Hopes for 2021

 Well Christmas is over, even more boring than normal we have been trapped in the house for so much of this year that being trapped in for Christmas was not a novelty. The only good bit was not being able to go over to visit my parents. It's never my favourite bit of Christmas, they are so dull and the conversation is always reminiscences of the 1970's. I spoke to them on Christmas Day....and multiple occasions before as they kept finding reasons to phone! DF seems fine, planning walks that he doesn't get to do with the weather but still fit and well enough to do stuff. DM had been sounding quite bright and her normal self but has sounded tired and slightly out of it the last few times we spoke, who knows it could be the effects of alcohol, she still seems to be drinking plenty.

They sent presents and DF plainly went into a remaindered book shop and bought random stuff.  DP got a couple of decent books that he might actually enjoy and a selection box of whiskey miniatures that even he said were like antiseptic...he still managed to drink them though. I got a magnifying glass with lights...it went straight in the donate pile. There was various other naff stuff which was donated or regifted. Luckily they sent cash to DD, DS1 and DS2...all preferred money. Still its the thought that counts...which would be more acceptable if there had been any actual thought!

Anyway what do I want from 2021? some if it is super easy like us all getting vaccinated against Covid 19 so we can get our lives back. I would also love for DD to come out of her current flair...she is sleeping pretty much all the time. She can move from her bed to her chair, where she then naps, and then back to her bed, where she continues to nap. I am really worried that this isn't a flair but her new normal. Her condition does keep having these sudden descents and it's always horrendously scary...this is one of the worst. It's really hard for her as she has finally got her eating disorder under control with therapy and is accepting her body and not hating herself for being fat. She really wants to be posting on her Instagram account to help other people make that journey. Maybe, if we're lucky.

But the jobs I'd like to do that I actually have some control over 

• I'd like to redo the bathroom. We need a wider bath so I can get a bath lift for DD so she can have a bath when she has the energy. The floor tiles also need replacing.
• replace the hall and stair carpet and get new bookshelves for the landing. 
• get new units in the kitchen, the ones we have are old and look it! I would also like to replace the cooker and move it so I can get a proper sized cooker. I also want new flooring, the stuff I got when we last redecorated the kitchen wasn't cheap but has proved to be really poor quality.
• I would love to get a new car, there is nothing wrong with the current car but a slightly bigger one would be useful.

There is no way all of these will get done, they all cost money and that is always a limited resource, but we can hopefully get a couple done.

I would also quite like DM to finally snuff it...more because it's a 'job' on my mental to do list and I want to cross it off rather than actually having any emotional involvement any more. She has no impact on my day to day life and I have no part in her care and even when Covid is all over I still won't be visiting more than once a month for a brief drop in to 'hi', so her demise or not will have minimal impact on my life. Though if DF dies first I will be busy sorting her into a Home and all the rest - can't see my DB doing any of it!

Hopefully next year will be easier than this year. Not that this year has been all bad, we managed to get out to the Moors loads and DD took some awesome photos, but still a hard year.

Update: well it looks as though we may get non of the jobs sorted I was hoping for! I have still been getting money from when DS2 was in foster care, now I knew the money wasn't permanent but I wasn't expecting it to stop so abruptly. It's disappointing but could have been really hard a year or so earlier, at least now most of the debts are paid off, all we have is the mortgage and the car loan. Still I had hoped it would last long enough to get a couple of the jobs done! Maybe another year.

The year is slowly dragging towards its end

 Well the American election is over and Biden is now President...or will be in January.  Unfortunately they didn't take the Senate so all the damage Trump and the Republicans have done will stay but its good to know a nuclear war isn't going to be started because some man baby is having a tantrum!

We are back on lockdown which sucks as DS2 and DP are in the house 24/7 with no gym, football or rugby. Still it's not as bad as first time round as we have an end date at the beginning of December and DS1 is still able to go to work.

