May 13, 2024

Living in the time of pandemic: COVID-19 (206)

Year 4 of COVID in the Bay Area.

Year 5, Day 40: Infuriating. This is the second time I’ve filed a Dependent Care claim for FSA redemption on our daycare expenses and, once again, their website has pulled an “What are you talking about no claim was filed”. It’s disappeared entirely from their site. WTF United Healthcare?? They were reliably reimbursing us last year but they changed their site two months ago and now nothing works. Actually, from January, they were automatically denying claims first with incorrect codes (claiming we were out of the grace period, for all new 2024 expenses 😒) before backtracking and approving them. None of my claims for which I have saved confirmations since mid-March are appearing on the site at all. It’s ridiculous.

I’m still symptomatic from the virus that Smol Acrobat gifted me last week. After pushing too hard on Friday and feeling worse than ever, I forced myself to rest as much as possible on the weekend. I did NOT hill my potatoes. I did NOT pull weeds. I did NOT hack at the encroaching branches from the neighbors’ yards. Today, I chastised myself to do the bare minimum until I’ve shaken the hacking cough and all: no appointments, no running errands (I have 3), no doing the laundry, no extra anything until I can actually recover. It’s been 8 days, I’m thoroughly tired of this. And Smol Acrobat keeps asking me every 3 hours: are you fewwing better? And I have to keep saying no, not yet.

It should not be so hard to just not do things!

I did hill SOME potatoes today, just the one batch that was tall enough, and of course that wore me out. But I needed the satisfaction, along with accosting cute neighborhood dogs to pet them. We met a delightfully regal retriever today who was doing her best imitation of a statue as she enjoyed our pets. I asked her dogwalker to come by this way more often.

Year 5, Day 41: I found our neighborhood off-leash dog! We were excited to see each other. She did tricks for me in exchange for treats and then hunted down a tiny stick for me to throw for her several times. That was good for my heart. No dog will ever replace Sera, Seamus, or Doggle, but petting a dog is vastly superior to NOT petting a dog, any day of the week.

Checked on the plants, gave them a light watering, whispered “germinate germinate germinate” to the seeds.

I still have a racking hacking cough but I feel less horrible today, even though I wasn’t able to sleep until well into the wee hours. I could walk up a hill almost without stopping, almost without stopping for a long cough.

Got our CPA to find the check that I sent her weeks ago. She thought it’d never arrived and just didn’t say anything. All this time, I was waiting for her to cash it already so I can balance our cashflow. Glad I followed up and got her to look at her mail.

Year 5, Day 42: Everything’s coming up Milhouse this morning (in a limited fashion). Physically felt much less terrible today. I’m still pretty sick but the least sick I’ve felt for several days. I got to pet a neighbor’s fluffy dog. I had to drop off Smol Acrobat instead of JB and they were pretty cooperative. Traffic was ok going and returning, there was no line at Costco gas, there was easy parking at the notoriously awful parking lot by the place I had to return to (again) for fingerprinting, picking up my packages was super easy. No awful drivers on the road this morning. That was all a welcome respite from the stuff and nonsense waiting for me at my work desk.

For the first time in a long time, in thinking about this post where Nicole and Maggie’s touching on a topic that’s on my mind a lot (Do I really have it together? Have I been hiding things?) I felt not terrible about things. Also, I’m realizing I don’t have any idea what I mean by “together” anyway! Best I can say is I’ve kept most things on the conveyor belt moving most of the time, much like those moments in the chocolate factory about 14 seconds before it all goes horribly wrong in that I Love Lucy episode. Does anyone remember that? But feeling impending catastrophe is not the same thing as actual catastrophe. I’ve always tried to do the best I could, for highly variable values of “best”.

There are many things I wish I could do but can’t right now (in this very moment or this year or further out): supporting a grieving acquaintance, making plans with friends we want to see and haven’t in too long, horseback riding. I don’t have riding time (or money or energy) right now but it doesn’t sting to realize that as much as it once did. I can look at all those wants now as a “later / maybe in a few years” thing rather than an acute failure for not doing it now. Maybe it’s because I’ve made myself rest more during this grieving and illness period, my body and mind are finally getting a moment to heal a little bit. It’s not nearly enough rest but, for the first time in a while, I’m not using this time to kick myself when I’m already down. Therapy!

