Saturday, January 29, 2011

Day 3

Ok, it's been more than 3 days since my last post and a lot has happened.  My mom is home from the hospital.  She pulled through, thank God!  It was the scariest so far with her.  She's recovering at home and my sister and dad are there helping her. 

My dad had a pacemaker put in this week.  He told us he had been having blackouts, so we insisted he see the doctor.  His heart was beating too low and causing less oxygen to the brain and thus the blackouts.  He was in the hospital over night and is home now and doing ok. 

My younger daughter had her cell phone, iTouch and Northface jacket stolen from school while she was at dance practice.  Not a good night at all for her or me.  I had just found out the night before that she had been drinking and sneaking out with boys.  I had heard that she had went to party at a boys house that is known for having parties with under age kids and booze.  The sneaking out with boys was a total shock!  I knew something was up when she all of a sudden started hanging with Haley D.  I never liked that kid from when she was 4 years old.  She's the daughter of one of my brother's girlfriends.  She has no parental supervision and pretty much runs wild.  She'll end up like her mom, homeless, car-less, dead end job and mooching off her mom.  I was told by a fellow dance team mom, so I'm sure my information is correct.  Jenna snuck off from a dance team party sleep over to hang out with a boy, Brian N.  I wasn't going to bring all this up to Jenna until after her dance competition, but then pictures of her at this party popped up on Facebook.  I forwarded the pictures to her as a message on Facebook and she got the messages on her iTouch while she was at practice.  She knew she was in trouble.  I get to practice and her jacket, iTouch and cell phone had been stolen.  She was going to have those taken away from her for a while, but I was not anticipating on re-purchasing them!  I've ordered her a new phone and it's taken forever to get here.  UPS shipped it to St. Louis 2 days after I ordered it and the numb nuts at the UPS place shipped the phone to Dallas, TX.  Dallas shipped it to Little Rock, AR and they shipped it back to St. Louis.  It should be delivered by Monday - geesh, morons work everywhere!  Went shopping for her jacket and couldn't find one.  Looked on-line, found it, but couldn't use the on-line coupon.  I hate dealing with this crap!  Jenna took her punishment, but now she just stays in her room and I don't like that either.  She has come out and watched TV with me, but she has not asked to go anyway with anyone.  I'm not grounding her from ever going with friends, just not Haley and her little group.  Hopefully she'll come around and this won't be a big problem.  I never had to deal with this sort of thing before with either of my girls.  I think Jenna wants a boyfriend, but she's going about it the wrong way.  Why are boys such jerks?! 

My sister claims that a low life friend stole $240 from her.  Of course me and everyone else thinks she had him buy her drugs, crack, and she smoked it up.  I don't know what to believe anymore when it comes to her and my brother.  They both mooch off my parents and both get mad at the other for doing so.  It's freaking crazy!  My sister has a hearing next week for disability.  She's claiming to be too sick/crazy to work.  Nice!  My brother I'm sure is up to his old tricks.  He has to be.  He's not working and somehow has money.  The less I know the better.  I just wish they would live their lives away from my parents. 

My niece, my sister's daughter, gave birth to her third child.  She is 21 and already has 3 (almost 4) year old twin boys and now baby #3.  I'm hoping this baby daddy will stick around and actually help her financially and physically.  She too needs to move out from my mom and dad's. 

It's been a crazy couple of months.  I'm sticking to my new eating plan ok during the week, but not so good on the weekends or days I don't go to work.  I haven't started exercising yet.  I haven't used any of my credit cards.  I actually had money left from my paycheck and didn't go in the negative with my checking account.  I may be broke now after paying for Mike's wedding ring repairs, dinner and Jenna a new jacket, but I had the money to buy those things.  I need to buy groceries, so I may be dipping into my next paycheck, but I get paid on Monday and today is Saturday.  Not perfect, but much better than I have been this past year or so with my finances.  I'm going Monday to see about getting our income taxes done.  Hoping to get back close to what we did last year.  I want to pay a chunk on my credit cards. 

Well that's about all I have for tonight.  The losing weight thing is so hard and almost seems hopeless, but I have to keep trying.  I saw pictures of myself holding my niece's new baby and I look freaking scary.  I look fat, old and my hair is gross.  I died it really dark - midnight blue and it looks blue at the part.  The parts that were totally grey/white look blue.  I like it when I look at it in the mirror and I even get compliments from people, but when I see it in pictures, it looks nasty!  Maybe people aren't really complimenting me as much as just making a comment on the drastic change.  You have to practically starve yourself to lose weight, I hate it!!! 

Good night.

