. He says that the fever I had was a virus that attacked my heart and damaged the lower chamber. He knows that much from the records from my hospital stay and the monitor I wore. I have to have a series of other tests so he can figure out how to fix the problem starting tomorrow and he said that maybe it could be controlled with a medications or, worst case scenario, a heart transplant, but that I am in good health otherwise so the outlook is good and no need to panic.... Really, the "episodes" aren't painful, just uncomfortable, and I'm sure I will get through this.
I'm going to drop my Broadband service for a while, I don't have a decent PC right now and have internet access on my phone although I can't seem to access this site from the phone. I'll have to find a blogsite that I can get to and move this or something.....
Jess has been disillusioned about her father lately, she can be a bit slow about some things, but it is good in the long run that she understand what a pitiful human he is and just stop expecting anything from him. I tell them to pity him that he has never really loved anyone and has no clue what it feels like to love anyone nor any appreciation for those who are unfortunate enough to love him. That has to be a no-life life. I would feel terrible that I wasted so many years with him but I don't see it that way because I realized how small a part he really played in our 22 years together. If someone asks about my X I immediately think of Jim, it is like Clown Shoes never happened . Jeanette told me the other day that she has at times since she was little been jealous of Jami having Jim for a father!! I told her that Jim wishes they were all his, too, and loves them all, and he does. He has his problems, but loving the kids has never been one of them. I have a lot of respect for Jim and really enjoy the relationship we have now and I love that he has Teresa and I have Jeremy and we all get along, one big happy family that takes care of each other however we can as it should be.
OK. I'm outa here.

Jaz is Two!!!!

Yesterday was Jaz's birthday but we are having her party this Saturday. Meez came last night and brought her a bunch of cool presents and he says he will come Saturday, too.I got screwed nd not even kissed by the people who handle claims American Family, Steve Deleanass, to be specific. The wrecker roadside assistance sent last time the van broke down hit the back of the van with the wrecker but they deny it even though a woman heard the crash and ran outside and accused the man. The wrecker company says that she is the one who hit the van and that she blamed them and that they didn't even load the van from behind anyway, that they never do. They picked it up from the rear that time and the time before as well. When I pointed out this lie to Steve Deleanass he accused ME pf lying!!!!!!!! I am changing insurance companies ASAP, getting quotes now, but that doesn't fix the van, poor thing.
My cell phone fell out the van window and got run over last week so I had to get a new phone.