Though in this same vein, the place where JB does self defense keeps running special event! after special event! Social get togethers, competitions, seminars OH MY. I’m getting exasperated. They get 90 minutes of my time (or PiC’s) up to three times a week, who has time for all this extra stuff? If and when I add more stuff, it’s gotta be something that brings me some joy.

Year 5, Day 43: Warm day ahead and the birds know it. They’re singing their little hearts out this morning. I’m so grateful for my friend who sends many dog pictures and videos daily. It’s not the same as my Sera 🐶 (or Seamus, or Doggle), but it staves off the worst of the dog-loneliness.

We’ve got an unusually jam packed day: PiC’s appointment, JB’s self-defense class, open house. Our friend who doesn’t drive has an appointment late tonight and we’re both frustrated we can’t save them a bus ride by chauffeuring because we’re already over-committed.

Frustration at work keeps increasing. There’s a ton of pressure to fix problems caused by people acting in bad faith, produce more than we can produce, while taking a hit from a hiring misstep. But we still have to try to do the best we can do, even though we now know that it’s impossible to hit our primary KPI, and of course I’m responsible for making it happen. Thus, this headline from a Fortune article resonates: Workers are eyeing the exit in 2024 as LinkedIn and Microsoft study warns more people want to quit their jobs now than during the Great Resignation. For the most part, my job has had the key elements needed to support a comfortable life. Not enough balance but we were getting there. Things changed dramatically this year. It’s too early to say whether it was for the better or worse because a lot of change is still to come, but the changes that have already happened stink. We’re inundated with lousy new colleagues who just barely do their jobs a month and change after deadlines and I’m feeling absolutely stabby. ⚔️ Even while we’re grateful that PiC is still employed, I’m taking many deep breaths. I have to give this some time, not least because we aren’t ready to lose my income either. We can do this.

Third try finally worked! My set of fingerprints are finally approved for volunteering at the school. I don’t want to volunteer for most things that involve herding children and talking to people. I do want to volunteer to help out in the library sometimes. Once in a while. That’s for next year though.

Summer camps are booking up fast, and I’ve booked four weeks of camp with 3-4 more weeks to figure out. I volunteered to take 2 bonus kids (JB’s friend and their sibling) for one of the weeks where we could only do half days. I’ll still be working but figured the kids are old enough to entertain themselves enough to get by for 3 hours a day.

I need to just put the brakes on for literally anything else extra, for a while, I think.

“She’s your friend? You have friends?” #Xena

Year 5, Day 44: Smol Acrobat insisted on sleeping on my arm all night so naturally I couldn’t sleep. They sure woke up cheerfully, though. Still a whole lot more coughing and sneezing today than I’d hoped to be doing on Day 12 of this. I appreciated the day hitting the mid-70s one more time, though. These are our handful of summer weather days for the season, probably. The fog’s rolling back in soon enough.

I’m doing my best to resist the urge to eat all the Girl Scout Lemonade cookies. They’ll all taste great until I hit the fourth one and then it’s all regrets. Just two cookies!

Dear old friend and I had a short chat about how terrible things are right now. Every generation has had their horrible terrible thing that dominated the social consciousness, I admitted, we’re no different in that respect. She’s got 40 years on me, she personally remembers many of them. But, she pointed out, what’s different is this time it feels like democracy is about to collapse. We didn’t have that before in the middle crisis or the Vietnam war and protests and so on. She’s right about that. It does feel like fascism is on the brink of taking over completely more days than not.

“You and I will be together for all eternity” #Xena (Is it just me, or do only villain types think having to exist for an eternity as a good thing?)

May 6, 2024

Living in the time of pandemic: COVID-19 (205)

Year 4 of COVID in the Bay Area.

Year 5, Day 33: My first morning of a work week without Sera. We didn’t start the day with our morning walk. No one’s watching me water the plants or waiting for me to come back inside after watering plants, or pretending she can’t hear me telling her to come back inside because the sun and wind is too nice.

