Bev's Babbling Blog

I have been trying to write this for a couple of days now but just couldn't seem to put the words in front of me to read. It always amazes me how something that happens in one split second can change alot of people's lives. The life you knew before that second is forever gone, never to be seen again.

On May 4th (11 days ago) my world along with my mom's world changed forever. My stepdad (for the last almost 20 years) died in his sleep and my mom was the one that found him. He was a diabetic and had been sick off and on for a long while now and for the last year we knew his health was not good. The thing is, the last few weeks he seemed to be doing pretty good for the shape he was in. He did not seem to be suffering and he was at home and happy.

When I got the call around 10 am on that Thursday morning I can't even remember what my response was. All I knew was I needed to get to the hospital. They did not tell me right then that he was already gone but what I was told was he probably would not make it. I got to the hospital as soon as I could and right then I knew, it was bad.....he was already gone. Basically all they did at the hospital was pronounce him dead.

I felt like I went back in time to when I was 13 years old and my mom told me my dad had died. So, here we were going through this all over again. I was angry. I shouted over and over to my pastor and anybody else that was in the room that this is not fair. It is NOT fair that we are having to go through this twice.

I am an only child, along with my cousin that my parents raised, which by the way, I am very thankful had moved back to my moms about a week or so before this happened, so mom was not alone when she found my stepdad. As the only child, I had to quickly push away my anger and my hurt to try to be there for mom. I started making calls and getting things ready for the funeral home and just getting things done that mom was not able to do. It gave me a taste of how things will be if my husband passes away before I do, and I do not look forward to going through that.

Luckily my mom has 3 wonderful sisters that got to the hospital about the same time I did so when we finally left the hospital and went to the house they were able to step in and do the physical stuff I was not able to do before people started coming by. Anyway, 11 days later I am still trying to wrap my brain around all of this and I am really worried about my mom. I have always known she is a tough woman, but I'm not and I worry about her. She went back to work today so I am hoping that will be good for her.

I am having to deal with this now because I had to push alot of things aside to be there for her and it is hard. I can't believe I have lost two dads. My stepdad wasn't perfect but he loved me. He loved me from the time we met til the day he died. I wasn't his stepdaughter to him, I was his daughter. For him to be with my mom knowing she had a teenager that had a load of health problems and to be willing to help finish raising me, he was a good man.

He always told me he would never try to replace my real dad, but he just wanted to be my friend......and that he was. I am really going to miss him. I already do. I just wanna hear him joke around with me and try to embarrass me (he loved to make people laugh) one more time.

The part I am having a hard time dealing with right now is I realize that as our lives changed in an instant, everybody else's life kept going. I have friends that have been there for me, and I really appreciate it.....but they could never totally understand because they haven't been through this. I get angry sometimes because I just wanna scream and say "Don't you realize my life will never be the same, don't you even care?!?" But I do realize life has to go on, whether it is the same as it was before or not.

Life somehow.......has to go on.  

Take Care and God Bless,

Bev

I'm sorry I haven't posted in a while. I really have been trying to figure out how to put down the things that have been going on in my head,  but sometimes it isn't that easy to do, even if the things going on in your head are good things. I run the risk of people not being able to understand what I am saying.

Things for me lately have actually been pretty good. Not a lot has changed,  but I am more content with things and sometimes that can make all of the difference in the world.

I went to see my grandparents on Easter Sunday and my grandpa was having a pretty good day. He knew who I was and was pretty talkative, which for him that is a plus. Every time a holiday rolls by now, I wonder if it will be his last. I know he isn't getting better, even if he has good days. I am at peace, for right now anyway, that he isn't in pain and that he is doing the best he can. I hope he knows somewhere in the back of his mind that we are doing the best we can to take care of him.

I have been doing some soul-searching lately and tried to get my mind back into thinking about the positive things in my life instead of the negative. I realize I do have people who really are my friends and I have people who really do care about me and do everything they can to help me stay happy and to show me I am important and I am a good person. Just having somebody that reminds you on a daily basis that you are special works wonders.

