Doing some reading and thinking and feeling

Hi guys,
So this weenend my parents are up in Virginia for my Uncle's retirement from the Navy thus leaving myself and my two sisters to ourselves for the weekend.

We've had a good time, watching a movie or two, listening to loud music, sleeping in and just enjoying each other's company. Tonight I asked my sister if she would help me read one of the suggested readings on the resource list that is recommended during discernment. I am finding that maybe a little less than half of the suggested readings are available to me. Meaning that I'm able to access them online in a format that my talking software can read, or am able to get them in an audio format.

That has proved a bit frustrating to me. I've started reading just about everything I could get access to but haven't finished them. I'm not sure why, but there hasn't really been one that impacted me as much as the one I just had my sister read to me that talked about group spiritual discernment. It's not bad, I did find myself listening to things that would get me thinking about examples of things then I'd have to tune back in, apologize for my inattentiveness and ask her to repeat what she said. Needless to say, we got about 8 of 15 pages read and she was tired and my brain was quite full.

One of the more prominent things I got out of that was the discussion on time and how when it comes to discerning things of a spiritual nature, not rusthing is important. It's interesting that situations in my own life and that of my committee members kind of made us slow down. I will admit, I found this frustrationg at the time but now I'm greatful for the pace this process has gone so far.

I found this important becaus as of now, I am feeling a sense of time running out. There's the Commission and their plans for me and them taking their time in getting things set up, but then there is my concern that if I go through with the Commission's plans and my discernment committee says yes, I'm going to step out of the commission's plans and into the process that may lead to seminary.

I've been told that it's ok to do that if my discernment continues and I get to go forward and off to school. I really really do want to go forward in this process. I understand that I'm not supposed to 'convince' my committee of anything just be honest but I admit, it seems like it would be easier just to say what I need to in order to make this happen. Two problems with that though, one, I have no idea what those things would be. Two, that wouldn't be being honest with myself or the process and why even continue if I'm not going to be honest. So basically, I figure that's overall just not a good idea, so then how do I proceed?

Well, I figure I'm looking for experiences that help me to figure out this crazy thing that I'm trying to figure out. I've really enjoyed working with the folks at the food pantry and helping them get set up and I really enjoyed my interactions with the wonderful amazing people I met this summer, and I've even learned some things while going through this process of wrapping my heart around the idea of my grandmother not being here.

It's strange, I don't really feel as much pain as I thought I would a week after barrying her. Yes there is still 'something' that makes me want to tear up sometimes. What it is, I'm not able to figure out right now. I do feel like I need someone to sit down with me and ask questions that will help me to better understand my thoughts. Then I have this thought, maybe I'm not meant to understand, maybe I'm just meant to feel and nothing more.

It's funny, I think about all of those things, the grieving process, the interactions I've had, the people I've met the things I've done and I ask myself, "So, do all these things lead you to think you should be a Priest? Or should you consider something else?"

The only thing I can think of in response to that is "I want to use all of my experiences to be able to comfort those in need of comforting, share the things I've learned in my short life about God and how I relate to Him with those who are interested, and to share my love of people with those who just need to know someone loves them." Is that a 'good enough' answer? I have no idea. That's further than I was before... so I guess that's something.

I want you all to know that I appreciate your reading of this. For some reason, I tend to do better at this 'journal' thing when I know someone is interested in my thoughts and feelings. Call it what you will, frankly I can't think of a depricating thing to call it, so I'll just leave it at that.

I guess to put it in plain english. I Yearn to serve God's people. It's a feeling akin to the strong emotions I feel about my grandma having died. I don't understand it but when I think, talk or write about it, I get the feeling every time. It's a 'tug' or a lurch in my heart that is so strong I want to fall on the floor and sob.

Am I being stubborn in having a hard time considering other things. Am I not giving this process the open-mindedness it deserves. I don't know. I just feel like this is what I'm supposed to do. I guess I don't really understand how the ordaination aspect would change things. I guess I need to see it for myself. I'm going to chat with Fr. Rob tomorrow at church about when we can meet and mention (per Roy's advice) that I'm going to meet with my discernment committee before the end of September, probably in the last week, and I need to have seen what it's like to do what it is that he does. How this will work, I don't know. I'm hopeful though.