It’s miserably lonely without her. I went through all the usual motions but it all feels hollow. Even the garden doesn’t spark a bit of anything.

I impulse shopped for this pile of seeds a month ago looking forward to planting them with Sera for company, probably trying to hold off the impending with hope for growing things. They took so damn long to ship and be delivered, 3 weeks, that they arrived after she was gone. Now it feels silly and bleak. I got some seeds into the ground anyway but. Well. There was no joy in it. Maybe they’ll grow and surprise me. Maybe by the time they grow, I’ll have healed enough to appreciate them.

JB and I both came down with the virus that had been plaguing Smol Acrobat and PiC a few days ago. This probably could have been avoided by breaking out my antivirals on the weekend but I was so overwhelmed I forgot. Now, we muddle through.

Year 5, Day 34: CA state testing starts today for JB but they woke up extra early (for once 🤦🏻‍♀️) with a fever so we sent them back to bed. This was our first go at it so we didn’t know what if make up tests are offered. We had to contact the school to confirm we’d keep JB home and they could make it up later.

I popped my painkillers, and set to shoveling out the piles and piles of work that have stacked up for as long as I could before taking to my bed.

As much as I hate Sera’s absence, I can’t deny that having one fewer caretaking schedule let me get a little rest today. Maybe I’ll even get some rest tomorrow. Who knows.

PiC and I were up far too late tracking down pricing for some possible summer plans. I regret that whole thing. It really could have waited until I wasn’t sick.

There are peaceful protests on university campuses across the nations and the inhumane responses of the administration on those campuses, Columbia and UT Austin are the two I saw reporting and videos from, with the NYPD causing far more property damage than anyone else did and Austin police teargassing students, are brutal and a sickening parallel to the genocide in Gaza. The Palestinians just want to live, but they’re all being collectively decimated for the actions of the few in Hamas. These students are peacefully asking their universities to divest their investments in Israel because of the genocide, and the administrations are sending violent out-of-control armed police forces to terrorize them. The media is also resoundingly ignoring how many of those protestors are Jewish themselves because they don’t want this genocide, or the profit off genocide, in their names. The protestors are being branded as antisemitic when many are Jewish. It’s an awful and strategic erasure. This entire everything is utterly infuriating.

Year 5, Day 35: Turns out Smol Acrobat still wasn’t as over this bug as I thought. They woke up at 3 am in extreme emotional distress, right after PiC had just finally fallen asleep so I was up to the plate, that usually happens when they’re still feeling down from a bug. I’m just grateful they hadn’t spiked a high fever again. They calmed down faster than expected only to coherently ask “Can I sleep wif you?” Uhhhh that means zero sleep for me soooo…. how about I sleep here with you…. that worked well enough that I was able to escape by 4 am. I’m really feeling the broken sleep today, I feel more sick today than I did when this first started.

’twas also another day of lining up little medicine cups and pouring a series of medicine shots for the kids. JB’s fever is nearly broken and their energy is at least double mine but they still can’t go back to school until tomorrow. I assigned a series of light chores that they could intersperse with sick time activities like playing games, reading ebooks on Libby, and reading stacks of books from their shelf. Myself, I was assigned a stack of not-so-light work. I did my best.

I got a VERY last minute notification of a memorial service for a former teacher’s spouse. Unfortunately, while I would have thrown on something to be presentable and run out to get there, I just couldn’t. By that point I was already working in bed because sitting up was too tiring. I felt terrible but getting the “viewing is at 10-12” at 11 am was really terribly last minute. I’ve been meaning to check on that former teacher, I know she’s lonely from mutual friends but I’ve been so swamped and now sick. I haven’t had anything left with which to extend an offer of support. Sigh. I hate having limitations. I hate being human (emphasis: derisive).

But I’ve got to survive, first. Here we are.

Year 5, Day 36: Busy morning. School drop off, answered a bunch of questions for work before a work call, then an hour on the phone with the lawyer to walk through our trust changes, rescheduled my eye exam which currently conflicts with a school thing for JB, and then picked up an outfit for them I’d ordered. By the time I got back to my desk and got any amount of work done, school pick up time! Whoof.