DD started therapy to help with her relationship to food. It is helping her approach food better but unfortunately it's not helping her weight and she is now too big for any of her clothes. Combining that with a flair she is having to take a break from Instagram, which is a massive shame as she was getting so good. Annoying too as she had only recently bought a new ...expensive...camera that I am still paying off. She has also bought a mass of new clothes...mostly custom ordered and so not cheap! It's typical though, pretty much the same happened last time she needed a break, and indeed the time before that!

She is struggling a lot at the moment ...she has very minimal energy so gets VERY bored as she's too tired to watch TV, or read, or play computer games...never mind actually doing any of her hobbies that she would actually enjoy. She has said, many times, that it's only knowing how hard Ruthie would take her death that keeps her from ending it all. 

DM still keeps going...miserable every time I speak to her and offensive pretty much every time as well. She will last for years, spite alone will keep her going. DF seems to be coping with her...I gather he's still managing to get out for walks occasionally and badminton when it's on, so he's happy.

A vaccine has been announced to the coronavirus which is fantastic news....hopefully the pandemic will be more controlled by next year and I can get DP out of the house again. Having him in the house all the time has not been fun!

I got my standard birthday present from my parents...flowers...usually they come from M&S and I entertain myself before the day deciding which of bouquets I'll be getting, the cheapest usually. Anyway this year I'm guessing my dad ordered them and he picked the cheapest flowers to be found on the internet...not M&S... and it showed! To compare the flowers my parents sent cost £15 including postage, the flowers my MIL sent will have cost £41 not including postage. My MIL remembers birthdays irregularly but as she's not my mum it's not a big deal. My parents are just unpleasantly cheap!

Its DS1's birthday today...he's already got cash...$40...from my MIL, his step Grandma has sent a card which arrived today and will undoubtedly contain £50 as it's what she always sends for birthdays. Nothing has arrived from my parents ...now a card could still arrive with Covid the post is having problems but even if they do remember it will be a card with £20...and they are definitely the ones with the most money. Given the fact they totally forgot DD's birthday it's not a given they remember DS1's birthday, I gave DF the benefit of the doubt for years and credited him with giving a damn and the spite just coming from DM. Now I'm not so sure, I still think the total self absorption is DM but DF is only fractionally better and does not really care about any of us. He has made it abundantly clear on many occasions that he values money more than me or the kids....DB may be different being male. DF is more misogynistic than I realised growing up...the 70's was not a good period and DF wasn't bad in comparison with the period but from the standpoint of today he's not great!.   

Update: well my parents did forget DS1's birthday and a card was sent that included £40, presumably by way of an apology. More interesting I have had a couple of extremely illuminating phone calls from DM. She has phoned more than once to check if she has forgotten a birthday...DP's and DS2's...when I mention DD she gets very unpleasant and snarls that she doesn't mean 'her'. The only explanation I can come up with is that DM intentionally ignored DD's birthday and then forgot that she'd 'forgotten'. With DS1's birthday she has now remembered she ignored DD's birthday and is desperately wanting me to tell her so, presumably so she can have a spite fest! She really is such a pathetic and unpleasant individual. I did wonder if she had 'forgotten' DS1's birthday but then DF had remembered it by some miracle...he is not good with dates and once memorably said that of course he knew when my birthday was, 'it was VE Day or VJ Day but he knew it was in May', my birthday is Remembrance Day!!

DS1 was very jealous that DD had her birthday purposely ignored by DM and wanted to know what her secret to success was. I'm guessing it's a combination of being sufficiently ill I need to care for her rather than being a position to pander to DM...not sure how that would work...other than in her fantasies...if I wasn't a carer I would be working full time so still have no capacity to fawn over DM. I also think DM is pissed off that neither DD or DS1 has paid her any attention for many years...as you sow so shall you reap!

Update 2: well guess who 'forgot' DD's birthday this year (2021) as well...my parents of course. Now this time my DF did remember about a 2-3 weeks late and phoned to aske me what he should do. I said just forget it DD hadn't mentioned it so probably hadn't even noticed....oh I can't tell you the hours I put into honing the perfect bitchy response...totally wasted on DF but it still felt good to finally say it. DF was fine with doing nothing... didn't feel any guilt at all. 