The one thing that has kept me going through all of the self-doubt and questioning of myself is that 'feeling' of this is good, this is right. I've Never ever gotten the thought to stop or to postpone, I actually have the feeling of 'why not now?' I'm told by people that this time in my life is a 'transition point'. That brings a lot of uncertainty, but for some reason the only certain thing I have right now is that this discernment process is an important thing for me to go through now.

Am I being too honest? I don't know, but I was told to be honest. If that hurts me in the end, then why say it if you don't want me to take you literally.

I don't know if this has made any sense but going back to my first point. The time at times can be a pain because I feel like I should be doing something, but not knowing what, I wait. Then the thought of time is daunting and if these things don't happen at the right time, I'm stuck. So basically the only thing I've realized is that I can't control time so I do what I feel is right at the time and hope and pray that things will turn out the way they are supposed to.

Much love to you all for listening to my ramblings :)
Nancy

The Show Must Go On

In a few words...
It has been a Long couple of days.

It feels like it's been a week but in reality it's only been a few days. It's harder to talk about an a little easier to write about, but I'm finding myself tearing up as I'm writing this.
In some ways, I kind of enjoyed the quiet after we burried grandma, but my dad refused to let that last more than about twenty-four yours.
A lot of family came over on Friday, but it just-so-happened to be my Uncle Mike- my mom's older brother- birthday on Friday.
Saturday morning we got up, got ready and got in the car. It's actually kinda funny, on the way there the song "puttin' on my boogie shoes' came on, and that made me think of how much fun grandma must be having up in heaven. That made me chuckle. But as we got closer and closer to the place where grandma was going to be burried, the more nervous I felt and the weight and pain in my chest got heavier and more pronounced. I was relieved that she was still in the herse when we got there, although due to having my sister and her stroller- off-road wheelchair, it's cool- we had to park behind it. I stayed relatively a good bit away from that.
We all got out of the car and were sorta mingling with people. I don't really remember who I talked to, it was kind of a blur, and I feel like a lot of it was spent in a fog. Then the guy in charge got all the folks carrying the casket- paul bearers, I don't know how to spell that- together. He had us stand out of the way then we as the family followed. As we walked under the tent, I tripped over something and fell into a chair. I learned later that it was a grave marker.
I moved a row forward and sat beside my sister.

I don't remember much from the sermon or whatever it was. The one thing I remember in the beginning was that he said that grandma had graduated and that graduation heralds good things afterward. That made sense to me.
Then the lady who takes care of Nikki- my twin- got up and sang. She had become good friends with my grandma over the years and she wanted to say something and then sing a song. It wasn't the song that my grandma wanted, but Vanessa didn't know that one and wanted to do a good job, so I was cool with it. Because that was kinda the thing I felt responsible for. My grandma had told me back when I was in the choir in high school, that that song was the one that she wanted.
So Vanessa sang. It wasn't until she got to the chorus and it kind of took on a soulful tone that I lost my control of myself. I had been crying but it was just tears running down my face, at that point I sobbed, and it set my sister to crying... I'm sure this is bad, but I kinda find that funny now... donno why, I'm just weird I guess.

Then the minister talked about how my grandma would walk to the church that he works for and she would refuse a ride, that's just how she was you know, independent.

Then I don't remember how it ended, but I stayed to watch them lower the casket, my sister and dad couldn't do that, so they left and my mom was still crying with my Uncle Mike and Aunt Sally. I have to say, my cousin's wives, Ashley and Miranda are great. (Hi Miranda and I'm not just saying that because you're reading this ;)) they came up to Chelsea0 my younger sister- and I, and gave us hugs and let us cry. That was awesome.