I just realized I missed free shipping on Bookshop for Indie Bookstore weekend. Drat. I had intended to buy all the niblings their books for Christmas on that weekend. Now I need to start a running list of books to buy as gifts so I don’t miss another free shipping weekend.

I stayed up really late working to clear the decks because I have an appointment in the morning. Told myself it’d be one hour but I went over and could feel the moment that I went too long. After mostly managing to feel almost-ok all day, all my symptoms came roaring back and then some. Welcome to the congested head cold phase of this virus. Should have pushed off sooner.

One thing checked off my list: huge thanks to Music for warning me off eShakti. I went with Nordstrom since they have reasonable quality and a generous return policy for the ones that don’t fit. I tried on so many and found 3 dresses that fit comfortably enough for this summer’s events. My two Elhoffer dresses are at my sister’s for alterations and in the meantime, my body shape hasn’t felt comfortable in anything lately. It was worrying me that maybe we’d show up at the event and they still wouldn’t fit right after alterations and then what would I wear?? So now I have backups.

Year 5, Day 37: Between dropping off Smol Acrobat and an appointment at JB’s school, I’ve peopled entirely too much for one day, and my immune system went spiralling down the drain. It was all I could do to get through the critical work and drag myself to bed for a rest.

The one bright spot of the week: this is the first day that looking at my plants, white blossoms on the berry bush, loads of potato leaves coming up, made me feel a touch of joy since Sera’s 🐶 passing. The kids helped me get the cucumber seeds into the ground on the weekend, and I tucked the lettuce and bush bean seeds into the soil on my own. 🤞 for a real harvest in about 2 months.

April 29, 2024

Living in the time of pandemic: COVID-19 (204)

Year 4 of COVID in the Bay Area.

Year 5, Day 26: Last week, I was eagerly anticipating the arrival of my seeds today for planting the front yard and the garden. Not only are they still in Florida today, throwing my planting schedule into a shambles, I’m anticipating a terrible conversation with the internist about Sera’s prognosis. She relapsed over the weekend and was hospitalized for lifesaving care. After going through half a box of tissues and putting a cool washcloth on my eyes, I did some grasping at straws research. None of it did any good. Her prognosis is bad. She’s already on the best possible treatment plan and it’s still failing. The other treatment options aren’t truly options, they’re desperate attempts to prolong life without regard for quality of life. We’re bringing her home for doggy hospice for as long as she still feels good. If she relapses again, when she relapses again, it’ll be her time. It would be deeply unkind to force her to go through this over and over.

It’s a good thing that I did a lot of work on the weekend because I’m fit for nothing today.

But she felt better enough from the overnight care to have a laugh at me.

Trying to shift her for her last walk of the night at 945 pm: Sera. Sera. Sera. (Gently shake her shoulder) Come. Sera come. Sera, come. Seraaaaaaa come. (Start worrying she’s relapsed again the past hour) Sera. Sera. Serraaaaaa? Ok fine, you leave me no choice. Open the wipes packet to get a wipe. (To wipe her down because she IS still a bit grubby from the hospital but I’m not going to make her have a bath now.)

She pops up like a jack in the box.

AH HA YOU WERE JUST IGNORING ME.

We finally went out and instead of going right back in like normal, she took me on a jaunt to sniff the ALL sniffs. She still doesn’t want to eat much of anything but her energy is much better than it’s been in days. I don’t know how long this will last but we’re going to make the most of what time we have left.

Year 5, Day 27: I can feel the depression gloom creeping in. I don’t want to eat, I don’t want to talk to most people, I want to be left alone with Sera to just be quiet together. I hand fed her boiled eggs this morning, she was strangely excited about it so I boiled some more for her. Of course she then decided she was done with eggs. I’ll have to think of something else for her dinner. Several cries later, I got some work done, listened to her snore, cuddled with her a bit, and then she took me for the longest walk in the recent history of walks. She was either feeling her oats or taking her farewell tour, or both.

We were both fairly wiped out but there was still the usual stuff to do so I went through our usual routines: “I’m going to pick up JB now, you can stay here and nap”, then “we’re going to run an errand now, we’ll see you when we get back”.

And she was here when we got back and she was coddled some more with hand feeding and head rubs. JB wistfully says, now and again, I wish she could get better.

