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mousmeDreamwidth didn't crosspost this, for reasons which escape me, so I'm doing it manually. Apologies if this somehow ends up posting twice.
My favourite aunt died on Saturday. She had cancer for a long time, and although she went into remission twice, a few months ago she was admitted to the hospital for... I don't remember the name of it. Some sort of intestinal obstruction that made it impossible for her to keep food down. That lasted for weeks, she was in and out of the hospital while they figured things out, and during that time they realized that the cancer was back, again. She managed to go home for a while for palliative care, but last week she was admitted for the last time, and she died some time on Saturday morning, I think (or it might have been late Friday, but my father only told me the news on Saturday).
I'm sad, because she and I had only recently reconnected. She lived in France pretty much my entire life, having fallen in love with, and married, a Frenchman. He died many years ago, so her current husband is her second marriage, but he was a very nice man by all accounts, and he's been devoted to her care for the past three years. So I mostly didn't know her until a few years ago, when I went to Barcelona. I piggy-backed on my parents' trip in 2015 and crashed with them for a week in the apartment they were renting. My aunt hopped over from France for a visit, and we really hit it off. So she and I had a sporadic email correspondence, and we got together in Paris in 2017 (I piggy-backed on yet another of my parents' trips, it's basically the only way I can afford Europe, ever, and these days I don't have enough money even for that, alas).
I may be sad, but at the same time she'd been so sick for so long, and she was suffering so much at the end, that I can't help but think it must have been a relief for her. She's the first of my father's siblings to die, and while he seems to be holding it together so far, I have no doubt this will hit him as hard as my grandfather's death did, and we can only afford one ticket for him to go to her funeral. That means he's going to be there without my mother to support him, which worries me a bit. I've been checking in regularly, but still, it's not the same. I should have more news tomorrow.
Moving on to stuff that's not about cancer and death...
I've been watching a lot of TV recently. Probably more than is reasonably good for me, but that's actually par for the course. The difference is that, rather than watching it during the down times on my night shifts, I've been doing it more at home. At work I've actually been working a bit more. But in the meantime, at home, rather than do anything productive, I've been watching Veronica Mars (among others) and playing an unhealthy amount of Stardew Valley.
Shockingly, I've been having a lot of trouble managing my time. It feels like I'm juggling too many balls at once (funny story, I can't physically juggle even two balls, I've tried), and so, true to form, I did what I always do when I feel overwhelmed and just kind of, well, avoided everything except the bare minimum of what I needed to do to get by.
The good thing is that I have a puppy, and she needs me to get out of the house every day. I haven't always taken her for long walks, but I have taken her out each day, and I try to work with her on her training each day, so that's probably been the best thing for my mental health. That, and the fact that she is the cutest, sweetest, most loving dog in the universe. It's all very helpful. :)
Otherwise, though, things aren't awesome. I think the trigger for this latest massive avoidance is the extra $1,500 I'm getting charged for university. There's nothing like financial stress to knock me for a loop and make me metaphorically crawl under my own bed and refuse to deal with the world. Is it productive? Nope. Is it my default behaviour? Yep. So, something to work on, I guess.
I'm heading to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
fearsclave 's this weekend for some romping around in the wilderness with Peggy, and introducing her to the joys of fishing. Or, more specifically, to the joys of fish. fearsclave has a long-standing tradition of letting his dogs lick the fish before they get taken back and cleaned (thoroughly!) for later consumption. Hopefully we will have an excellent day of fishing, which means actually catching fish. Not catching fish is still a good day of fishing, but I would really like to see Peggy's reaction to a fish. My guess is that she will go bonkers.
I've got a short list of things I want to get done before I leave on Friday. I'm working on keeping things realistic, because I have a tendency to over-plan and have a poor sense of how much I can actually accomplish in a given amount of time. Apparently that's a common thing with ADHD, the inability to properly gauge the length of time unfamiliar tasks will take. That, and forgetting that you need to plan time *around* the task. Also, I get overambitious about plans when I'm on nights at work. I have hours stretching in front of me, and it always seems like future!me is going to have tons of energy and motivation to do all these things, and in practice future!me is way more interested in catching up on sleep. So I hope I've worked it out correctly this time.
