For the Guy with Kids and a WW Diciotto

[hopeful4her]

Thanks for the words, Dash.

And welcome to my crazy, zany world. I'm glad you can take away something from my sitch. I put a lot of myself and my goings on into this crazy thread. For my benefit and for others like you.

And suga....

you and me, girlfriend. You and me.

My intention is or was to keep up my darkness for a bit. It is for my benefit and if someday it has another benefit attached....
then it WAS the right thing to do.

However, I had to contact her yet again today.

Is drama just attached to me? Following me?

Today, the boss wanted us to have a late call night to contact our best clients. Until 7pm. Knowing that the wife was taking on extra hours at work this week, I was not about to try to enlist her help. I can do this on my own. I arranged to take a late lunch at 4pm to pick up D7 and take her to the apartment with D11 and then head BACK to work for the call night. Then S14 would get to the apartment and stay with them until I got there when I finish and pick up ALL of them, since S14 comes with me today and tomorrow.

So I had it all planned out. My thought was to pick up some burgers after I got off for us to eat and pick up one for the wife and leave it there for her. Whether she ate it or not would be her decision. No idea if OM would be going over or them going out or what. Just do it and be done with it. My nice thing for her for the day.

Around 12pm, I notice a missed call from FIL! No VM. I had only missed it my about 10 minutes. I call back and his wife answers.

Now, she is from Mexico and ONLY speaks Spanish. Since my Spanish pretty much sucks, I can only understand a few things. FIL is very ill. Doctor wanted her to contact family. What hospital he is at, his room number so on and so forth. I let her know I'm sorry. I assumed that she tried to contact the wife, but got no response again. I know that she is not allowed to keep her cell phone on her at work. I let the lady know I will contact my wife and she thanks me.

I decide to contact the hospital where FIL is to make sure what is going on. I ended up talking to a nurse and she tells me that FIL is terminal. It is very difficult for him to breath on his own now. The doctor wanted his wife to contact family. She says that he may have to go on a ventilator and wanted the family to be able to make that decision. I ask if it was currently at that point and she says that they expect him to code sometime today, so that is why they need to know.

I call the wife at work and get her co-worker. She says that the wife is talking to the manager right now. I let her know that it's an emergency and needed to speak to her. She transfers the call and the wife finally answers. I ask her if she has spoken to her dad's wife. She says not today. I let her know the story and that I called the hospital myself. She is starts to break down. Sobbing. She starts to say that she spoke to his wife on Tuesday and she made it seem that he was okay. My wife tells me that she had made arrangements to go down to Laredo today, as a matter of fact, but changed her plans because of his wife telling her not to. I tell my wife that it sounds like things changed. She is so upset and crying that her boss gets on the line and tells me that my wife told her to tell me that she will have to call me back.

Now, I was upset. My first thought was to take off of my work and go to her. That she needed me. I felt completely helpless. I know she is going to go to Laredo, by herself.

Most of you know what happened the last time we went, under stressful circumstances of her great grandfather passing away. Her second stroke. I think that was just in May. I was VERY concerned about her going by herself now.

She calls me from her apartment about an hour later. I missed the call again and she left a VM saying that she was packing and heading to Laredo. I call her back and she is still crying. I ask her if anyone can go with her and she said no. We talk about her dad and his wife. She was upset with the wife for telling not to go. She asks me to take care of the kids. She tells me that her cell is not working right now. She has to go pay it and it will work later. I ask her if she has been taking her meds. She says that she is today. I tell her not to take it all at once. She says that she tried to call her mother, but no answer.
She was going to ask her to help, but then again, she is unreliable anyway. I tell the wife that I don't need any help with the kids. They are taken care of. She begins to tell me that she has not spoken to her mother since she can't remember when. That her mother is in her own F'ing world.

Yeah, like mother, like daughter, I wanted to say.

"I don't have ANYONE!" she loudly says.
I stay quiet.
"But I brought that on MYSELF, huh?!" She's still crying.
Again, I stay quiet. I didn't feel that it was the time for darts.

Then, I unfortunately told her, "You know, you can rely on me if you need me." Now SHE stayed quiet.

I tell her that she needs to take care of herself and be careful. She says that she is, because the kids are her number 1 priority and she is not going to leave them without a mother. She was not being pissy. I remind her to get gas and to make sure to call me when the phone works and when she gets there.

I ask her about what she thought about keeping him on a ventilator. She says that he wanted them to try everything possible to keep him alive. I was surprised by this. She says that she needs to honor his wishes. I ask her if he told her this personally and she said yes. We said a few other things that I don't remember, then she said she is leaving and will call me. She tells me thank you.

She called about an hour later. AGAIN I missed the call. I call her back on her cell. I ask where she is. She is just getting on the loop here in town. I told her I thought she was gone already. She says that she had to find the Cheaters Choice Cricket office to pay her bill. They would not take check or debit card, so she had to go find and ATM and take them cash.

Okay, I added the Cheaters Choice part.

She says a couple choice words about them. She then tells me that she'll get gas a little further out. I again tell her to be careful and call me when she gets there. I also tell her not to worry about our dog. I will take her home. She tells me thanks and that she'll call me later when she gets there.

I did the rest of my day as planned. Rush to pick up Juli, take her to the apartment, pick library books that the wife has and some movies that need to get returned. I take the movies and books back to the library, go back to work, finish call night at 7, leave to pick up burgers for the kids and head to the apartment. I figure that the wife was in Laredo by now, but just didn't call. I was not about to call her. We all head back to my house and the wife finally calls me as I pull into the drive.

We talk for a while. As I'm talking to her, the kids unload the car, and get sleeping Juli to bed for me. They are wonderful. They knew I was concerned for their mom.

The wife is upset. Her dad does not look well. I ask about her arrangements at work. She is taking it as vacation days and then FMLA can kick in if needed. We talk for about 25 minutes. She is telling me that the wife is acting odd. I tell the wife about my convo with FIL's brother the other night. He didn't think that she was handling things right. The he wanted my wife to be more involved. He is not on a ventilator, but another machine that HELPS him breath. She spoke to the doctor and he even says that if he goes cardiac, that in his opinion, he should go with dignity. The wife now agrees, but she was unable to get through to the wife. That maybe the wife was not understanding her because of her Spanish, even though its a lot better than mine. She mentions that FIL's wife is not letting her get too close to him. Even doing things like fixing his pillow for him. So again, my wife is upset. She says she is going to stay at the hospital.

I ask her if she has everything she needs. She says yes. Someone starts talking to her for a few minutes, and then she tells me that she will call me back. That's been a couple hours ago.

While we were talking, she kept breaking up. I hate her phone. You hear your echo when you talk and it breaks up a lot. I think she was getting a couple calls while we were talking, but it could have just been her dumb phone.

Odds are, it was someone calling her. Could be bill collectors, could be OM. Either way, she didn't answer it.

We'll see what tomorrow brings. I told her that God will watch over her dad.

Just another day in my life.