Me too, kid.

She was hospitalized overnight and part of one day and the house positively echoed with her absence. It’s going to be so much worse when she’s gone.

Year 5, Day 28: Sera woke me before 5 am trying to get out the door because she had the Tummy Troubles and we didn’t get out in time so the first hour and a half of this predawn was spent scrubbing the carpet, the floors, her tail and bum, and washing blankets and towels. That was a lot.

She seemed fine the rest of the morning so I decided it was more important to get some calories into her around lunchtime than to go the full 24 hours of withholding food. This proved to be a Big Mistake. She frantically (for her, this just looks like a tense body and an intense eyeball) got me to take her out at 6 pm and had a real mess before we got across the street. I had to get some warm water and wash her up. She smelled of Mango Tango for about ten minutes before she continued to have Tummy Troubles a few more times. Oh well, good effort.

I camped out on the sofa so I could get to her quickly during the night if she needed to go out urgently again. She did. Every single hour until 5 am. But not for Tummy Troubles, half the time she needed to pee, half the time she was asking for water. I’m grateful I didn’t have to clean up but am ever so tired.

Year 5, Day 29: Just in case, I’m switching her to morning meds only. I gave her the steroids she’s been on for months last night. I’m not sure whether it was the steroids or if it was because I camped out and she was thrown off by the light and relocation. Thankfully no tummy troubles since 7 pm but I am whipped and it’s only 7 am. Another 12 hours of water-only and tiny amounts of rice to be safe.

I’ve cycled through all the stages of grief in the past few days and I’m sure when the clock really starts ticking I’ll be cycling through them again a few more times. But for this moment I’m finally in a brainspace of trying to just be in the moment with her, whatever that moment contains.

I’m mentally (and photographically and sometimes here) recording her maybe-lasts. Tonight, she came to Smol Acrobat’s room and laid down nearby when they started to tantrum, following Seamus’s tradition of going TOWARDS the alarming and loud screaming. They never interfered with the yelling, they would just be nearby radiating support. She followed me out of the office yesterday afternoon to see where I was going, like she used to do all the time. I’m trying to commit these all to memory. Smol Acrobat cuddled her face gently tonight. It breaks my heart that they’re not really going to remember her. They’re still too young to remember this year on their own, outside of pictures and stories. I hope we have a good night tonight, maybe a good day will follow that.

Life is still inexplicably going on around us. We’re scheduling the final review of the will and trust. I marked up my first round of edits and sent those back already. This week I marked up a second round of clarification questions to be sure I know how some of these details work when we brief our new executors/trustees for our meeting. Then it has to be notarized to be official. That’ll be one giant important thing off my list. Then we need to make sure all the relevant people have a copy of the paperwork and understand our wishes and our thinking.

My seeds are still in transit. I’ve been itching to plant them and have something good to look forward to, to do something that’s positive and not sad.

Year 5, Day 30: Starting at midnight, she kept coming to fetch me to go outside every hour, then half hour, then quarter hour. She threw up everything she’d eaten yesterday evening, and it wasn’t that much to begin with. It tore my heart up trying to support her as she heaved.

It’s been almost seven years together and she’s only now communicating clearly to me. Each time she comes to get me, I know she wants me to take her out. Maybe it’s less about clarity and more about consistency. Most of the time, prior to her illness, she didn’t need anything, she was just keeping me company. I’m just slow and sluggish on my third night of this, having had no sleep, day or night. She settled on the kitchen bed, instead of coming back to the bedroom like usual. She wanted to stay near the door. We went outside seven times by 330 am and I was absolutely beat. I begged her quietly to sleep for a while. We both needed it. I was dizzy and no longer seeing straight. Miraculously we got three whole hours of sleep before she fetched me again and out the door we went.

I wondered how much longer we could keep this up. She was still interested in food, she was still ambulatory, but she wasn’t going to get better. The disease had progressed too much. And I was getting delirious.

I sat and held her paws for a long while, crying and contemplating what we could do to make her more comfortable. I wondered how we’d make the decision. I wondered how I could let her go. I don’t want to. She’s come so far, we’ve tried so hard.

