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Aug. 3rd, 2005 10:29 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
hippybngstockngI feel only vaguely prepared to deal with my mom being here. She's arriving sometime this afternoon, and staying until Monday morning, so don't expect to see or hear me for quite some time. She still doesn't know about my journal, and she's as nosey as Pinnocio and can't keep her mouth shut, so we're going to keep it that way since I'd like to stay mostly public if I can. My mom has a thing against computers and the internet, even though she's a programmer- She claims it's that thing where you don't want to use the thing you use at work for fun, but I think that's just her proving herself to be old and lame. It's like a photographer refusing to take pictures of his family because that would mean touching the camera when it wasn't for "work". *eyeroll*
Anyway, I have lots of things for us to do, it's just a question of how many of my plans she will try to shoot down. She does that, and it pisses me off, especially when I actually have reasons for the plans. This visit is supposed to be all about her helping me go through THE STUFF. Most of the STUFF is stuff she gave me that used to belong to her, or some other relative. I have a lot of STUFF that I've discovered I never use and don't even like, and the only reason I am keeping it is because it is part of THE STUFF that used to belong to other people in the family. The part of my brain that decides whether this item is a sacred antique, or just a piece of random crap is quite broken and has been for some time, so I told her that it was her job to come up here and help figure it out. Basically anything she thinks I should keep, SHE will be keeping, since I don't want it anymore. She also has a big car, so we'll be using her as errand whore for a bunch of days. I also might have a yard sale, just because she's good at running them and I'm not, and I haven't gotten rid of my donation pile yet.
I'm also scared of the Emma/Betty aspect of this. Betty was getting a little better, but she's still very very unsteady. Sometimes it takes her several tries to get her back legs off the ground, and she often needs help with the stairs. Her whole world view changes when Emma is around, she tries to do one better than everything Emma does. Betty is like the alpha-male of the dog world. If there's another dog around, she tries to make a big ol' show of superiority. It's my hope it will inspire her to get up and moving more and be okay, but my fear is that she will have a heart attack in there somewhere, since her heart is not good. Someone (*grins at the one who will know who she is*) said that perhaps that would be the best way to go, and so that's where I'm trying to put my heart in case it happens. I know Betty loves her time with Emma in a weird kind of way, so yes, it would be a good way to go. I will just not enjoy mourning her anywhere near my mom. She still thinks I'm 5. I will also have to fight the urge to say, "MOMMY MOMMY MOMMY! GET ME ANOTHER DOGGIE RIGHT NOOOOOOOOOOOOOW" because I think she'd possibly do it, as I think that's where I got that tendency from. When she thought our first dog might be kicking off soon, she got another dog quick, BEFORE so there wouldn't be any severe mourning. When my first cat died very suddenly a year later, she got me Delirium within a week. It's not a totally bad thing to get another pet right away after a pet dies, but it's a bad thing to rush into the process without thinking... That leads to bad choices.
I've been thinking that one of the best choices I could make would be to see if we qualify for a service dog for K. They now train dogs to kind of herd and protect autistic kids, and that's just the kind of help I need. I could get them to send me a human for my trips to the store, and whatever else I might need, but I feel kinda goofy asking a highly trained and educated autism worker to play sheep dog, when I could get an actual DOG to do that job, and save the humans for more interesting moments like when I am trying to get him to understand the need to use the potty and he won't listen because he thinks all I am trying to do is keep him from playing with his trains. I also can't personally schedule things for shit, so having a dog that was always at my beck and call would be ideal, since I wouldn't have to worry about either not having help at the store, or having to WAIT now that I finally realized I need to schedule something, but waited too long.. I do a lot of waiting for help, so it'd be nice to have the confidence to feel like I don't have to do that so much.
But yeah, if Betty were to go, and if we don't qualify for a service dog, I would be tempted to go with not having any dog for at least a little while during our upcoming seemingly unavoidable massive move at the very least. I really want to have another dog sooner than later though because K totally loves them. I'd feel like he was deprived of something important to him if he didn't have a dog to play with anymore, since he loves Betty so much even though she will barely give him the time of day. I'm not looking forward to it at all though, because in my heart what I really want is another Betty. No dog will be able to fill her, uh, collar... She's polite, quiet, devoted, and extremely patient and gentle for an old lady. I worry that the reasons I miss her illnesses so much is because of how quiet she is, she does suffer in silence a great deal, which is her only flaw. I am used to dogs that let you know they've got problems, where Betty would rather slink away and just have them.