DM however obviously felt I hadn't been appreciative enough of the fact the birthday had ...eventually... been remembered and phoned to claim she had ordered some flowers from an unknown company that she couldn't remember the name of, or what she ordered never arrived. Total bullshit in my opinion.

Not sure this year will ever end!

 Well lockdown as such has ended and DS1 and DS2 are back at work which is fantastic for both of them...it also gives me a couple of quietish days. The major problem is DP is still working from home and likely to be long term. I really hate him being around all the time, even when is 'working' he is wandering round and talking at me....and he is soooo boring and self absorbed! For someone who claims he watches no TV he is constantly telling me about the stuff he watches! I'm so lucky to be deaf.

DD is doing really well with her Instagram and taking some beautiful photos and writing some lovely posts. Going out leaves her shattered....and me! We left the house by 4am last time and were in Scarborough before 6am for sunrise! It was beautiful but I was struggling to keep my eyes open by the time we got home and still needed to sort DD and do all the other jobs waiting to be done before I could close my eyes for an hour or so.

Went over to Malton a week ago to see DM, she is still alive, well it's not what I'd call a life but she's still breathing and being racist. I can see I'll need to go over every month or so until she dies...I reckon another year or two. She is in nappies and can't realistically move except in a wheelchair, oh the irony after all her foul bitchy comments about DD being 'overly reliant' on her wheelchair. I will be so pleased when she finally dies, a job I can cross off my 'to do list'.

They had some photos of my DB ...all I can say is he does NOT look like my baby brother. He is not aging well at all. He's put on some weight...probably still weighs less than me but it really does him no favours. He is also bald...a family trait...and very wrinkled, which is less usual in the family. It makes no odds to me, I haven't seen him in years and will probably only see him twice more for DM's funeral and then for DF's. I email him a couple of times a year to thank him for presents and I send him Amazon vouchers for birthdays. Not a relationship I miss which is sad. I still miss DB1 and he died 30 years ago.

Hopefully we won't have another lockdown, but who knows 2020 is a year that keeps shovelling more shit our way. Leeds is coping better than many parts of the world which is something I am grateful for, but it's still not a year I would ever choose to repeat!

In other news America is gearing up for and election in November. Trump and the Republicans are doing everything...legal and realistically illegal to ensure they win. The popular vote will almost certainly be for Biden, as it was for Hillary Clinton in 2016 but I do see him 'winning'. I think Trump and his apparatchiks will steal the election, in much the same way Hitler 'won' in 1933. To be fair I fully expected Trump to cheat in order to win this election...I foresaw him manufacturing an emergency so he could declare martial law. Well he has Covid-19 but he barely needs an excuse...he is just dismantling the election system. Four more years of Trump....and more if he just passes the Presidency down to his children...are not going to be fun to watch.

Given my unmatched skill in predicting election results...100% wrong so far....I seriously hope my pessimism is a defense mechanism but I don't think so with this election. Trump is a vile repulsive person but his Republican enablers are just evil people. 

Thoughts on my mum

DM is still in hospital, Malton Hospital now which means DF can visit her through a window near her bed, which makes it easier for her. He did look into a nursing home which would have been more realistic given her physical and mental state.

She is bed bound, more than DD as she can't get out of bed at all without help, like 2 nurses help, so she can't use a toilet and is apparently pretty much totally incontinent. She is not able to cope with reading or watching screens...okay DD gets like this a lot but DM is also showing real signs of confusion and general batshittery. Apparently her most recent diagnosis is arterial fibrillation  which means irregular heartbeat which means oxygen problems, which she has in spades because of her smoking anyway, it can also cause silent strokes in the brain and lead to dementia, which would explain a lot about her behaviour for a number of years now. She has had even less interest in boundaries and what is appropriate behaviour for a few years now, I remember last time she was in hospital she was speaking to DF on the phone and she was vile to him and shocked the other old ladies in the room with her.