But by mid afternoon I had my answer. She was crashing again. She had always jumped up for her midday walk. Today, she didn’t even try to get up. She just looked at me. It took such coaxing and encouragement and helping her up to get out the door. Once out, she was fatigued and unsteady. Not nearly as bad as when we took her to the ER but we already knew that we could not let her get that bad again. When we returned, and I offered her baked salmon, she’d only take slivers. Nothing like enough to sustain life.

She sat nearly in my lap as I hugged her and snuggled close to me for a while. That was a first, and last. She’s never, not once, been a lap dog like I’d hoped she would become. Seamus certainly was and he had 30 lbs on her. It’s like she was checking every last box this week except the one where my dogs are on 20 year contracts. But she was telling us it was her time, so we called the vet, got the kids, and brought her to say goodbye. We were with her every minute, telling her how much we loved her. I felt like the world’s worst traitor. She trusted me and I tried but I failed her. And now …

The vet was as kind as could be. She pointed out that Sera’s 🐶 body condition showed it was time and reminded us that we’d done everything we could do. She talked the kids through what was going to happen and gave us time to say our goodbyes.

This has been one of the most painful days of my life, having to make this decision because of a disease, before her time. She deserved more years, more pets, more cuddles, more love, more treats. Everything feels terrible and unfair and awful.

Frankly I don’t remember how to exist with my dog. She’s been a constant companion, day and night, and everything in between. She’s my officemate, snoring and running in her sleep while I gripe at the computer. Sometimes stinking up the joint with her toxic farts. When your heart breaks, you hug your dog. What do you do when your last dog is gone?

April 22, 2024

Living in the time of pandemic: COVID-19 (203)

Year 4 of COVID in the Bay Area.

Year 5, Day 19: My OB’s covering person is being really thorough. She’s approving routine prescription refill requests, and emailed me to follow up on health issues I reported in 2019 and 2020 first, before approving them. They’re not a problem anymore but that was weird and unexpected. If only all doctors were as diligent (and believed their patients with chronic issues).

Brain fog is thick today, and I find myself easily irritated by the littlest things that require brain processing. I have so little to spare today, y’all, I need every little bit I can hold onto! But I got through a record amount of work with some time to spare for recruiting JB into my weeding crusade. Quality may be another question entirely but for now we’re not asking that one.

But in “happyyyyy??” (as they would say it) news, it was Smol Acrobat’s turn to make me think they were bodyswapped. They ate their entire dinner using their own hands, including veggies, without a complaint or dragging heels. After each food group they’d turn to me: I ate my vegetables, are you happyyyyy?? They used the toilet and the real capper: put on their face lotion all by themselves. They NEVER do the face lotion! They always kick and whine and fuss. I know it won’t last so I’ll marvel over it now.

Year 5, Day 20: Our bills coming due this and next month will be spectacular in the blowing cash flow sort of way. I keep thinking what on earth did we spend on??? Oh yes, Sera 🐶 (4 digits this month alone), the new washing machine (another 4 digits), therapy. Some big ticket items are coming up soon too, between life insurance and homeowners insurance premiums, so I am having to harness my “we have enough cash for all the things” feelings, particularly when it comes to mutual aid. There’s so much need but we have to take care of our responsibilities first.

Speaking of which: we have a working washing machine again! Thank goodness. We didn’t replace the dryer because it was still working, please cross your fingers that it continues to behave another few years to justify not replacing them both at the same time (which would have saved $300). I’d like to keep it out of landfill for at least 3 more years (totally arbitrary number).

After getting dive bombed by that daddy long legs, and catching and releasing it outside, I caught the little sneak trying to get back inside the house three more times. I yelled “you don’t live here” but it just tucked up against a box and ignored me. Rude.

I took the Favorite IA Supporting Character Quiz and ended up with Her Grace. I do like her a lot. But maybe primarily because she’s linked her survival to Dina and so she won’t turn on her. I’d be less of a fan if she weren’t so bound.

