Update

I'm not doing so well as a Blogger....it's a lot like my Twitter account - I tweet but I'm not sure anyone reads what I tweet.  The Blog thing is just something I haven't embraced.  Perhaps it's because I'm not sure I have anything anyone really wants to read.

My dad is now 73 and he continues to have problems with reading and writing.  We just keep getting conflicting information.  We had been told by the doctor in Tampa that he had a stroke.  We followed up recently with a doctor in Indianapolis (a neuro-ophthalmologist).  At first she concurred with the Tampa doctor that he's had a stroke, but if that were the case, he should be improving and he's not.  She had another PET CT scan done and now she says there is no indication on there that he has had a stroke.  She had diagnosed him with PPA - a rare form of dementia called Primary Progressive Aphasia.  For my dad, his symptoms are basically problems with letter recognition, writing, and reading aloud.  No big deal, right?  Not for most of us, but for my dad, who happens to be a college professor AND a successful textbook author?  It's a big deal.  It's a HUGE deal!  It's probably the most cruel thing that could have happened to him.  So now what?

He finally has an appointment scheduled at Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville in October.  I pray that they can determine what's wrong with him.  If it truly is PPA, they have programs and studies dealing specifically with PPA.  My hope is that we can get both of my parents into some sort of PPA management and care program for when they are down south during the winter months.  From what I have read so far, this disease will progress and he will get worse.  How much worse, we don't know.  

For the time being, my goal was to get him writing again, and that's happening.  He's not able to write as he did in the past - he can't just sit down at the computer and write - but with my mom's and my help, he's writing.  Right now we're working on several cases to submit for publication.  He tells me what to write and I type it in.  In some cases, he's been able to sit down and type, but he often has to stop and ask my mom how to spell a word and sometimes he can't remember which letter he's supposed to hit on the keyboard, but we're learning to be patient.  

He is going to be teaching a class again this Fall - it's on-line, so there's not the issue of his being unable to read something to the class.  However, it will mean a lot of interaction on-line and I'm guessing that will require my assistance.

And that brings us to me....school started this week and for the second year in a row, I didn't go.  It was easier this year than last.  Last year was really raw.  This year, not so much.  Now, though, it's pretty clear that I need to find a job and quickly.  But what to do?  I had found several opportunities that seemed intriguing, but they were out of town.  With my dad's problems, moving is out of the question.  There are some who don't approve, but I can't abandon my parents.  My mom doesn't touch the computer, my siblings are out of town, and there's no one else who can be at my dad's beck and call to help him with computer/writing issues.  Sure, he can call a repairman to get the printer working, but a repairman isn't going to send an email with an attachment for him.  So....if it's to be, it's up to me.

Introduction

     I am 50 years old.  I have never been married.  I spent 25 years as a high school teacher but have been on a medical leave for the past year.  I have a younger brother and younger sister, both of whom are married.  I am the only one who lives in the same town as our parents.  My sister and her family live three hours away while my brother and sister-in-law live a thousand miles away.  My mom is 74 and my dad is 72.  Comparatively, they are still pretty young.  Both of them have longevity in their family history, so it's not unreasonable to expect them to have at least 15 years left.  My parents spend the winter months at our beach home in south Georgia.
     My mom is a breast cancer survivor of nearly 24 years.  She is an insulin dependent diabetic.  She is obese and get little physical activity. She does play golf several times a week, but she drives a cart.  She suffers from lymphedema and venous insufficiency in her lower legs.  They look awful!  The skin is severely discolored and thin.  Her lower legs are very misshapen.  She also has knee and hip problems and struggles to walk properly.  She would prefer to "waddle" instead of getting her knees replaced.  She has a recumbent bike in her kitchen but doesn't ride it regularly.  She claims she does, but it's not even plugged in.  She is almost always sitting down watching TV and working on her counted cross-stitch.
  My dad has had heart problems since he was in his mid-20's.  We had been told he had a heart attack at age 27, but we've since learned that wasn't the case.  At age 40 he collapsed while teaching and we discovered he had a problem that required him to get a pacemaker.  He's had it replaced several times.  One year ago (last March), he had a heart attack, which led to a triple bypass.  He appears to have fully recovered from that.  The more disconcerting problem, is his memory.  He has been having problems for over a year, now.  In January 2012, he admitted he was struggling to remember what specific letters looked like and how to spell certain words.  I got him to agree to get help and my mom tried to get him into Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville, FL.  Because they couldn't get in right away, she gave up and that was it.  My dad has continued to struggle - mostly with words, letters, and symbols - and finally this past fall, his neurologist sent him to a neuro-psychologist.  The test results weren't good but instead of following through, the ball was dropped.  There was an opportunity to see a doctor in Indianapolis but the appointment they had available conflicted with a presentation of an award to my dad, so instead of asking if the presentation could be done some other time, they didn't make the appointment.  Yes, the award was great, but this is his life!
  My mom has supposedly been trying to get my dad into Mayo's now for this winter but once again, it's not been possible.  I just keep hearing from people that it should be no problem to get an appointment and that he doesn't need any referrals from doctors, yet we can't get him in.  Finally my brother stepped up and was able to get our dad into a neurologist in Tampa.  My parents drove to Tampa on Sunday and my dad met with a neurologist.  He had blood work and additional memory tests today and tomorrow he will have an EEG.  They have a follow-up with the neurologist on Friday.  We are praying we have some answers.  However, I'm not sure if we're ready for what those answers might be...
  My dad's mother and aunt both had Alzheimer's.  We are very concerned that he has it and his fear is making him difficult to live with.  Whatever the outcome on Friday, I would love for my dad to get counseling in order to deal with whatever this is.  I am concerned for my mom as she often bears the brunt of his hostility.  He is verbally abusive to her, even though he says he adores her.
  As I am the only one who lives close to my parents, I am feeling the pressure of bearing the burden of dealing with them.  Added to that, my sister and brother haven't spoken to each other in over a year - making me have to be in the middle.  I need for them to resolve their conflict (or at least agree to disagree) in order for us to be able to help our parents.  