I have come to the conclusion that no matter how bad some things around me can get, that it isn't always my fault; so why should I punish myself and not try to be as happy as I can?

For somebody like me, who has lived her life feeling very insecure.......friends that know you need that extra bit of reassurance, are  very good to have around.

I have always known the more you hear something, the more you start to believe it. My problem was I was hearing the negative stuff and not taking time to hear the good things that I needed to hear.

I still have good days and bad days, but that is part of life........but for now I am basking in the sunlight of the good days.

Take Care and God Bless,

Bev

P.S. I wrote this a day or so ago and it is so weird how things can change in just a few hours. I'm not having such a good day basking in the sunlight today, but I posted this so it can remind me I can hopefully get back to doing just that.

Well, I was told I needed to get me one of these here blogs so I could vent when I needed to. So here goes....

I don't use the kind of cell phone where you have to pay a monthly fee and have unlimited minutes and all of these new techie stuff I wouldn't understand anyway. I have just a simple Tracfone, where every two months I spend $20 to buy some minutes and if I don't use all of those minutes up in two months, it adds up. It has served my purpose for a few years now because all I need is a phone that I can use when I am out somewhere if I need to. I don't keep it on all the time and I don't use it allot.

This past Christmas, I decided I wanted a new phone but still a Tracfone, this one is just smaller and it is a flip phone. I like it allot. But from day one I have had a problem with when I call somebody that has caller ID, my number shows up but it shows a foreign persons name. At first I didn't think about it because like I said, I don't use it that much. Plus if somebody has my number programmed into their phone it will show up with my name. No big deal, right? Well I noticed after awhile that it seemed that there was some people that wouldn't answer the phone because of the name it showed on the caller ID. So back a few months ago I started trying to call Tracfone and see if they could help me. The first time I called they said it would be fixed in 4-6 hours. Well, it wasn't but then I would forget about it because I can go weeks sometimes without even using my phone.

Anyway, back about a month ago I was determined to try again and to keep trying til I got it fixed. Every time I called, I would get people I couldn't even hardly understand but basically they would just tell me again that it would be fixed in 4 - 6 hours. So a couple days ago I tried again. I was a little more stern this time in letting them know I wanted it fixed. I provided them with the name it was showing on the id, and everything. Again they say, give it 4 - 6 hours, sorry for the inconvience. (somehow I didn't believe them) Well, yesterday it still wasn't fixed so I made up my mind, that today I was going to call them back, and demand a new number or new phone.

I call, and I get this man on the phone and finally somebody I can understand so I thought "I might get somewhere this time". Here is where the title of this blog comes from. He had to be one of the most stupid people I have talked to. I repeated my problem......again. I told him it made no sense and that there had to be something that could be done. He kept just saying "yes, I see where you have called several times, and it has been reset" He wanted to hang up and leave it at that! I said well ya know, it still isnt working so can I just get a new number. His response to me was "well ma'm. if we do this your phone number will change". That is about when I wanted to open a can of whup ass on him. I asked him if I would lose my minutes, he said no I wouldn't but repeated AGAIN "but if we do this, you will have a new phone number" No shit sherlock! He kept saying that caller id probably just wasn't available in my area. I finally convinced him to change my number. I do not see how people like that can keep a job. I wanted to tell him exactly what he could do with my phone, and it would have been very painful! Anyway, my phone seems to be working now with my new number. Talking to Tracfone's help desk is as bad as calling Dell's help desk and that is pretty bad.

Take care and God Bless,

Bev

Well I realized it has been a little while since I wrote, so I thought I would do a catch up post.

There really isn't allot that is new that is going on with me. The weather here has been warm and we are getting some very needed rain today. I am so glad Winter is over with for awhile. I love Spring and Summer.