Year 5, Day 21: 🐿️ mode today. My brain wants to dwell on “you’re a bad friend and a bad person“. I asked a longtime friend for advice and they were angry at me when it landed as selfish and inconsiderate. Of course I apologized, I try not to be horrible to my friends intentionally but am not immune to accidentally being so. They haven’t spoken to me since so it feels like I broke our friendship over asking for advice. That feels awful. And as another friend observed, my brain reflexively blames me when things go sideways so if someone I respect and care about deeply called me selfish, maybe they’re right. I mean, they’re definitely right that I haven’t been able to check in with everyone I care about on a regular basis. I try, but this year has kicked my ass in so many dimensions I can’t even count the number of ways I feel like a failure, so that plus one, now. Maybe there’s something else going on but, in the end, they felt I was selfish at them and seemingly don’t want to be friends anymore. That sucks. This whole thing hurts. But I’ve done my best to mend fences to no result, so the best I can do now is to try not to destroy myself over this.

My gut reaction (to blame myself and go to that dark place of just how horrible am I) is not super healthy so, after a hefty dose of therapy, I’m working overtime to stay in neutral emotionally even if I can’t manage to be affirming. That means constantly redirecting my brain every single time it wants to go There. That means SQUIRREL!

I started a load of laundry. Filled the dishwasher and started that.

My seeds still haven’t shipped. *Poke poke* Ship them! So that I can plant them and then stare at the soil waiting for them to grow..

We had to file our tax return very close to the deadline so it’s still processing. Poking “Where’s my refund” won’t make them process any faster buuuuut…

I ordered garden stakes, maybe they’ll arrive when the seeds arrive.

I scheduled recheck appointments for Sera 🐶 who still isn’t eating nearly enough to sustain life. Her appetite dropped off last week and it’s been a daily struggle to get her to eat anything but a handful of treats. She’s weak and unsteady on her feet much of the day and some of that may be her disease but the low caloric intake cannot be helping. She’s also increasingly resistant to taking her meds. I’d started out giving them to her with pill pockets, now she refuses the pill pockets. She keeps chewing them up and spitting them out. WHY. The whole point is that you don’t need to taste them! I started giving her a handful of treats, roughly the same size, mixed up with those pill pockets. That worked for two doses, then she started chomping on the entire handful and spitting it out. Now I’m wrapping them in smaller pill pocket wraps and embedding treats in those smaller pieces. Cross your fingers that she stops being so picky about it all? I really don’t want to have to pill her twice a day. It’s unpleasant for everyone.

There are MANY more things on my to do list but I can’t seem to spare the executive function to schedule any more things, so keep circling back to my emotional support bank accounts for comfort. Alas, it’s not helping the way it used to.

Year 5, Day 22: Taking care of Sera 🐶 is bringing up all the grief from losing Seamus as she declines in small but significant ways. She wandered the hall last night for hours. I took her out for a pee at midnight just to be sure she was ok and she paced intermittently for the next three hours. I listened to the click click click of her nails, remembering Seamus’s last months when he’d have confused nocturnal meanderings and I’d have to get up and help him settle down. But his first choice was to settle right on top of Sera. She didn’t object.

She absolutely refuses to take her meds now. She will take the treat wrapped pills from Smol Acrobat’s palm, not mine, but then she bites it in half and spits it out. Her appetite is very low. Her energy is correspondingly low. She’s still responsive to us but in a grumpy detached sort of way. She doesn’t follow me around half as much as she was doing last month. Her walks are much shorter and a little less frequent, by her preference. She doesn’t like to sunbathe when it’s warm anymore, she prefers when it’s cold. It feels like a lot of these changes developed in the past two weeks. I’m hoping that my gut instinct is right. I’m hoping she’s just exhausted from months of treatment, twice monthly pokes for bloodwork, six walks a day, etc, and needs more time to bounce back. Hell, I’m exhausted from all of this and I’m not the sick one. So I try to hug her and rub her ears as often as I’m tending to her and hope really hard she’s going to come back from this.

Year 5, Day 23: This Ask a Manager post reminds me of my regular musing about retirement (whenever it is, early or not). Will I have enough to occupy my time by then? It really depends on where we are in life by that point. I have friends who retired early who are busier than they were when they worked. We currently have young kids and an aging dog, and that makes us REALLY busy because their needs are so high now but that’ll change. Who knows what that’ll look like ten years from now. And who knows what my community and friendships will look like ten years from now. I’m terminally online socially because I can handle that. Socializing in person, even with people I like a lot, leaves me so very drained.

