Week 401 Update

It was 6:55 AM when I stepped up on Mr. Scale for the 2808th time on my journey for a daily weigh-in, and the 401st time for a weekly weigh-in, and he said, "202.5 pounds!"

I am currently demonstrating the fine art of treading water, and nothing more.

I feel a bit trapped by circumstances at the moment. Our contractor wasn't straight with us, and instead of working the time that he promised us back in October, he spent a lot of his time on another project, and let our building languish incomplete. At no time did he tell us that he was over-committed, and couldn't do what he promised us. Looking back at it, we could have found another contractor and had the thing done already had we known he wasn't going to give us his full attention. But he wanted the money, and took the job knowing that he would be paid for work he wasn't doing. (His fee was in the form of a flat weekly salary, and of course the longer he took to complete the work, the more he would make. Shame on us for allowing that.) We were counting very much on his reputation for being honest, and that burned us, both in time and in money.

Until the building is done, I am forced to work in a cramped space in our bedroom, and my books are not available to me for reference. I am cut off from what I had in Vancouver, and growing exceedingly impatient as the weeks move by. We were told that he could have the building done before Christmas. He said that if he could hire some extra help, he could make it. He hired a guy who cost us a couple of extra thousand dollars, but it didn't help.

The costs have doubled over his initial estimate, and that has added to the very costly dental woes we have gone through the past year, and is very distressing. As we went along, we kept cutting things back from our initial plan for the building (which was what his original estimates were based upon), and are down to a bare bones building. (Two big things originally planned for that we gave up were plumbing, and a garage.) He is building something far less complex than what we had agreed upon before he started, and instead of finding the cost being less, because we are asking for less, we are paying over twice as much. And still the building is not completed. It is getting closer to completion, but while we are waiting, our busiest month on the web page is passing us by.

In case you haven't guessed already, I am exceedingly unhappy with our contractor, and his reputation with us has been more than simply damaged. This is very unfortunate, because he is a really nice guy as a person. And he is a very talented carpenter as well. If he could organize his time, and would take off his rose-colored glasses when he estimates what he can do, he would be more than adequate to any building task he set his hand to. But we were counting on him doing the job, when, and for how much, that he promised, or at least within 50% of those estimates. He has exceeded an overrun of more than 100% on both cost and time already and it is still not done.

Okay, some cheese with that whine would be very much appreciated.

As distressing as this has been to us, it is not the big deal in our lives right now. We were dealt a very unhappy blow when we found out that my mother would not be able to sell her house for probably at least a year, and she was in no condition to live on her own for that year or longer. Our list of options was very short. We were hoping to move her up to Vancouver, but that door appeared firmly closed. In Vancouver we have all the organizations, and services to help us care for Mom, and her condition. In Tiller we are 22 miles from the nearest real gas station, let alone a hospital. We are an hour away from anything resembling a city, and the resemblance is minimal even then.

I feel like the fish in "Finding Nemo" who were sealed up in the plastic bags that were floating in the ocean, and one of them says to the other, "Okay, now what?" Here we are, but what do we do?

The tension of dealing with problems is not offset with time out for fun. All the books say that the number one thing you have to watch is getting time for yourself to unwind from caregiving. So far we have found no source of help in that area. Because the building is not completed we haven't even been able to move in fully and we have stuff in storage in Vancouver yet. All our rooms are cluttered with boxes and our bedroom is filled with computer equipment.

We hope that things will get better soon, but that is merely a hope. We of course will have to locate some form of help in what we are doing, and once we do, things will look a lot brighter for at least the short-term.

The theme song for dealing with dementia should be Three Dog Night's Going In Circles. Her doctor told us, "You can't win the argument." That is golden counsel, and if we can remember that, then we won't burn up a lot of energy trying to reason with Mom, and convince, the unconvincable. We have consumed a great deal of wasted energy in such discussions and, being human, I am sure we will forget in the future and burn up a lot more of it over time. But at least we know we shouldn't, and it helps us to not feel guilty when we don't try.

On some days I feel like Alice, who had fallen down the rabbit hole. This can't be happening to the woman who raised me, and cared for me, during all those hard years, with Dad's alcoholism dominating our lives. She played softball with me, and Monopoly on Saturday nights. She listened to baseball games with me when the Dodgers were winning the pennant and World Series in the 1960s. She was the only adult on earth who really cared about what I had to say back then, and she deserves better than this. But I can't give it to her. I can't make things right, because what is wrong is on the inside, not the outside. My heart wants to save her, but my head tells me that if I give her what she asks, she, and/or someone else will be terribly hurt. Alice did escape from the rabbit hole, but she was only dreaming.

Mom still gives hugs today, just like she did when I was crying as a child with a skinned knee, and they are just as filled with love. We'll take this one day at a time, and do our best.

We recently watched the movie A Beautiful Mind, and there were two things in that movie that struck me. The first was a scene where the wife of the main character, John Nash, a man suffering from schizophrenia, was overcome with frustration and she let go for a bit, while in a room by herself, throwing a glass into the wall and shattering a mirror, and screaming at the top of her voice. The first time I watched that movie some time ago, I thought that was a moving scene, but today I can relate on a far more personal level. The second thing that struck me was the resolve of John Nash to use his reason to find a solution to his condition. I am a strong believer in reason, and I could empathize with his determination to reason out a solution to his problem. That is my aim as well.

So, is that cheese ready yet?

Weight loss…weight loss, oh yeah, that is what this journal is about isn't it? Just like this write up got sidetracked, so has my weight loss journey. I just hang on from day to day and hope for the best. Somedays I just overeat, and I don't care. Other days I try to watch what I am doing, but I am not writing things down. I am even struggling to not start smoking again right now, and that says a lot about "where my head is at" these days.

So, to be only 2.5 pounds overweight right now is actually remarkable, though I wouldn't call it good. I am busy and going up and down stairs a lot, so my activity level is up. This week I walked 9 miles, and that isn't too bad. Weight loss…weight loss, I'll see if I can get my mind on that for a while.

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