Saturday, January 1, 2011

Day 2

So today is January 1, 2011.  Rang in the new year sitting at home with my husband.  Of course, he sat upstairs watching college football/Blues hockey, while I sat downstairs in the family room watching nothing in particular while dozing off.  We did meet for a late lunch and drinks at Ragazzi's on the Hill in St. Louis.  He was suppose to meet a co-worker/friend, but got stood up, so I joined him.  We had went out the night before to a nice dinner and concert - TSO, so I'm not complaining - too much :)  Our New Year's Eve celebrations have not been the most enjoyable since we've been married.  Somehow the night always ended with him yelling at me how unhappy he is with his life and me, blah, blah, blah.....and me ending up in bed all day New Year's day.  Not the most enjoyable way to start off a new year.  I vowed last year not go out with him this New Year's and we didn't.  He made us chocolate sundaes and we ended the night watching TV in the same room.  We text our kids at midnight and then went to bed around 1:30am. 

Our kids...I have 2 daughters.  One is 20 and a junior in college up at Western Illinois University.  She will be 21 in March.  She is majoring in Fashion Merchandising.  Her dream job would be London working with a fashion house producing fashion shows or being a buying for a major department store. The other daughter is 15 and a sophomore in high school.  She just received her drivers permit. They are both on dance teams at their schools.  They were both cheerleaders in middle school.  My oldest cheered her freshman and sophomore years of high school before making the varsity dance team, which is the team she really wanted to be on.  My youngest made the varsity dance team her freshman year, though I'm pretty sure she doesn't like it as much as her oldest sister.  She has even told me that she is thinking about not trying out next year and maybe trying out for cheer leading.  Of course that would be fine with me, expect I'm on the board, Treasurer, of the Dance Team Parent Association and very involved with the fundraising.  I also owe mega bucks to the team, but that's a whole different story.  I actually need her to stay on the team until I get the money paid back or figure something out.  I know this is not her problem and I can't force her to stay on the team.  I need to do some creative thinking here real soon!  I also have a 20 year old step son.  He played hockey all through high school and when he was younger.  My husband has been his hockey coach since he was little until he went away to college.  He played for Eastern Illinois University his freshman year and only year of college.  He didn't take going to classes seriously, thus did not return to college this past fall.  He has had a couple of different jobs and is now working full time at my husband's employer's warehouse.  So far, so good, but he's not totally happy with the job.  I look for him to quit sometime soon.  The good part is that he also got my nephew a job at the warehouse and he seems to like it ok.  He graduated high school, finally, last December and was working at Imo's Pizza for a while until he quit for dumb reason.  At least he's working.  I hope he and my step son decide to go back to school, even a community college, and have a better career. 

My mom is out of the CCU and is doing much better.  It was so scary there for a while.  She had been placed on a ventilator and put in a medical coma for 11 days.  My siblings and I, along with my dad, had to make some important decisions, whether to have her resuscitated or not should her heart stop.  Of course we decided to have the doctors try to save her life, but thank God it wasn't necessary.  She has pulled through and I'm very happy, but I get the feeling my dad is not so happy.  I think he thought this was it and he was finally going to be free of her.  I could be wrong and hopefully I am, but that is the feeling I get from him.  It has been a rough couple of years with her health and their finances and I think he saw this as a way out.  Of course my sister, her kids, her grand kids (another one on the way) and my brother and his son all living under my mom and dad roof doesn't help matters one bit. 

I have one sister and one brother.  Both are pretty much losers.  I'm not saying I'm "Miss Perfect", but I'm doing everything in my power not be sponging off my parents at this point in my life as they are.  I've been with men to help me financially, which I know isn't right, to keep me from having to move back with my parents after my divorce.  I've been lucky with keeping my job for the past 19 years.  I don't make a whole lot of money, but I have benefits.  I work for a State University.  I wish I could make more money and I would if I had a degree, but my experience is degree enough in my position for the job, but not for the pay. 

I'm 45 years old and I don't want to be in the financial position my parents are in right now at their age or the have the health problems my mom has.  This is why I've decided to make some changes in 2011 in regards to my health and financial situation.  I've put away my credit cards and will try my best not to use them.  I will not buy gifts for people if I don't have the money.  I will have to say "no" to my girls when I don't have the money.  I'll have to not go out to eat when I don't have the money.  I'll have to tell my husband we don't have the money to do whatever and not dip into the house payment money and leave myself broke on my next paycheck.  I'll have to start eating less and eating better.  I'll have to start exercising instead of sitting around watching mindless TV.  I'll sit and write more about my life and try to write short stories instead of eating or spending money.  I'll focus my writing on events in my life, characters in my life and just daily ramblings.  I plan to introduce you to each of family members, those will be stories within themselves. This is my New Year.