In other news, I’m so frustrated with these work people who are actively obstructive. Driving home in an empty car, a rarity, I made like Orro and screamed my frustration to the heavens. I did not claw the air, though I wanted to, both hands on the wheel. It helped a little. Like a tea kettle venting steam. Nothing has changed but at least I don’t feel like I’m going to burst with the pressure of keeping it all in.

April 15, 2024

Living in the time of pandemic: COVID-19 (202)

Year 4 of COVID in the Bay Area.

Year 5, Day 12: I was in a terrible mood yesterday and woke up on the precipice of that terrible mood again today. That, my utter lack of patience for anyone’s anything, and my pain and fatigue during school dropoff when I’ve normally walked twice that distance by the time we’re done – it’s screamingly clear I’m completely at the end of my emotional and physical ropes.

Between last week (travel, Sera’s health scare, hours of catching up, Smol Acrobat suddenly deciding that they’re ready to use the toilet so we have sixteen false alarms a day, Smol Acrobat’s stomachaches that spiraled out of control last week) and the weekend (scrubbing Sera’s vomit out of the carpet, the rug, and off the floor x 4, the washing machine dying, my backup computer turned main work computer trying to die)… I need a break. But I have a full week ahead of me so there’s no room for recovery in sight.

I put myself to work on meditative tasks: washing dishes and cooking turkey for Sera in an attempt to settle my ruff.

*****

I simply don’t understand why people call it “six months of the Gaza war”. It’s a genocide, not a war. The Palestinians are not waging war. A small part of their population is committing crimes and the entire population is being held responsible for it. To quote a friend, “one side in this has the power to exterminate the other and they are using it.” Of course we all know the chaos and horror that suicide bombers can wreak and October 7 was horror upon horror. And then it was followed up by a relentless six month extermination campaign. How is that going to bring any hostages home? They’re murdering indiscriminately, children, women, men, aid workers, it doesn’t matter anymore. Israel is just on an all out destruction rampage. They even killed some of the hostages themselves: 3 hostages killed in Gaza by Israeli troops were shirtless and waving a white flag, official says.

(more…)

April 8, 2024

Living in the time of pandemic: COVID-19 (201)

Year 4 of COVID in the Bay Area.

Year 5, Day 5: Taking a moment to reflect on the fact that I really didn’t expect to still be writing my weekly posts into Year 5 of COVID and, since we’re going to apparently be living with it forever, is it time to stop tracking the days? It’s mostly a habit now, like masking, but I don’t intend to stop masking any time soon.

We’ve taken the unusual decision to take the kid on an impromptu quick trip into the wilderness (Yosemite). I have been so busy with work and Sera that I have spent exactly ten minutes discussing or thinking about it, PiC did all the planning and booking. It wouldn’t have happened without him but also without me being an active part of the planning meant lots of things were missed. Not all my fault, we always tend to forget one thing unless my list is really extensive and I’ve been working on it for months.

We forgot to pack laundry mesh bags (small deal), warm hats (eh oops), PiC’s driver’s license (big oops), boots for Sera (which she might not have even been willing to wear). We don’t even own boots for the adults. The kids had rain boots that worked for them but my feet went up a half a size each since Smol Acrobat so my warm fuzzy boots don’t fit anymore. Wonder if it’s worth getting a replacement pair sometime.

Year 5, Day 6: Oh my aching everything. What a time for a flare-up. I had lava bones all night and well into the morning. Not great. Not great at all.

While granting that none of this trip was really made for me, I’ve made the grumpy snap judgment that I am not at a stage in my life where I appreciate nature enough to trade it for inhaling this much dust, being this cold, being this cut off from Internet connectivity and functioning GPS (I cannot stress functioning GPS enough) and being an hour of twisty windy long and slow drive away from anything. The majesty of the park struck me but fades into the background of my physical discomfort and preoccupation.

We always knew my body is no longer fit for camping but assumed I’d be fine near nature in a nice enough accommodation.

(more…)