Skip to main content

Friends in Need - Friends Indeed


Just when I thought I was all alone and lonely, I picked up the phone and I wasn't so lonely anymore. Friends are just the best when we can turn the frown upside down and uplift each other.

My friend, Sunny, brought sunshine into the rainy day of my life by listening to a letter I composed with the thought of sending it to an estranged friend. She pointed out that we are not to be sorry for our feelings. Our feelings are our feelings and they are valid and necessary. We are allowed to be sorry for our actions, or inaction as it were. I agree.
Another friend, Gabe, temporarily housebound due to illness, made my day by allowing me to commisseurate with him about how awful we feel about being unemployed. He showed me how we were alike in this regard, feeling useless and ashamed, but taking heart in the that this likely temporary. I also lamented the loss of a friend and the estrangement of another and told him about the steps I was taking to amend the estrangement. Validation from trusted friends and confidantes is like gold to me.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

I Remember...

I remember catching fireflies,  putting them in a jar, as a girl of five. I picked pears off a tree that overhung an alleyway on my route home from school, then enjoyed the forbidden fruit. .I had a golden cat who chased a gray mouse through our living room sending my mother, 3-year old sister, and me screaming atop the sofa and chairs. We lived in a farmhouse and I watched Romper Room. A daddy longlegs skittered across my dirty kid legs as I teeter-tottered on a broken kitchen chair back. I played grocery store and laid out a bedroll for group nap time in preschool. We lived in an apartment attached to a bakery. My maternal grandparents visited and a photo was snapped. Grandma held Dawn and Grandpa held me. I held Grandpa's chin. Walking through the back of the flour-caked kitchen, I saw scrumptious pastries and colorful toys stuck in the cupcakes with my hungry kids eyes. We lived in a two-story apartment building next door to a large farmer's field.  That field was my...
3 comments
Read more

Managed

Managed care, do not get me started. It is the bane of my existence and my savior. If quadriplegia has curtailed my activities, and it has, then being in a home has curtailed even more. I've had to dumb it down and set my standards low. Gone, are the halcyon days of getting in my wheelchair to go for a stroll or sit in the sun, or even sit in the sun room. Neither the nurses, nor patient care technicians, know how to put me in my wheelchair. Seriously. My chair has head controls and it is a bafflement. Most caregivers don't even realize I have head controls. First, they hit the left head pad when they lift the armrest which turns the chair on. Next, they sling me over and place me in the chair. The problem? My head, naturally, rests on the headrest, which accelerates and drives the chair and is beyond my control. Running over a caregiver or running myself into an obstruction are very real consequences of their ignorance. What could be worse? The caregivers remain clueless abo...
Post a Comment
Read more

Best Birthday Ever!

Started my day in a snit. Housekeeping cannot seem to get together on getting my clothing into my dresser drawers, instead packing shorts, tank tops, and pajamas into the closet on hangers. Those closets get so overstuffed the clothes end up in a pile on the floor where nobody bothers to pick them up. Then an unsuspecting aide arrives and asks me what I want to wear. I respond, "What do I have? " I get asked the same question as though I never answered and I blow a gasket. Woe is me, nobody greeted me with a smile and a"Happy Birthday! " Nobody surprised me by cleaning out the closets nor did they lay out my Birthday clothing. I refuse help until my closets are clean. I've been waiting for weeks for my regular aide to catch on to my routine. God knows she can't understand my requests between my ALS accent and her Ethiopian one. But, today I make my stand and have the Resident Care Manager making order so I can make some logical decisions. A waste of her va...
Post a Comment
Read more