I needed to see it completed, so as the funeral folks were taking the drapes off of the chairs, I went up to one of them- found out it was the guy in charge- and got him to explain everything that was going on. It was really neat, evidently in this cemetary, they put the caskets in a concrete box and the lid lays on a sliding bar behind the casket during the service, then they lower the casket into the box, then slide the lid forward and seal it. Then they lower the box into the grave. Then I watched them take the mechanism apart. I would have stayed and watched as they covered the box with dirt, but my dad came and him and someone else wouldn't let me.

It some how made me feel better to see it completed. I also tossed one of the carnations that she had on her casket into the hole after they lowered it. I'm glad I stayed and watched.

Then afterwards, my family, my cousins, Scott and Andy with their wives Ashley and Miranda, my Uncle Mike and his wife Susan and my cousins Laura and Sara, and my Aunt Sally and Uncle Thurl (Andy and Scott's parents) all went out to eat. That was what grandma wanted us to do and frankly I'm glad we did. We had a lot of fun. There were 13 of us, but 12 that needed chairs because Nikki was still in her stroller, so some of us had to go to another table. Luckily it wasn't too far away. It was fun, I went over to the other table with Scott Andy Miranda and Ashley. We joked that we were sent to the kids table. But as the lunch progressed, it turned into a silly experience. My dad was shooting spitballs at my cousins and Scott was tossing little pieces of corn bread back at the other table, but hitting almost everyone else But my dad. Andy was laughing and couldn't figure out how they were shooting over my head and hitting him. My dad said it was because he has skills. Needless to say, it was fun.

After the day before with people at our house, I appreciated coming home and it being quiet. The funeral home had put signs in our yard that said 'slow down, funeral' on them. It was pretty cool, neighbors came and brought stuff, a lot of cake, white bread, and lunch meat. The sentiment was nice, although most of it went to feeding our family that came over on Friday.

Yesterday, Sunday, my dad put the pictures of grandma away. The had been on a table that we set up in our Living Room for the party on Friday and Uncle Mike brought all of these pictures. Frankly, it's been hard for me to look at pictures of grandma, and quite by accident I had to go hang up the clothes that the funeral home didn't use and in her closet, I found her favorite pink fluffy sweater and accidentally touched it. That still makes me really sad to remember what it felt like, and I'm kinda glad that my Aunt Sally took all of grandma's clothes with her yesterday. Smelling grandma was hard.

So my dad took down the piectures and unfortunately that was while mom was out. She came home to find them all in the storage bin they came in. She got upset and is still kinda mad at my dad about that.

It's interesting, some people find comfort in looking at pictures and can't bear to see them go, but I can't stand to look at them, it hurts too much. Although Ashley and Scott brought us pictures that they took of grandma with their son Cowen a few weeks ago. I got the one where she was smiling and looking lovingly and Cowen and Scott, all the others made me too sad.

The other thing is that grandma's room had once been Chelsea's room then she moved into mine when grandma came then she got her own room when we turned our front pourch into a room for her about a year ago. So my mom said that she wanted me to move into the room that grandma used to be in. At first I didn't want to, but my mom kept saying how grandma never wanted to push us out of our rooms. I agreed to move, but I didn't want anything in my room that belonged to grandma, it hurts too much. I know that hurt my mom's feelings and I apologized but that's just the way I feel. Maybe it'll be different later. I just kinda need a break and get used to the idea of her not being here.

So last night, I was feeling restless and took apart grandma's bed and put it on the back pourch and it's going to go to one of Andy's kids because she said the other day that she wanted a bed like that someday. So I took it apart and put the bolts and washers into a bag so the bed can be put back together.

Then today my dad and I went and got paint. It's a green color, I like it. I didn't want to keep the carpet that had been in there, so we took that up too. We got the room painted today and I'm going to mop the floor in the morning.

My dad and I also went and got me a bed. I've been sleeping on a 'built in' bed in the room I'm in now. So we went everywhere today and finally we got one. It's pretty cool. It's used and really nice wood, so we're going to sand it and paint it tomorrow.

So this whole 'moving on' thing is hard but helpful at the same time. I don't want to be disloyal by forgetting her and moving on without her, but I'm beginning to figure out that I'm not forgetting her, I'm carrying her memory and lessons with me and she wouldn't want me to be sad and not enjoy my life. I know she was proud of me and I really miss her a lot, but the pain isn't nearly as bad as it was Saturday morning.