Anyway, I have lots I want to do, and even though I've got an equal amount I'd like to do here, it will have to wait until Monday. I'm really behind on actually reading my friends page (I've been skimming, but not really absorbing) and I imagine it will be a lot worse when I get back.
Anyway, I have lots of things for us to do, it's just a question of how many of my plans she will try to shoot down. She does that, and it pisses me off, especially when I actually have reasons for the plans. This visit is supposed to be all about her helping me go through THE STUFF. Most of the STUFF is stuff she gave me that used to belong to her, or some other relative. I have a lot of STUFF that I've discovered I never use and don't even like, and the only reason I am keeping it is because it is part of THE STUFF that used to belong to other people in the family. The part of my brain that decides whether this item is a sacred antique, or just a piece of random crap is quite broken and has been for some time, so I told her that it was her job to come up here and help figure it out. Basically anything she thinks I should keep, SHE will be keeping, since I don't want it anymore. She also has a big car, so we'll be using her as errand whore for a bunch of days. I also might have a yard sale, just because she's good at running them and I'm not, and I haven't gotten rid of my donation pile yet.
I'm also scared of the Emma/Betty aspect of this. Betty was getting a little better, but she's still very very unsteady. Sometimes it takes her several tries to get her back legs off the ground, and she often needs help with the stairs. Her whole world view changes when Emma is around, she tries to do one better than everything Emma does. Betty is like the alpha-male of the dog world. If there's another dog around, she tries to make a big ol' show of superiority. It's my hope it will inspire her to get up and moving more and be okay, but my fear is that she will have a heart attack in there somewhere, since her heart is not good. Someone (*grins at the one who will know who she is*) said that perhaps that would be the best way to go, and so that's where I'm trying to put my heart in case it happens. I know Betty loves her time with Emma in a weird kind of way, so yes, it would be a good way to go. I will just not enjoy mourning her anywhere near my mom. She still thinks I'm 5. I will also have to fight the urge to say, "MOMMY MOMMY MOMMY! GET ME ANOTHER DOGGIE RIGHT NOOOOOOOOOOOOOW" because I think she'd possibly do it, as I think that's where I got that tendency from. When she thought our first dog might be kicking off soon, she got another dog quick, BEFORE so there wouldn't be any severe mourning. When my first cat died very suddenly a year later, she got me Delirium within a week. It's not a totally bad thing to get another pet right away after a pet dies, but it's a bad thing to rush into the process without thinking... That leads to bad choices.
I've been thinking that one of the best choices I could make would be to see if we qualify for a service dog for K. They now train dogs to kind of herd and protect autistic kids, and that's just the kind of help I need. I could get them to send me a human for my trips to the store, and whatever else I might need, but I feel kinda goofy asking a highly trained and educated autism worker to play sheep dog, when I could get an actual DOG to do that job, and save the humans for more interesting moments like when I am trying to get him to understand the need to use the potty and he won't listen because he thinks all I am trying to do is keep him from playing with his trains. I also can't personally schedule things for shit, so having a dog that was always at my beck and call would be ideal, since I wouldn't have to worry about either not having help at the store, or having to WAIT now that I finally realized I need to schedule something, but waited too long.. I do a lot of waiting for help, so it'd be nice to have the confidence to feel like I don't have to do that so much.
But yeah, if Betty were to go, and if we don't qualify for a service dog, I would be tempted to go with not having any dog for at least a little while during our upcoming seemingly unavoidable massive move at the very least. I really want to have another dog sooner than later though because K totally loves them. I'd feel like he was deprived of something important to him if he didn't have a dog to play with anymore, since he loves Betty so much even though she will barely give him the time of day. I'm not looking forward to it at all though, because in my heart what I really want is another Betty. No dog will be able to fill her, uh, collar... She's polite, quiet, devoted, and extremely patient and gentle for an old lady. I worry that the reasons I miss her illnesses so much is because of how quiet she is, she does suffer in silence a great deal, which is her only flaw. I am used to dogs that let you know they've got problems, where Betty would rather slink away and just have them.
Anyway, I have lots I want to do, and even though I've got an equal amount I'd like to do here, it will have to wait until Monday. I'm really behind on actually reading my friends page (I've been skimming, but not really absorbing) and I imagine it will be a lot worse when I get back.
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no subject
Date: 2005-08-03 07:37 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-08-03 08:18 am (UTC)Anyways... um... Yes, service dog seems like a perfect idea!