DF seems to think he can cope with her being back home and eventually the hospital will want to discharge her so he'll need to sort something out. I think he is totally delusional about just how far she has deteriorated this time and that without any additional help he will struggle, but it's his choice. He has had a lot of advice but I'm doing non of it so not my problem. I will offer muted sympathy. Hopefully DM will die very soon so it's not a long drawn out problem for DF. He is more than happy on his own, he has his garden, goes on walks, is more than capable of doing all the cooking and cleaning and stuff...he's been doing it all for years. His only issue is going online, but he's aware of that and can learn it easily enough. He even has a new walking group picked out, so he is not going to find life on his own too hard.

I have been struggling with overeating this past few weeks and think it's very much tied in with my complicated feelings about DM. I don't like or respect her. I think she is an unpleasant, selfish woman who cares only for herself. I have some acceptance that she was very young when she had me and my brothers which is not an excuse but explains some of her mistakes. But it doesn't excuse the fact that my childhood is filled with examples of her saying mean things to me and the fact that all my life I have only felt of value if I'm doing stuff for other people. As far as she is concerned I'm invisible unless I'm doing what she wants, jobs mostly she doesn't like me that's for sure. Mostly I think she is embarrassed by me, I'm fat, I'm not rich, I live in a small inner city house, my children are fat, non of them is successful or beautiful...to her, as far as I am concerned my children are all fabulous and totally amazing people I am privileged to know. I am sad because with DM this close to dying I loose any hope I still had that she will ever see me and like me, I obviously had more hope left than I would have expected if it's hitting me this hard.

I am allowed to want a mum who liked me, note that even writing for myself I don't write 'love' me, I never expected that. I think my DF likes me, but I know he prefers my brother and still misses the older of my brothers because he was 'someone he could talk to'. I am and have always been invisible to my parents and only valued for what  I could do, the tasks I performed. It doesn't help that I haven't spoken to my brother or seen him in years. I was the one driving our contact and I stepped back after he hurt me deeply...not caring about my DD's illness....I dropped the rope and he plainly didn't care about me enough to pick it up.My DP is similarly uninterested, I dropped the emotional rope on him over a decade ago and he doesn't appear to have even noticed! It does sometimes feel as though it must be me that is the problem, after all I don't even have any friends, but I think I have been so shaped by DM to be an enabler for narcissists that I am unable to cope with normal people and only interact with selfish people.

Anyway I will not be sad when DM dies, hopefully very soon, for her as well as for the rest of us. She is very frail and looks MUCH older than her age, she hates her life and death would be kind to her and the rest of us. I will try to remember to be kind to myself and remember I am worthy of love and I am a worthwhile person. I am not only valued for the tasks I perform, I will like myself.

Update: well it looks as though DM is finally getting to back home. She had another trip back to York, not quite sure why, might have been a reaction to her new pills or lack of oxygen. Who cares! She did phone me and she is obviously fully back to her normal mental state. She phoned to say that she'd nearly had a panic attack, when asked why she said it was because she'd thought she'd missed my brothers birthday but realised it was June not July. Sounds innocent enough but she phoned on DD's birthday which was completely ignored by both of my parents. She is such an unpleasant bitch. No proof she did it on purpose but the mere fact I think she might have done says everything anyone needs to know about her. I blocked her number on my mobile phone and was 'too busy' to answer when she tried the house phone. She is just so poisonous!!

Still in lockdown...no end in sight

We are almost at the end of May and still no sign of a real end to lockdown. DS1 is still off work, he's still got a job and is being paid but heaven only knows when he'll be back....I've given up trying to guess. He struggles being stuck at home all the time and not able to meet any of his friends or go out to the cinema...you know all the normal stuff people do. He seems okay at the moment but has had some bad days.

DS2 is getting very anxious and veres between wanting to meet his friends in the park and refusing to go back to work when it reopens because he's so scared. Poor kid, he struggles to understand and the uncertainty is hard for him....and the rest of us to he fair.

DD is still suffering from the aftermath of what we assume was Covid-19. She is pretty much trapped in her room and goes out to take photos occasionally and then retreats to her bed. She isn't well at all and she is finding all of this emotionally really hard. Life is hard for her at the best of times and having a full house all the time isn't good.