It's going to be a while but I know I'll be ok with it eventually. But I give myself- and others- a break by saying 'it's ok to not be ok, because we'll always miss them but know that they're always with us'.

Praying has taken on a level of oddness though. I never knew anyone in Heaven before and now that I know that someone's up there, talking to God is a strange experience now. I didn't go to Church yesterday. I kinda wanted to spend more 'quiet time' with my family. I think I'll be ready to go next Sunday. I'm not going to go to the food pantry in the morning because we're going to work on my room some more.

I thought it was really nice that Father Rob from St. Matthews sent me a Facebook message saying that Doc and I were missed yesterday. I appreciate that, and I know the folks at Our Saviour were praying for us too.

Thank you everyone.

Think I'll go see what my sister's up to, and since I'm getting sleepy, I'll probably go to sleep, just hope it's earlier than 4 in the morning.

Feel free to leave comments.

Nancy
PS: The pic is of my room so far

Clearin' out my head

Hi guys,
So where to start... news first, then purpose and whatnot later...

On Wednesday night about 11PM, my grandma passed away.
The family didn't find out (at least my immediate family) until about 12:30. The hospital called my aunt and told her, she thought it was a joke (they had woken her from a dead sleep) so she went back to bed. I don't know what woke her, maybe the hospital called her back but she called my mom histerical and told her.
We had been having a good night, we decided to watch a movie and take a break, grandma was supposed to be moved out of ICU and we made plans that when my mom was going to take me to meet with my perspective spiritual director, she was going to take some things to the hospital.
Well, my parents went to the hospital and didn't get back until about 4 or so in the morning and I of course was still awake. They told us a little bit about how she looked and such and then we all crashed. But before we went to bed, my mom told me that she still wanted me to go see my spiritual director. I admit, I appreciated that sense of it felt like the world was on pause but it was ok for me to do what I felt I needed to.

So I dragged or maybe drag/hopped myself out of bed at 9 that morning and got ready to go meet with Roy Cole. He's a retired priest who's been a priest since 1974 and served 10 parishes (churches) in 3 different Dioceses. He was a really nice guy and a lot of fun to talk to. When I sort of off-hand mentioned what had happened the night before he dropped his pen and looked at me and said, "why are you even here right now?" My response was "I'm supposed to be here, I need to be here." By 'supposed to' I don't mean because my Discernment Committee wants me to have a spiritual director, I've been wondering about a lot of things for quite a while and I knew that this would be an experience that would hopefully help me to engage those questions and hopefully begin to figure out the answers. Although, it's funny, some questions wound up causing more questions than answers.

That conversation was everything I was hoping for and more! I literally just shook this man's hand and was learning about who he was and telling him things about myself that I don't share with anybody. Although, I am more open than most people. In-fact, he said, and I'm not surprised by this, that my having the vision impairment that I have has made me to be more open to possibilities and thoughts and experiences than most people. I'm not surprised by those words but I feel awkward saying them, almost as if in some way I'm 'better' than everyone else, I'm Not. All I know about myself is that I don't meet strangers, most conversations can start out about simple things and can turn into amazing conversations. Evidently I have the ability to get people to open up and tell me things that I never expected to hear. I don't know why I get people to do it, but I can.
We talked a little bit about my not feeling qualified to tell anybody anything about God, I guess I had it in my head that you have to have read the bible first. He said that it's more about sharing my story. he said, "You've got a story don't you?... then you're qualified."
In the end, Roy changed from a perspective Spiritual Director to agreeing to be my spiritual director. We're going to meet once a month and I'm going to email him regularly with questions or thoughts on things in the meantimes. I like that idea. It's comforting to have someone that is a person I can turn to for things. It's not like nobody said that I couldn't talk to them, it was more about my having some sort of hang up. I'm not sure what that was all about but I'll admit I've felt a little lost so far in this process. I get the jist of what's going on but dealing with the self-doubt and second-guessing myself was something hard to deal with.
It's also kinda interesting that we talked about how in Pastorial Counseling one of the more-often things discussed is grief during a loss. And since this is my first closely related death that impacts me personally, he's also kind of using it as a teaching tool, or maybe just something to be thinking about. He just encouraged me to pay attention to what's going on as best I can. Keeping in mind how I feel, how I deal with things and how others deal with things. Interestingly, I'm noticing things like when people are arguing about things that really aren't important like where to put the table so we can put grandma's pictures on it, I realized that each person involved in the argument is hurting and things can sometimes come out in weird ways. It's also amazing to see how a family member who's kind of pushed everyone out of their life seems to be bringing themselves closer to the family too. I thought it was a great thing for me to be able to express to the other family members how much this person loved my grandma and how they miss her just-as-much as everyone else does. I'm hoping and praying that this experience can draw the family closer to this person because people have been hurt on both sides and we all need to band together now because we only have each other to depend on.