Okay, time to get back to work. These night shift duties aren't going to do themselves.
My favourite aunt died on Saturday. She had cancer for a long time, and although she went into remission twice, a few months ago she was admitted to the hospital for... I don't remember the name of it. Some sort of intestinal obstruction that made it impossible for her to keep food down. That lasted for weeks, she was in and out of the hospital while they figured things out, and during that time they realized that the cancer was back, again. She managed to go home for a while for palliative care, but last week she was admitted for the last time, and she died some time on Saturday morning, I think (or it might have been late Friday, but my father only told me the news on Saturday).
I'm sad, because she and I had only recently reconnected. She lived in France pretty much my entire life, having fallen in love with, and married, a Frenchman. He died many years ago, so her current husband is her second marriage, but he was a very nice man by all accounts, and he's been devoted to her care for the past three years. So I mostly didn't know her until a few years ago, when I went to Barcelona. I piggy-backed on my parents' trip in 2015 and crashed with them for a week in the apartment they were renting. My aunt hopped over from France for a visit, and we really hit it off. So she and I had a sporadic email correspondence, and we got together in Paris in 2017 (I piggy-backed on yet another of my parents' trips, it's basically the only way I can afford Europe, ever, and these days I don't have enough money even for that, alas).
I may be sad, but at the same time she'd been so sick for so long, and she was suffering so much at the end, that I can't help but think it must have been a relief for her. She's the first of my father's siblings to die, and while he seems to be holding it together so far, I have no doubt this will hit him as hard as my grandfather's death did, and we can only afford one ticket for him to go to her funeral. That means he's going to be there without my mother to support him, which worries me a bit. I've been checking in regularly, but still, it's not the same. I should have more news tomorrow.
Moving on to stuff that's not about cancer and death...
I've been watching a lot of TV recently. Probably more than is reasonably good for me, but that's actually par for the course. The difference is that, rather than watching it during the down times on my night shifts, I've been doing it more at home. At work I've actually been working a bit more. But in the meantime, at home, rather than do anything productive, I've been watching Veronica Mars (among others) and playing an unhealthy amount of Stardew Valley.
Shockingly, I've been having a lot of trouble managing my time. It feels like I'm juggling too many balls at once (funny story, I can't physically juggle even two balls, I've tried), and so, true to form, I did what I always do when I feel overwhelmed and just kind of, well, avoided everything except the bare minimum of what I needed to do to get by.
The good thing is that I have a puppy, and she needs me to get out of the house every day. I haven't always taken her for long walks, but I have taken her out each day, and I try to work with her on her training each day, so that's probably been the best thing for my mental health. That, and the fact that she is the cutest, sweetest, most loving dog in the universe. It's all very helpful. :)
Otherwise, though, things aren't awesome. I think the trigger for this latest massive avoidance is the extra $1,500 I'm getting charged for university. There's nothing like financial stress to knock me for a loop and make me metaphorically crawl under my own bed and refuse to deal with the world. Is it productive? Nope. Is it my default behaviour? Yep. So, something to work on, I guess.
I'm heading to
fearsclave 's this weekend for some romping around in the wilderness with Peggy, and introducing her to the joys of fishing. Or, more specifically, to the joys of fish. fearsclave has a long-standing tradition of letting his dogs lick the fish before they get taken back and cleaned (thoroughly!) for later consumption. Hopefully we will have an excellent day of fishing, which means actually catching fish. Not catching fish is still a good day of fishing, but I would really like to see Peggy's reaction to a fish. My guess is that she will go bonkers.I've got a short list of things I want to get done before I leave on Friday. I'm working on keeping things realistic, because I have a tendency to over-plan and have a poor sense of how much I can actually accomplish in a given amount of time. Apparently that's a common thing with ADHD, the inability to properly gauge the length of time unfamiliar tasks will take. That, and forgetting that you need to plan time *around* the task. Also, I get overambitious about plans when I'm on nights at work. I have hours stretching in front of me, and it always seems like future!me is going to have tons of energy and motivation to do all these things, and in practice future!me is way more interested in catching up on sleep. So I hope I've worked it out correctly this time.
Okay, time to get back to work. These night shift duties aren't going to do themselves.