Last Saturday I went to a party for my grandpa's sister's birthday. I was able to see allot of people I have not seen in a long time. My grandpa was there and he is really going downhill. His alzheimers is getting worse. He just looks like he isn't even with us anymore. This has been really hard on the family. My grandma does her best to take care of him but it gets harder and harder. He ended up in the hospital for a couple days this week so they could run some tests. They didn't really find anything any different but they told my grandma she is going to really have her hands full (like she hasn't already). It upsets me to think they can't get any help for him, but yet Mike and I can have an aide every morning. They said his insurance wouldn't pay for it because he "JUST has alzheimers". I think that is nuts.

Not much else has went on this week. I have had a pretty good week.

Take Care and God Bless,

Bev

I now have pictures in my gallery of my haircut, finally!

It has been a very long week of trying everyting I could think of to get my camera fixed. I just kept making things worse so I had some help. We still couldn't get it working.

I finally called Kodak today and they were able to get my software back on my computer but it still would not transfer pictures (which was the original problem I had before I made it worse).

Now during this week, I have asked a couple of people to look for me and make sure everything was plugged in like it was supposed to be. I can't physically get behind my computer to make sure myself, so I had to depend on others. The two people I asked just kept saying "yes, everything seems to be plugged in".

After talking to the lady at kodak we had narrowed it down to being the dock, either the dock was broke or it wasn't hooked up right. I called a friend, asked him if he could come by here and make sure it was plugged in for me because I did not know what else to do. He came I specifically said "follow the cord from the dock to the computer and make sure it is plugged in" He started doing that and when he got to the end of it..........it wasn't even plugged in!

I didn't know whether to be relieved or ticked off. All I know is I learned a huge lesson. Say what you mean and say it specifically because to me saying "make sure everything is plugged in" and "follow the cord" is the same thing.....but to the people I had to depend on I guess it wasn't.

I know being upset over a camera doesn't seem like a big deal, but for me it was. I got this digital camera back when my grandma was told she had cancer. I did not know how long we would have her around so I wanted to be able to have some good pictures. She is in remission and is doing great now, but now my grandpa has alzeimers and is going downhill. I am thankful I have this camera to be able to get pictures of him that I can treasure for the rest of my life.

Thank you to the different ones that tried to help me get it fixed.

Take Care and God Bless,

Bev 

I just thought I would write some before I go to bed so that way maybe all these thoughts won't be in my head when I try to get some sleep.

First off, I worked very hard today trying everything I could possibly do to fix my camera. Now I can't even get the software to download on the computer. It is very frustrating when you feel like you don't know what you are doing. I appreciate all the help Pimpernel put into trying to help me get it fixed, when he wasn't even here. He was having to tell me on messenger step by step things to try. I know that has to be hard to do especially when you are trying to talk to somebody like me that doesn't understand things very well sometimes. I really do appreciate his help though.

I ended up emailing Kodak so hopefully they will have some answers. If I don't hear from them by Wednesday I will have to call them. I hate doing that because I feel like they think I am so stupid.

Now to the next thing that has been on my mind. Friendships are one of the most important things to me. It always has been. Like I said in my story I wrote awhile back, I have always dreamed of having a best friend that I can be myself around and always depend on. I have a few people that I talk to online that I feel that way about. Not real sure if the feeling is mutual, but that is how I feel anyway. My thing is.....is it right for me to go around feeling like I have to watch everything I say to them for fear of making them mad and not talk to me for days? Upsetting my friends seems to be one of my best qualities even when I don't even try. I just start feeling like if I have to watch everything I say and always worry because they get upset with me easily, then maybe they are not a true friend after all.

I am not saying I should be ugly to them or do things I know will make them mad. That isn't quite what I mean. I just know sometimes I feel like I can't say anything because it might upset them. They say whatever they want to me, whether I have voiced how it bothered me or not.

I guess what I am saying is, I feel like best friends or real good friends should be able to joke around or say what is on their mind or their opinion about something (especially when asked what your opinion is) without feeling like they have pissed somebody off.

I try to always be honest with people, that is just part of who I am. But lately I feel like I have been trying to change who I am just to please other people. Am I the only one that doesn't think that is a good way to live?

Well, enough babbling for tonight.

Take Care and God Bless,

Bev