So I originally started writing at 3 o'clock in the morning because I had a lot on my mind and a certain way I thought this was going to go. I'm sleepy now and I don't really remember what that way was but I'm ok with the way this turned out.

My mom explained to my sister and I what happens at the funeral this morning. I've come to realize that I'm a private person with this grieving thing, but I don't know what's going to happen and at this point I realized that we're all going to be grieving and nobody will be upset with me if I get emotional in public or not. I'm my own person and griev in my own way. It's like what I told my sister, "it's ok to not be ok."

8 or 8:30 comes soon so I'm going to crash. PS: I fixed the problem with not being able to make comments, it was set to subscribers only. Who knew...
Good night all.
Nancy

Needed time to gather my thoughs

So, after I got home from the hospital yesterday, I didn't know what to think, so I decided to give myself some time to think about what it was that I saw.

I had never been to ICU and admit myself very unprepared for what I saw. It was a bit disturbing that since my grandma had a tube in her nose, her mouth was open and she appeared to be breathing rather hard. It was also very disturbing that she had large amounts of flem in her mouth and it seemed like it took forever to get someone to get a sucksion tube to remove it.

It was sad... really sad. I think the thing that got me was the lack of coherency that I noticed in her. She wasn't really aware of much. She wasn't able to open her eyes much and had these pillow-like gloves on so that she couldn't remove the tubes and whatever she had on her body.

I guess that made me think about what it was like for me wearing gloves and how uncomfortable it makes me, I feel like I lose touch with the world and kind of feel lost. I can't imagine not understanding what's going on, barely being able to see, not being able to feel anything, not even being able to scratch your nose, and only knowing that you are in pain. I think that was the part that got me the most.

At one point I could hear her breathing as if she was panicked. That made me nervous and I had to comfort her, so I moved between her and my sister who was just sort of standing there and I put my hand on her arm and was rubbing it and for some reason, that helped. I wasn't so afraid to touch her anymore. So when I noticed her breathing start to calm a little I moved my hand to her forehead and began to just talk to her. I don't remember what I said but I knew that she was responding to my touch and my voice so I continued until it got awkward. I'm not sure why I felt like it got awkward but there were about seven people counting me in the room and they were all just sort of standing around.

My mom got them to get her a cup of ice chips and she gave her some, then my aunt proceeded to do so. At one point, I believe she gave her too many or something because she started to choke. I admit, I panicked, I stepped back and my only thought was 'I don't want to be in the way.' Well I don't really remember looking specifically looking at anything but I found that looking at the monitor made me more nervous than anything I had seen before. There are three lines on it, the one in the middle was all over the place, and at one point, the one at the top went flat for a second. My sister said that it occured when she coughed.

I think if I had more knowledge of what those scary-looking lines meant I would maybe have not been so nervous, but I think the thing that I wish the most that had happened was someone explaining to me what I would see. It was dark in there and felt very lonely.

I think another hard part about this situation is the fact that my mom consented to a DNR. The doctors said that she may not survive being revived. Evidently she had been revived the last time she was in the hospital. That made my grandmother angry, she didn't want to come back. Evidently she's been calling family out of town and telling them how much she wants to die.

