I say yes, you say no, OR People are Strange

Bren-2007

Barbara .. you and hubby look so great together!  Beautiful sunset.  Glad the cruise was fun ... too bad the food wasn't the greatest, but the ambience was perfect! 

Blue .. your baby boy is adorable.  I can't believe how much he's grown.  I remember when his mama was pregnant!  Where does the time go???  You're lookin' good too .. your hair is growing out so fast.  How are you feeling?  Is the arm any better?  Is Virgil getting better or did he have to go back to the vets?

SusieQ .. your new little grandbaby is beautiful.  I love the way newborn babies smell .. so fresh and clean.  Hope you get to see him soon.

Sandy .. you lasted longer than I did on the AI's.  I lasted one week on Arimidex and 6 weeks on Tamoxifen.  The SE's of nausea of vertigo were just more than I could handle.  I was constantly dizzy and sick to my stomach.

love to all,

Bren

Bren-2007

Rosemary .. congrats again on your anniversary.  How was the party?  Did the kids clean up?

hugs,

Bren

BarbaraA

Thanks Bren. We had fun despite the inedible(for me) food. I am picky since I can cook and have trained DH.



Tonight is hormone free hamburgers with salad and spinach. Yum!

bluedahlia

Today, it was all about cleaning. Too bad it doesn't last long with Virgil The Shedding Dog. 

Sue, grandchildren are the best gift in the world.  August can't come soon enough I bet!!

Barb, so glad I'm not the only picky eater when we go out.  Glad you had a good time.

Bren, that's an older picture of us, pre-surgery, when I was a skinny minny.  Found a few more things in my closet I never wore but won't be able to fit into anytime soon. Virgil seems to be doing better, and my fingers are crossed, otherwise it will cost us $2,000.  He won't keep the wrap on the little stinker, but seems to be putting some weight on his leg.

BarbaraA

Blue, prayers going up for Virgil. Fur kids are our new kids.

bluedahlia

Thank you Barb.

Lilah got groomed today......

rosemary-b

Oh Blue so cute, the gradnson and the dog and Suzie what a cutie.

The party was great but the set up by three sons and a son in law was a goat rodeo. Hal and I went out to "get Sterno" and we stopped and had lunch at Wendy's The party was at 3:00 so we felt lunch was justified along with a long drive, to let them set up on their own. 

The kids invited some people we hadn't seen in a long time and it was good to see them. Hal's 85 year old mom was here along with some of his brothers and sisters. They all live 4 hours away.

Then my oldest grandchild slid into a chair and smashed her nose. Dr tomorrow if it still looks bad.I really hope it is okay. We already have a 2 yr old grandson with a broken leg. This summer is not starting out well for the babies.

But they had to go home with their parents. I love being a grandmother. It really was a good party

suzieq60

Our daughter thinks she might be pregnant - sore boobs - so we might be double grandparents before long - eeek!!! I'm too young

BarbaraA

Rosemary, so glad the party was great! AND you didn't have to do anything!

Suz, how wonderful. Congrats!

Today DH's band is playing at Jimmy B's beach bar. Should be a fun afternoon/evening. Then after that....a big fat grouper sandwich at Dockside Dave's along with waffle fries. YUM! Gotta cheat sometimes.

otter

I wish the Mods would hurry up and install that "Like" button.  A grouper sandwich?  Yum is right!!!

otter

1Athena1

Heelo, thread friends, 

Congratulations everyone - lots of milestones/anniversaries/births to celebrate here. Barbara - lovely picture of you and your husband. 

E - I miss KK so much. Life is so unfair.  

BarbaraA

{{ATHENA}} missed you! ((ELIZABETH)) missing you tons!

bluedahlia

Athena, glad to see you posting.  I'm so worried about KK.  Been thinking about her lots and missing her.

Alpal

I adore grouper. Then had to read an article about "grouper poisoning". Long time ago, so I hope that's no longer a problem.

Rosemary - glad the party was fun for you. "Goat rodeo" ? Bwahaha!

Missing our dear KK.

1Athena1

Deleted, as the post was read and discussed and it was a thorny subject.

AnnNYC

Athena, I do think this is a sensitive subject, so I'll try not to say much.  But my dear uncle lost his dear wife (my beautiful aunt) when she died of lupus at age 54.  In their case, the death was sudden and unexpected.  Their four children were all young adults between 18 and 30 at the time, I believe.  My wonderful, devoted uncle remarried within the year, probably becoming engaged about 6 months after my aunt's death, to a recently widowed woman -- both families had been friends, and they lived in a small farming town, in an area that had only small farming towns for hundreds of miles.  This was 23 years ago, and all (including my cousins and their children) have been very happy.  My uncle wrote us, especially my Dad (his first wife was my Dad's sister) to tell of his plans to remarry, to hope we would bless the union, to say that he felt his deep love for Aunt Joan and their very happy 30-year marriage was the bedrock for this new union.  I agree.

People who have been deeply, happily married often find a new partner sooner than those who were less happily married.  There are very strong cultural differences between groups, too, in how mourning is handled -- for instance, a group with very intense, deep, profound mourning rituals is a community that then also encourages the bereaved to rejoin "life" when the ritual (yet deeply personal and emotional) period of mourning is completed (in the case of Judaism, the funeral and burial are within 24 hours, the bereaved family spends the next 7 days at home in intense mourning, and the bereaved spouse continues a ritual mourning through 30 days after the death). And it is in fact culturally considered essential, a blessing, a mitzvah if you will, that the bereaved find a new spouse, especially if the bereaved is young, with young children.  And in such a culture, if a wife knew that she (or a husband knew that he) was dying, that spouse would encourage their spouse to make a new connection after their passing, and would really, really mean it. 