DM is still in hospital, DF has been trying to get her home again .... she is NOT happy about being trapped in hospital and who can blame her. The main problem is that it now seems DM is totally incontinent and DF is very clear that he can't cope with that, and who can blame him. Having all this happen while lockdown is still ongoing makes it all harder of course as no one can actually speak to staff in the hospital so getting information is not easy.

DF is now looking at getting DM moved to either the local hospital as a stop gap or moving her straight into a local nursing home. Don't envy him that conversation!!! It's a Bank Holiday today which further complicates everything but hopefully DF can get things sorted so DM can get out of hospital and somewhere more appropriate. Given how quickly she seems to have deteriorated she may well not last too much longer. Having said that I've been expecting her imminent death for years.

Just spoke to DF and it looks as though she may get moved to a small hospital very close to their house, so DF can cheap out on not paying for a nursing home. DF is obviously not keen on paying out for DM! Well if she gets home eventually she will be miserable in familiar surroundings and DF can ignore her as much as he usually does. Good luck to DF handling it all! Fingers crossed she dies soon, for all our sakes....even hers.

I haven't spoken to DF as much in years!! Not a habit I intend keeping thats for sure. I have spoken to DM most days she's been in hospital and she is getting more confused and her filters are even less evident than normal, non of it's new behaviour but it's becoming more visible. She is in really poor health but could easily linger for another 20 years.

DP has been less hard work than I pictured but lockdown would still be soooo much easier if he wan't here. He gets vile and grumpy if anyone speaks when he was planning on pontificating...even if the other person/people were already speaking and he was going to butt in. He is going to carry on WFH until September at least, oh what fun.In an ideal world he could also get this virus and end up in hospital giving us all some peace and quiet, or just piss off into the sunset ....alone or with another woman I really don't care. Not that it's going to happen.

Still as lockdown carries on ....for ever.... it could be worse, not that I won't be overjoyed for it to all end and to get the house back to just DD and I!

Still in lockdown

Today is the 75th Anniversary of VE Day and should have had a full list of commemoration events.  Instead we are still in lockdown for Covid-19. Thinking about wars, as I tend to do on these big anniversaries I am forever grateful that I have lived in a period where none of my children had to go and risk life and limb to fight. DS1 in particular would have struggled in WW1, to the point I seriously doubt he'd have survived. Just so many triggers for him, if I believed in reincarnation....and I really want to.... I would say he lived through the War and that's why he reacts so intensely to facets of life in the trenches. DS2 would not have lasted 5 minutes as a soldier in either War...he just doesn't understand enough to keep himself safe. In WW2 he could have worked on the land, which he'd have coped with but he needs so much looking after! I can see DS1 as as bomber pilot, he really likes Lancaster Bombers, so his life expectancy would have been measured in months. DD would have worked in something front line and dangerous because that's who she is...she would have been my only hope of a child who survived. As I say I am grateful all the time for being lucky enough not to have to watch my children go to fight.

On a different topic I got a phone call from DF last might and DM has been sent to hospital. Nothing to do with the pandemic, she is just getting increasingly old and frail. All those years of smoking are catching up with her with a vengeous! Apparently she is not managing to get to the toilet, lack of energy to walk according to DF. So pleased we are in lockdown so I don't have to feel guilty about not visiting. It was interesting how happy he was to chat on the phone, both last night and again today, he could also hear better without DM being around. I spoke to her briefly on her mobile but she had no interest in speaking, not ill just keener on speaking to DF to complain about him not sorting stuff...she really is a poisonous old woman. I have checked and don't have a skirt for a funeral but I'm sure I can sort something if the best happens. Hopefully soon while restrictions on funerals are still in place, that way it can be a brief affair and I don't have to pretend to care even minimally.

Lockdown looks as though it will still be in force at least until the end of June...I am thoroughly bored with the whole thing. It just makes life tedious and worst of all there is just no quiet in the house. With DP, DS1 and DS2 all off work and with no sports or gym to go to they are hanging around ALL the time! They just make so much noise and fill the house up. Luckily tips have finally reopened, though you now need to book a slot to go, anyway I have booked what may well have been the very first slot at the nearest tip and DP and DS2 will go on Monday to get rid of the mountain of cardboard and wood we have stacked up ready to go. Assuming the tip calms down and we can get to it more easily we can then start sorting DS2's room. He wants it reorganized which will mean a lot of  old furniture taking to the tip and new units put in place.