I'm finding that my mom will ask me rhetorical questions like 'how could someone want to die, I just don't get it' and I've realized that it's ok that I can't answer that question, she's just needing to express her feelings.

I was going to try to work on my spiritual autobiography for my meeting with a spiritual director tomorrow, but I just can't right now. I hope I don't need it and that once I explain what's going on, he'll understand.

I'm finding that I'm finding ways to get away from it all. It was kind of nice when everyone was gone, I blared my music really loud and danced around, that was fun. Then I wore myself out by trying to play drums on the level of Hard. Exhaustion is kinda nice, you don't lie there thinking while you go to sleep. I just crash.

Apparently, grandma is being moved from ICU. I was told that this happens because of the DNR and I guess they're just going to make her comfortable. There's a lot I don't understand so I work with what I got and hope for the best. Prayers are appreciated and welcome, and a call every now and then is appreciated too.

Speaking of which, I'm going to go to bed. Meeting at 10 in the morning, I'm looking forward to it.

Night all

a long post, just so you know

This post is going to pretain to what's going on in my life right now, but I must give a bit of context first.

My grandmother was living by herself for most of my life until about two years ago. She spent time in the hospital then had to move into my parent's house. She's been living with us ever since. I've been in school for the last few years so I didn't really know what it was like living with her. When she first moved in, she told me that if she had a gun she would have killed herself. I sat with her a few times and wept beside her as she cried that she wanted to go to heaven to be with her family that she missed.

Two years later, she may very well get her wish.

She's been not feeling well for about a week from last wednesday or so. It seemed like it got worse Friday evening when we were all at dinner and my mom was trying to get her to eat something. She ate a bite, maybe two then said, "Stop pushing, I just want to go".

Things had been getting bad and my parents decided that the time was nearing that she may need to go to the hospital. Well, Sunday evening about 11:30 or so, after I helped her eat a few bites of an omlet for dinner, she must've passed out. My sister heard her moaning and got my parents. My dad called 911 and they showed up. First it was a fire truck looking thing, then a few minutes later the ambulance showed up.

They took her, she had a feaver and was moaning in pain a lot. She cried out when they transferred her to the stretcher. My parents were running around getting dressed, getting all her meds, and making sure she had all her insurance papers.

My parents got back at 7 the next morning. I didn't sleep well, I was kind of on alert all night long.

The reason I'm writing this right now is because at 7:30, my mom sister and I are going to the ICU to see my grandma. I've never been to the ICU before, not even with Nikki, maybe she was on ICU, I don't remember.

I've been doing a lot of thinking since sunday night. I feel like I've made my peace with her, I know she knows I love her, and in some ways, I'm ok with the possibility of her passing on. The part I'm having a problem with now is that when I get in that room, I don't know how I'll feel. Will I be upset, will I cry? I don't know.

I don't want to. I don't want my possibly last memory of her to be my bawling my eyes out in her hospital room. I'm very unprepared for this, but ready or not, I've been asked to go.

On another note, I worked at the food pantry today and had a great time! I enjoy helping. I can visibly see that this is helping people because when I come back the next week, the shelves are empty.

I've got a meeting scheduled with a Spiritual Director on Thursday morning. I still want to meet with him. He said that he may not be able to devote time to me because I'm in the Discernment process, but he said we will see. Frankly, I'm just looking forward to the conversation. We've exchanged e-mails while setting this appointment up and he seems as excited as I am.

Back to grandma for a moment- The doctor said that it could get worse before it gets better. It has gotten worse, she has a bad infection, her heart beats are fluctuating a lot and some other bad things that I can't remember. I kinda feel like it's going in one ear and out the other. I am appreciating that I kinda have a role, I'm there listening to my mom. The good thing though, is that my dad has been talking to me alot, so I'm not carrying this alone. It's weird though, I don't feel crushed by this.

Now if she dies, I don't know, but for now I'm ok, just a little nervous.

I think that if my grandma wants to go, sure I'll miss her, but at least she will be happy.

I'll post later this evening.
By everyone
Nancy