Gone again

She told me she was xmas shopping.

Then sent me a wall of text and blocked me immediately after.

My grandma has

Covid. Mhm other one passed a few weeks ago.

Now this. With no open communication from her.

Just gone….

Saturday. The same day I found out about grandma.

Her timing is special…..She even played along through the day wlrh all her other texts.

I was tested today for covid and am waiting for my results. The kids need to keep away from me for two weeks.

I’m lonely. And everjtnong falls apart around me.

I got the two boys, bit I’m not ok. Not without my girl.

The cruelty of words

I’m sitting in my grandmothers living room. I haven’t been over for a visit in a while with the kids being back at school and home.

My partner sits beside me. He has just snapped at me for texting on my phone. I was checking in with A and N.

In the background my grandmother talks about something unrelated. Her dementia has gotten worse. I try to follow her but the tv is loud, the voice of my partner is loud. And then my mother adds in to the cacophony.

I’m managing fine, as her and him both talk down about N. I defend him as I always do and feel myself growing agitated. I hear my grandmother talk about something unrelated again and I’m struck with how messed up it is we are talking as if she isn’t in the room.

Once again I try to engage with her, ask her what she was saying, what she meant.

But the others they just keep going. So loud that my father, dealing with his own grief from the loss of his mother, comes down and asks me why everyone is yelling at me.

I was holding my own, right up until my mother called me selfish. Yells at me that I don’t care about anyone but myself. Accuses me of ignoring her texts when N is over.

Then I start to cry.

I try to explain to her how I’m doing my best to balance everything. How I try to see the best in people. But her end b are both flaring hot in their dislike for N. in the midst of the flames my mother is cruel.

I leave shortly after that, but her words have stayed in my mind like a loop track.

They whisper with every choice I make, or don’t make. They have me adding another insecurity to the list I already have. I’ve been called a few things in my life, but selfish isn’t one of them.

I’ve gone through all the excuses for her. She is just grieving, she is overwhelmed with grandma, she is just tired, she didn’t mean it. Logically I know she didn’t. Emotionally though, it hasn’t sunk in yet.

Balance

Balance.

It’s what it’s been about these days. It’s what I strive for. What I drive myself crazy over trying to give the ones I love.

B and N are hard. One refuses to see the other, so it makes balance hard. I do my best to keep it equal, but sometimes, more often then not, one of them feels like it’s not,

My days are spent fighting fires I didn’t cause but get blamed for. But when it works all the hard work is forgotten about.

When we do things together, be it group play, shopping, laughing, watching shows, or just talking, all the stretching thin of myself just melts away.

When I’m in the trenches of it though, it’s exhausting work. When I want kitchen table polly and two of my partners won’t be in the same room.

I respect boundaries, I wait, I watch, and I balance.

My job has been much the same these days. I’ve started a new role and it has many many layers. I’ve had to lower my expectations of myself and realize it’s ok to be slower. Using a screen reading program with programs that aren’t designed with blind users in mind is hard enough. Add to it it’s outdated because they haven’t updated it and it’s worse. So I balance what I want to do, what I feel I should be able to do, and what I actually can do. It’s hard work. I’ve been relieved I work from home so no one sees when I break down and cry in frustration. I remind myself to breathe and balance.