The world has gone to sh*t

I have spent a large part of my life reading disaster novels and post apocalyptic stories....well now I can live it for real.

Not a good feeling. The world is experiencing a novel virus going pandemic. Basically worse than Spanish flu which is some feat. The response from every country so far to experience the virus is to totally shut down everything, which is already causing massive problems with job losses and a massive recession to come. DP has been told his salary will be cut by 30%...talk about sh*t!!

The virus seems to be a fairly mild flu for most people but for old or those with other health issues....like DD....the death toll can be up to 15% which is pretty horrific. Even with those figures I would be awfully tempted to just leave people to get sick and leave the old to die. I think the recession that follows this is going to cause way more deaths than leaving the virus to do it's worst.

So far DS2 is off college and work experience, his rugby has already stopped for the foreseeable future and his football is likely to follow suit this weekend. He had been picked to play football in a tournament in Switzerland with the MENCAP team at the end of May. Its not been officially cancelled yet but I can't see it going ahead.

DS1 is coping so far as his work is still carrying on though that's probably only going to last another couple of weeks, if that long. It's then questionable as to whether he has a job at the end of the shut down. His D&D has already had to stop and he can no longer go to the cinema with his friend or meet up with friends. I can see him sinking into depression if it carries on too long.

DP is already working from home full time for who knows how long....I had spoken to my parents about him going over to stay with them to help them and also get him out of my hair. A total win-win for everyone, but DF decided it was too much risk of DP bringing the infection with him. His choice but he can f*ck off when he wants help later as it all get too much. Worse case scenario is he gets sick and then DM is left to fend for herself....she'll be dead in a week! ( A win-win for me). Unfortunately I can see them both surviving just fine, but with DM being even more unpleasant and miserable than usual.

DD is really struggling and has been over dosing on adrenaline all week. Well she crashed big style today and is exhibiting symptoms as though she has stomach flu...I think it's just a flair but she is certainly very unwell.  It's a real shame as she has been feeling so much better with her new pain  meds and had started posting on Instagram again and had even got her lovely new doctor to refer her to  rheumatology to try and find some treatment for all her spine and joint pain. She has been asking for a referral for years. All the uncertainty over what's going to happen is not doing her anxiety any good .... this is not going to be a pleasant few weeks/months.

The situation is bad enough but there has been a mass of panc shopping which means normal shopping is impossible...toilet paper is unavailable, as is pasta, rice...basically once one item is all sold out the next food/household product goes out of stock. DS2 described it as 'shelves filled with emptiness' a very apt description.

Update : well its now 25th March and we have been in lock down for 2 days. In some ways it's easier to be finally locked down ,,,,the uncertainty is over and we have a fair idea of what is going to happen next. DS2 has, predictably not been coping well but DD and DS1 have both worked very hard at keeping him occupied and staving off his melt downs.

Unfortunately having DP at home is not making the situation any easier, though to be fair it could be worse. I'm guessing he is trying not to be too much of an arse. Still I can't wait for him to piss off back to work, go out to the gym....basically anything other than hang around telling me what he's posting on Facebook...what makes him think I care I really don't know!

Update 2: it's now the 18th April and lockdown is likely to continue until the middle of May. DS2 is finding it hard, he gets himself into a spiral of stress and is convinced he has Corvid-19 and needs to go to hospital!.But in the main he is coping better than I imagined a lot of the thanks for that is all the planning that DD did and the efforts DS1 is putting into keeping DS2 occupied.

DS1 will need to wait until all this is over to see if he still has a job. He's still being paid so far, thanks to the Government covering 80% of wages while lock down is on. But who knows how if the company will get the orders they need in a post lock down, massive Recession world.

The only upside to all this is that I've not needed to go over to Malton for DF's 80th birthday.