Alpal

I, also, will not say much. Frankly, I don't feel comfortable commenting. Speaking as a Stage IV, I don't think our loved ones start grieving when we die. IMHO, their grieving starts when we're given the diagnosis. I think that puts a different time frame on things.

crazy4carrots

Speaking as a person who will celebrate 41 years of marriage next month, I can honestly, truly say that if I pass before my DH, I would want him to find someone to share his life as soon as possible.   I know how much he loves me and how much he would "hurt", and I don't want him to suffer.  I venture to say that the majority of those who are lucky enough to experience deep love would feel the same way.  Of course, the saying "Marry in haste, repent at leisure" has some validity.  But staying single as a sign of obvious mourning for the sake of "propriety" is utter nonsense.

I agree with Ann:  it's been said that those who had a wonderful, loving marriage/partnership are more eager to remarry.  I think it's a tribute to the departed spouse.  Those whose marriages were not so happy are more reluctant to try it again.... 

1Athena1

Interesting to hear your points of view as happily married women - thank you for enlightening me. I don't have the benefit of that vantage point. Alpal - it is certainly true that the grief probably begins at Stage IV diagnosis. I am not married, but I can understand wanting people I love to prosper and be happy with or without me. If I had a husband, it would break my heart to leave him.

In this vein, one of the most touching things I have ever heard was, of all things, in a sitcom, when the husband tells the wife (it could easily have been the other way around) that he he hopes SHE dies first so that she will not have to go through the trial of suffering HIS death. I think that would be the nicest thing a man could say to me if I were married (that and "can I see some ID" when I buy alcohol - lol).

1Athena1

Back to our regular programming (and I apologize for the thorny message), I am so glad that our heat wave is over here in DC! At least for now. 

rosemary-b

This post seems to have taken on a life of its own as I wrote it. I will probably only leave it up a little while. Read on but be warned. It is the first post I have written that has made me cry.

Well Athena

I did not see your OP and hope you are not offended if I continue the discussion but I must say my DH and I tell each other all the time"I have to die first" because we can understand in a fuzzy way how terrible the grief will be when the other one dies. As for remarriage, I don't know how I will feel if he dies first but it has taken me 40 years to break in one man and I still have work to do. Why would I take on another one this late in life?

Seriously, it takes time to adjust to anyone, I don't know if I'll have the time or energy. 

I know this will be very difficult for most of you to understand but my DH is a Permanent Deacon in the Caholic Church and cannot remarry after I die.

My dianoses is Stage I but I have had 3 or 4 life threatening illnesses after dianosis and we do talk about mortality. He is very uncomfortable with it but sometimes that stuff just spills out of me. I try to save it for other people because it just makes him so sad.

1Athena1

Rosemary, I feel for you and it was partly sentiments like those which informed my own words.

Edited out the rest. Too personal.

Early stage cancer is like crossing the Mafia and getting away with it. You live, but must forever glance over your shoulder.
Diagnosis: 3/2009, IDC, 3cm, Stage IIb, Grade 3, 3/8 nodes, ER+/PR+, HER2-

bluedahlia

Well, Ray is so much younger than I am and I have tried to discuss this with him, having gone through major surgery and two cancer diagnoses.  All he has ever said to me is he is coming with me.  I really would want him to move on with his life, but he is so attached to me, I worry about him in that regard.

208sandy

My dh passed away in November of '09 just after I finished the "year and a half from hell" - he had his own version going on simultaneously and the conversations we had (155 days in the hospital off and on all year for him) in the hospital consisted of sadness that one of us would be left without the other, we were married for 36 years and we were the lucky ones I don't know what life will bring me but I certainly wouldn't be entertaining even going out for dinner with someone even now - I keep hearing that men are different but maybe it's circumstances that are different.

Sandy

1Athena1

Sandy - I'm so sorry to hear about your husband. My mother was only 54 when my father died and she said the same thing you are saying. Perhaps men are different? My grandparents had friends who were married for more than 50 years. She died. He remarried six months later. His children were absolutely FURIOUS and almost cut him off. I think family is the most hurt. His defense -and I find merit to it- is that he was old and didn't have time to wait. I think, also, partly his children were furious because of his extraordinary wealth and the suspicions they had about his second wife's intentions.

crazy4carrots

"Perhaps men are different"?  Yes, I think that the majority of men over the age of, let's say 60, are different.  They don't know how to live alone.  They don't know how to cook, keep the house neat (or maybe not even care whether or not it is neat!), do the laundry, make grocery shopping lists etc. etc.  They probably are not the ones who make social engagements, and they stop getting invited to married friends' homes unless it is a matchmaking event!  And remember, there are twice as many widows as widowers.

DH and I say we want to leave this world together (maybe that's why plane trips aren't quite as scary as they used to be.....) 

1Athena1

Lol!!

rosemary-b

Athena

I sometimes feel like I won the lottery (and sometimes wonder what I was thinking when I made this commitment). We did everything wrong. I was 19, he was 22, we dated for 8 months and we married the day after he graduated from the Coast Guard Academy. I think we are both just too stubborn to let this thing die. And now he is a part of me and I know I could go on without him but much diminished.

Bren-2007

I know what you mean Rosemary ... I feel like I finally hit the lottery at 48 when I met Tim. 

Hope everyone is having a good day,

Bren

1Athena1

Bren, nice to "see" you.