Fifty-one weeks to go

So in a little less than 51 weeks I will be fifty years old.  Will I be fit and fabulous or fat and flabby???  I've got a decision to make.

Happy Birthday to me!

So I just celebrated my 49th birthday.  All in all, it was a great day!  For Labor Day weekend, it wasn't the greatest weather, but that was all right.  I went to church and then to my parents' house.  My sister, niece and nephew were visiting and we'd planned a birthday dinner.  I had asked if I could invite two friends to join us, and both of them did.  It was a lovely afternoon with family and good friends.  We took the kids shopping for shoes, came home and had leftovers for dinner, then went to see a movie, "The Help".  It is an amazing story of racial inequality in the 1950's.  We went back to my parents' home and had a fireworks show.  We had more cake and ice cream and then I came home.  I received many good wishes thanks to Facebook and then checked my school email.  I got an email from my "sister", Brigitte and the news wasn't good.  My friend and "big brother" is struggling with his chemo treatments and now the disease has impacted his liver.  I need to take the time to tell him what he means to me before I no longer have that opportunity....

A new direction

Tomorrow is my 49th birthday. Or, as I'm thinking of it, the start of my fiftieth year. This past year, OK, really these past two years, have been up and down. I had decided four years ago that I wanted to be in great shape by the time I reached 50. I took some steps towards that goal and in fact, was in the best physical shape I'd been in a really long time -perhaps ever! My health was also great. But then, and I'm not sure what happened for sure, I did a 180. So as I look ahead 366 days (2012 is a leap year), I'm trying to visualize what I will look like. Do I continue the downward spiral or do I turn back and go back to where I was even two years ago?????? Fat at fifty or fit at fifty????? Which do I want? I'm the only one who can decide.

A lot has happened in the past year. I've moved schools, I've moved homes, I was diagnosed as being in the initial stages of uterine cancer (leading to major surgery), and I've had a student teacher in my classroom for the past four months! I've been out of my classroom more than I've been in it - not ideal, but necessary. As of today, though, I am back in charge of my classroom and am trying to get the students back on track - no easy task!

The best part of being out of my classroom for so long....sometimes I've wondered if teaching is really what I'm supposed to do with my life but I've come to realize how much I love teaching and I hated being out of my classroom and away from my students for so long! What a blessing!

Lemonade Stand - 1

Tomorrow is our lemonade stand day - yikes! My third period class has come along and gotten a little more involved. They came up with the idea of selling T-shirts and decorating the lobby of the school. We didn't sell the Tees to make money -just to have some fun way of identifying ourselve and a way to have a long-term reminder of our project. I came up with the basic design, based on the Alex Tees, and one of the girls tweaked it using PhotoShop. Wow! She is soooo creative! I think they turned out great! The shirts are yellow and we created an iron-on transfer design for the front. Some of the students stayed later to decorate their shirts with puffy paint - three of them wrote: My 4-20 plans are better than yours! I'm raising money to find a cure for cancer! How refreshing to see students take a stand to make a difference!

We have spent this past week baking in the Foods Lab. I got some great photos of the students working together. Today the students were all supposed to be job shadowing somewhere, but 24 of them came to school to finalize preparations. No, we didn't go anywhere and learn about what someone does while they're at work, but they learned about how to start up a business and what all goes into preparing for opening day! We messed up the printing of the transfers and ruined half a dozen of them, so we talked about how that impacts cost. The same for some of the cookies that didn't quite turn out like we had hoped.

I'm watching the news and it is supposed to be 70 and sunny! Yay!

Today I could see some of the kids really taking ownership of this project and that's cool. I know that the evening paper is sending someone to take photos tomorrow. I'm hoping that the TV media will take some video - they will be here to cover the track meet, so hopefully they will do both!

On a different note....I announced to my colleagues that I am leaving to move to another school next year. I am very excited and nervous at the same time. This move will allow me to teach only French in a 9-12 building instead of a 7-12 building. The new school is much closer to my home, which means I will spend 15 minutes getting to school instead of 30. I will put 8.5 miles on my car instead of 19. As gas prices only go higher, my transportation costs will go lower and I am looking forward to that. It was a very difficut decision for me to make, but I believe it is the right one in the long run.